Travel changes you

"Some recipes carry you farther than a flight ever could – not just to new places, but to new ways of seeing." Itamar Srulovich/The Guardian

It's winter in Australia - except in the far north where it's tropical, but that too brings it's problems. Extreme heat or extreme wet. And so, at this time of year, a large portion of Australia's population at least the wealthier ones, are not here - they are travelling elsewhere. My book groups are always down on numbers at this time of year - one year there were only two of us - this year three this month, and so we are going out to lunch instead of reading a book. Indeed as I write this post two emails have come in informing me of such travels, with apologies for missing this and that.

So when I opened up this week's Guardian Feast Newsletter from Itamar Srulovich and read his eloquent words about how travel changes you I decided to follow his lead. Maybe it's the sunshine today that brings a little optimism into the mind. Encourages me to dream.

So why the tomato salad at the top of the page? A simple, unadorned tomato salad, dressed with just olive oil and salt - maybe a touch of garlic and basil, maybe a touch of wine vinegar, and most importantly superb tomatoes that I sometimes think you can only get in Europe. It changed my eating and cooking world, is why. I have spoken of it many times I know but here I go again. Hopefully with a few additions.

When I was just twelve, maybe thirteen years old I went on that first exchange holiday trip to France. I had never been abroad before. So acquiring a passport and stepping off the ferry at Calais, to a whole new and virtually incomprehensible world which smelt different, looked different and where people were talking in a language I really did not know very well, was pretty mind-blowing in itself. And then having been met by Simone's parents, installed in a Paris hotel with a bidet - what on earth was that? - was it a new kind of toilet? - I was then taken to dine in that glorious Paris bistro where massive plates of choucroute were being carried high over the waiters' heads and I was served salade de tomates - looking much like the platter at the top of the page, although with more tomatoes. It was - yes - life changing. It wasn't just that it was an amazing new taste, it was an introduction to a completely different way of eating, a completely different way of life and a completely different landscape. I became a Francophile, indeed I would say that France is my third home.

Feast, is, of course, a newsletter about food, and so Itamar Srulovich's focus was on food. But of course other things connected to overseas travel change one's life. I suppose the supreme example of that in my life is our arrival in Australia way, way back in 1969. Over many years we have changed as people, sometimes in ways we would have done anyway - parenthood, career, responsibility and all of that. But in others we have perhaps become more Australian than British - although one always carries one first home within - for good or ill.

Here we have adopted the generally more relaxed attitude to life of the Australians, and their various cultural mores have played their part, as has the better climate, but it is indeed surprising how food also plays a major part - a love of wine, the barbecue, the gatherings in the parks, new foods - mangos, pumpkin - you can laugh but it was unknown to me when I first arrived, a whole different tradition at Christmas ... So many unexpected things. I still remember looking out of that aeroplane window on the flight from Sydney and Melbourne, and seeing below almost nothing but green hills - even snow - for we arrived in June. Somehow or other I had not expected green hills, which is astonishing as I had studied Australia at school for my A-levels. Eye-opening.

"Travel is an adventure and rarely leaves us untouched. Every time we pack our suitcases and get on a plane, we open ourselves up to the unknown. Travel, after all, is a leap of faith – an invitation to experience things beyond our comfort zones: unfamiliar tastes, unexpected encounters, moments of awe, and sometimes moments of utter frustration." Itamar Srulovich

We don't even have to get on a plane - or a boat. A bus or car ride can take us into a whole new world. The centre of Melbourne is not at all the same as leafy, hilly, sleepy Eltham. The western suburbs are entirely different to the inner ring of suburbs, the outer, outer suburbs and the middle wealthy suburbs. If you travel just a few kilometres from here to Box Hill you would swear that you were in China or Hong Kong. There are skyscrapers - in an outer suburb - all the signage is in Chinese - or seems to be, all the people are Chinese - well at least 80% it feels like, and the food in the wonderful market there has a massive array of vegetables and other things that I just don't recognise. In Oakleigh I am told it's very Greek - and so on. Sometimes the difference is not necessarily an ethnic one, it might simply be one of wealth. They eat differently in all of those places.

So let me list some of those food associated and life-changing moments in my life.

Travelling at speed across Germany on the way to Yugoslavia, stopping every now and then to sample from the vast array of German sausages, and sauerkraut, introduced me to sauerkraut, which I now love. I didn't try it in that Alsatian bistro in Paris and my hosts never cooked it. It seemed to be an inevitable part of German life, as were the completely astonishing beer halls, one of which we experienced in Munich, and on a rather more refined note, this is where I first experienced the beautiful Riesling and Moselle wines that we occasionally drank.

