The Pleasures of Dining Alone | Vietnamese Street Markets | Recipe: Grilled Star Fruit
Issue No. 29
In this week’s edition, don’t be shy about celebrating a Valentine’s Day meal (or any dinner) with yourself. ❤️ Also travel through Vietnam’s street markets, make sure your home doesn’t fall into one of FEMA’s flood zones, and don’t let your starfruit or peppergrass go to waste.
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Now that I no longer run a restaurant, I get to do weekend activities like take long, leisurely bike rides followed by long, leisurely afternoon naps. On a recent Sunday, I ended my ride at Doc Ford’s, the least bad option for eating out on Captiva. I got my usual, a grouper sandwich and a Florida beer. I sat outside on the breezy patio and ate by myself, feeling like a queen. There is a lot of cultural baggage associated with eating out solo, but I am here to make believers of you all.
Eating out alone is the perfect opportunity to spend some uninterrupted time alone with my thoughts, a rarity in a culture of screens and codependency. Forcing myself into a situation in which I get to truly be alone, whether that’s taking a long walk in the woods or occupying a table for one, feels like a gift to myself. Particularly as a woman, I expend a good deal of energy thinking about and listening to other people, and dining alone is an opportunity to be blissfully self-absorbed. I do my best planning, problem-solving, and creative thinking when I’m dining solo. I have brainstormed many-a newsletter while destroying a plate of french fries slathered in hot sauce. Perhaps it’s the lack of distractions, or the heightened sensory state of eating. And if you’re the sort of person that hates being alone, think of it as much needed practice.
I remember the first time I ate out alone. I was 19 and spending the summer taking Italian classes in Pisa. One night I took myself out to a trattoria recommended by my host family. I had a plate of simple grilled vegetables and melted scamorza cheese, lots of bread with good olive oil, and a glass of red wine. I remember every single bite of that meal.
There is a meditative quality to eating alone, in which I actually have the brainspace to absorb and enjoy the sensory experience of eating. Sitting at that little wooden table alone, way too dressed up, slightly tipsy, slowly savoring dainty forkfuls of zucchini with scamorza and balsamico, it was the most grown-up I had ever felt.
Take it from me, being alone doesn’t have to be synonymous with being lonely. As an unpartnered 33 year old woman who lives by myself on a remote island far away from family and friends, I happen to be an expert at being alone. I realize for many people solitude can feel scary. For others (particularly mothers), it can feel completely elusive. I want to savor those precious moments of solitude. Dining solo feels like a reminder of the many pleasures and luxuries of having time for yourself.
love,
Jackie
Sunshine + Microbes — it’s the best company to have when dining out alone 📰:
TRAVELING WHILE HUNGRY
Friend of the newsletter and globe-trotting travel guide Sasha Shahidi explores Hanoi’s street market culture.
In Hanoi, Vietnam, whose Old Quarter has been continuously inhabited for over a thousand years and whose population has climbed to over eight million people, there is little physical space for large western-style supermarkets. Traditionally, Vietnamese people prefer to shop at open-air markets for fresh and local ingredients twice a day just before cooking and eating.
Global trends are infiltrating Vietnamese cities, and the nation’s young people enjoy the conveniences of supermarkets, delivery apps, and online grocery shopping. Longer work hours and more women in the workforce mean less time for cooking and household activities. Yet shopping the old way is still prevalent, and Hanoi markets are bustling, vibrant centers of social and cultural life. Street markets represent much more than buying food. They play a pivotal role in Vietnamese social, cultural, and even political life. Market shopping is a daily ritual that bonds communities, sparks conversations between neighbors and friends, and builds social structures.
Wet markets spill out onto narrow winding roads from tiny storefronts and living rooms. They provide fresh foods that put the best supermarkets to shame: fresh (often live) meat and seafood, mouth-watering tropical fruits, vegetables, roots, and dozens of varieties of greens and herbs. There are hundreds of prepared items too: fermented foods and pickled foods and dried foods and jellied foods; homemade soy milk, roasted sweet potatoes, and grilled squid on a stick.
