Destinations
Not a bucket list — a short account of the places I keep finding reasons to go back to, and what keeps pulling me there.
I'm a poor source for a highlights reel. Ask me for the best view and I'll tell you about the best market instead. What follows are the regions that show up again and again in my notebook, less because they are unusual than because I never finished understanding them the first time.
Southeast Asia's market towns
Small towns built around a single wet market, where the pace of the whole day is set by what's for sale before seven in the morning. I keep returning for the noodle stalls that never bothered to open a second location.
The Mediterranean's working coastlines
Not the resort towns but the fishing ports beside them — the boats coming in, the auction shouted over the catch, the small restaurants that only cook what sold that morning. Related reading: the cuisines that grew out of exactly this rhythm.
Andean highland villages
High-altitude markets selling more varieties of potato than most people can name, and kitchens where a single pot of stew can take all day and feed the whole street. A slow place that rewards a slow visit.
West African street kitchens
Roadside stalls, each specializing in one dish cooked one way, and a street-food culture with more discipline and craft in it than most tasting menus I've sat through.
Japan's countryside, away from the cities
Small-town train stations with a single stall selling one regional specialty, and rural kitchens where a recipe is really a household's entire relationship with a season.
These are the settings; the food itself, and what I've learned about handling it, lives on the cuisines page. Shorter, less polished notes from these same trips show up in the notebook before they ever become a finished essay.