The sausage experience continued into Yugoslavia - and I know I have written about this before - where, not often having much money, and where the food on offer in the local markets was somewhat restricted, we invented our own Yugoslav dish - a stew made with those sausages, peppers, onions, potatoes and tomatoes. Every time I make it I am reminded of those holidays, and the years of young love, and friendship. We also purchased a very large (3 or 4 litres) wicker shrouded flask of olive oil, which smelt stronger than any olive oil I have had since. I kept that flask for decades, until the wicker finally fell apart.

My first visit to Thailand and those first tastes of Thai food. I can't remember exactly what - maybe Larb, that spicy salad that features minced meat. So hot, so light, so spicy but not like Indian spicy at all. And I loved every dish that followed. Everything we ate on that brief visit, and a slightly longer one a few years later, was stunning. So much so that when I got home I went out and bought Charmaine Solomon's book on Thai food, and also a Women's Weekly book. For a time I would occasionally make something from it, but my husband's late life aversion to chilli and coconut has stopped all of that. Although there is still one dish that I sometimes make - noodles with a spicy chicken and peanut topping.

America - fast food and cheap food because it was all we could afford - I ate so many hamburgers. The enormous size of steaks that we were served in family homes, corn on the cob - an utter delight. Clam chowder - even the Woolworths version was great. The awful, awful bread - and cheese, maple syrup and waffles, hash browns. The massive size of just about any food item you bought. America was a revelation and so unexpected in its beauty and so alien in its attitude to the rest of the world, about which it seemed to know so little. Truly a place of the very best and the very worst of humanity.

Food markets and supermarkets in every country I have ever visited. A supermarket tells you everything about a country in its way. How much things cost, the range of things on offer, a hint of what the people eat, how it is packaged and displayed, who is shopping there and what they are buying ... Open-air markets do sometimes, but not always, as many are geared towards tourists today.

"But it’s the other moments that stay with us. The ones that surprise us into wonder – like tasting chepiche for the first time, or watching a soup come together with the gentlest of ingredients and the deepest of care. Those are the memories that quietly but powerfully remind us that the world is vast, varied and, more often than not, generous." Itamar Srulovich

I travel very little these days, and so yes, eating food that reminds me of places I have been, or tempts me with the idea of a visit to somewhere I have not been is a substitute. Every time I cook that sausage and pepper stew I remember Yugoslavia, the sun shining brightly on a brilliant sea, the happiness of love, and of being in the company of the very best of friends. Friends with whom we still keep in touch, even if we no longer see them. And a tomato salad will always bring back that very first step into a world of food that I had never known existed.

Itamar Srulovich points out that there is even more if you care to look, to think, to imagine:

"Some recipes carry you farther than a flight ever could – not just to new places, but to new ways of seeing. You find yourself wondering about the woman who first rolled that dough, or the grandfather who taught his grandson the perfect spice ratio for harissa. And then there’s the surprise – that with just your hands and a humble kitchen table, you’ve made something that tastes like a far-off city at sunset. That’s the magic. That’s why we keep cooking. Because sometimes the best way to explore the world is one bite at a time."

Since I began writing this blog, I have obviously been thinking more about what I am eating, and often my mind does indeed stray to wondering who it was that first realised you could grind seeds into flour, then combine that flour with water, apply heat and make a primitive bread. I find that utterly mind-blowing.

Tonight I'm making another sort of Carbonnade Nïmoise - this time with the last of the roast beef and with some beetroot in the mix of vegetables. It will remind me, I hope, of my early attempts at cooking French food from the recipes of Elizabeth David, those first years of true adulthood, in London where we shared many convivial meals with our newly, ex-university, friends. Not a 'far-off city at sunset', but magic perhaps of a kind - yes the magic of young love - cooking for your man and a world full of possibilities and adventure.

As for last night's leftover pasta - yes it was really quite good in a comforting kind of way - that indefinable taste of everything simple, and good.

YEARS GONE BY

July 4

2024 - Nothing - I think we may have gone to Port Douglas for a mid-winter break.

2023 - Peas, tahini and za'atar - leftovers

2022 - The 4th of July - Hamburgers

2021 - Nothing

2020 - Deleted

2019 - Goji berries

2018 - Cooking with peppercorns

2017 - Nothing - still away in France