Wandering through a market, I catch glimpses of home life behind the stands: kids getting ready for school, grandparents serving steaming bowls of broth, whole families lounging in front of the television, older people squatting around cups of tea with their loyal dogs lounging nearby. Friends and family members shop together and take time to catch up on each other’s personal lives and neighborhood news. Markets allow sellers to personally connect with their customers, often establishing lifelong relationships.
Some vendors, mostly women in conical leaf hats called nón lá, travel far distances every day to sell from bicycles or bamboo baskets. Their lives are full of challenges, but they are trusted for specialized knowledge of their products, from oranges to dried beans to snails to hard candies.
The future of Hanoi’s street markets is unclear, considering how quickly Vietnam is rising up the ranks as an international economic player. At least for now, travelers can wander through the markets of Hanoi and get a sense of the slower, more grounded food shopping experience that Vietnamese people have cultivated over hundreds of years.
—Sasha Shahidi
Fresh links
🌊🏡 The Reality of Buying a Home During Climate Change | UC Davis’ “What Can I Do About Climate Change?” blog.
Kat Kerlin found her dream home. Then she needed to talk herself out of it.
The home had a scenic view of a river, and that was the problem. The house was located in the floodway. Although the neighborhood hadn’t flooded since 1964, climate change makes flooding in the near-future a matter of “when” not “if.” To live in a waterfront or even just a water-adjacent property in the age of climate change means needing to accept certain realities, according to UC Davis flood expert Nicholas Pinter:
Look, you have to ask yourself, are you ready to drop everything and move everything to the attic whenever a big storm is coming? Are you willing to go up after a flood and muck it out, with all the mud and the stench? Are you ready to lose the house?
California is especially vulnerable to natural disasters — from climate-change-related wildfires and floods to earthquakes. But other coastal states like Florida don’t make buying real estate any easier with so much area threatened by sea-level rise. Dream house or not, options are becoming more limited in every place vulnerable to climate change.
You should definitely check where your home or future address is located on a FEMA flood map, even though it might require accepting some hard truths.
🛒A Supermarket Sweep for Math Skills Becomes An Internet Sensation | CNN
Ahmed Alwan, a 20-year-old college student, has been working shifts at his father’s Bronx convenience store Lucky Candy since he was 13. He’s gotten to know many of the regulars and has learned some of their struggles.
Earlier this year, he started giving those familiar faces simple math problems (quick! what’s 11 x 11 - 20?). A correct answer allows the customer five seconds to grab whatever they can off the store’s shelves and carry it out free of charge. Alwan covers the costs no matter how many items the person snags.
These mini-supermarket sweeps have earned Alwan more than 300,000 followers on TikTok and another 27,000 on Instagram, plus more people coming to the store hoping to get picked to play. Alwen doesn’t need to know a customer for that person to get a shot at a math problem. But there is one key rule. You cannot take the bodega cat.
a fun video of supermarket sweep in action:
🍚What the Coronavirus Forcing Me into Lockdock Taught Me about Cooking | Reddit
U.S. expat Chris and his fiancé Steph from Guangdong live in the small city of Shunde, China where they produce the popular YouTube cooking series Chinese Cooking Demystified.
The couple’s routine took a change of pace when the coronavirus shut down the city. While Shunde is not in Macau, which is bearing the brunt of the epidemic, the area still has been on lockdown for the past several weeks. Most everything, including restaurants, remain closed, besides the essentials. They walk their dog on the roof of their apartment and get checked for coronavirus symptoms each time they leave the apartment and come back. Chris wrote a long post on Reddit about what’s happening while also reflecting on the history of cooking. He begins:
What I just wasn’t mentally prepared for, however, was the shortage of fresh vegetables. Veggies were pretty much the first thing to go after medical masks. If you’re anything like me, the thought of that makes you feel… claustrophobic. No fresh vegetables for potentially weeks on end. The walls start closing in…
But he’s found that the downtime, lack of ingredients, and the need for supplies to last awhile has inspired the pair’s cooking in ways they never imagined before. In his at-times rambling post (that happens when cooped inside all day), he hypothesizes why modern cuisine seems so uncreative and how scarcity and limitation birthed the best cuisines in the world, a commonly-held belief among food historians.
The post ends with photos of some of the foods they’ve made during lockdown like “Tomato sauce with spicy fermented paste over Northern Chinese ‘cat ear’ noodles, with stuffed lotus root on the side” and stir-fried mantou buns.
Chris and Steph emphasize that they don’t think their meals are particularly awesome or expertly made, just that coping with the shut down has “forced us to be the most inventive cooks we’ve ever been in our entire lives… and this’s just from two nobodies with a camera over the course of two weeks. Imagine millions of people, many lifetimes over, with the same mindset.”
Grilled Star Fruit
There are two gigantic, too-prolific star fruit trees at the Rauschenberg Residency that have already set fruit three times in the nine months I’ve been here. Even if I picked and processed star fruit for 40 hours a week, there might still be rotten fruit on the ground. And sadly, star fruit is not a popular choice in fruit baskets. It’s musty and chalky and just kind of boring (besides their super cool shape). So I’m always wracking my brain trying to figure out what to do with it.
I make a lot of star fruit vinegar. I’ve been dehydrating thin slices marinated in lemon juice and chili, which makes for a nice snack. Recently I tried throwing them on the grill, and I was pleased with the results. I paired them with peppergrass, a mustardy weed that grows rampant during South Florida winters. You probably have some in your backyard right now! Serve this with some simply prepared fish for a very classy, very Floridian dinner.
Serves 2-3 as a side
Ingredients
2-3 ripe starfruit (they should be yellow with brown edges and not a hint of green)
A spoonful of nice mustard
Juice of one lemon
2-3 peppergrass plants (just rip’em out of the ground! And if you don’t have access, just substitute any green you like.)
A few sprigs of cilantro, roughly chopped
Basic vinaigrette of your choice (see recipe below)
Coarse salt and pepper to taste
Peppergrass growing in backyard:
Step-by-step
Cut star fruit into half-inch slices. Using a paring knife, pop out seeds. Marinate star fruit in lemon juice and mustard with a pinch of salt and pepper for about 20 minutes or while the grill heats up.
Preheat grill to medium heat. While the grill heats up, chop cilantro, make the vinaigrette, and strip peppergrass leaves and seeds from the stalk.
Using a cloth, oil grill grates. Grill star fruit, about 5 minutes per side, until they are juicy and there are pretty grill marks.
Toss star fruit with peppergrass leaves and seeds, cilantro, and a generous squeeze of vinaigrette. Finish with salt and a few grindings of pepper.
Basic vinaigrette
In a dressing bottle or mason jar, add equal parts olive oil and acid (lemon juice or vinegar).
Add a spoonful of mustard, a squeeze of honey, a minced garlic clove, a few grindings of pepper, and a pinch or two of salt. Cover tightly and shake well.
Now taste it. It should be bright and zingy — noticeably sour with just enough salt and sweetness.
Adjust until you’re happy with the vinaigrette. Too bland? Try another pinch of salt. Too sour? A bit more olive oil or another squeeze of honey. Store in the fridge, where it will keep more-or-less forever.
Feels refreshing to just drink straight from the bottle, ya know.
(To be fair, the legislator is drinking water from a reused Hershey bottle). Here, however, is a very Canadian sight:
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Sunshine + Microbes team
Jackie Vitale is the current Chef-in-Residence at the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation and co-founder of the Florida Ferment Fest. Her newsletter explores the intersection of food, culture, environment and community.
Matt Levin is a freelance reporter based in Colombia. He edits Sunshine + Microbes and contributes other scraps to each issue.