A smattering

Oh Morocco, what a mixed bag of pleasures. It is a place where the "a" is where the "q" should be and the period is where no one should place sucha frequently used item of punctuation. Aside from this and the insane prices of pretty much everything, it's quite Utopic: warm sun, clean bathrooms, boys love us and delicious food in abundance.

Here the women cover themselves from head to foot, but that foot part is nothing but style. Peaking out from their luxurious flowing kaftans are inevitably the most stylish of stilleto pumps. These pointed pedestals hold up the heftiest of Mediterranean women, who prance around with the finesse of a ballerina despite the addition of both boobs and butt. The men are something of another story. Lanky men draped in fabric often have their hoods up to keep out the beating North African sun. The stiff material of the ensemble means that the hoods stand on end, and despite the usually organic color of the outfit one can't help but be constantly reminded of the KKK. It's a weird phenomenon reserved for the few Americans to ponder over.

Genna and I have managed to drink a gallon or so of sweet gunpowder tea in which is submerged a sizable branch of fresh mint, as well as the delicious yogurt mixi drink in a collection of flavors (my favorite so far being avocado). The latter is reminiscent of the Indian lassi and more refreshing than you might think a dairy beverage capable of being. We have also managed to try a delicious Moroccan Halana Merlot and search some place that may allow us to tour their vineyard.

The food experience extends from the richest cousc cous au viande to Essouaira's famed fish tagine. Last night's affair brought Genna and I to the seaside with eyes bigger than our stomachs. But, as we have learned from many devoted years of overeating, when the food challenges, you challenge back. I will most certainly have to upload the bucket of carcasses our fish frenzy left, but let me just say for now that there is such a thing as too many shrimp. Also BEWARE OF SCAMPI! You might think they sound like the most innocuous dish on the Red Lobster menu, but as delicious as those buggers are, they come equipped with the most elaborate array of defense mechanisms any underwater vermin could produce. Think of trying to bite into a cactus and then add booby traps to that.

Perhaps the most difficult part about Morocco is the feel-need-to-buy that goes with being in a tourist town surrounded by a multitude of the most beautiful rugs, tables, bowls, lamps and leatherwork one has ever seen. For this reason I have been enlisting my family in the operation of needing something that will give me an excuse to shop. Anyone else?

And so the Moroccan adventure continues. We hope to reach small towns with olive or argan oil, and the desert along our journey, but aside from that Morocco is an ambling sort of journey. Until then we enjoy the seaside sun, the salty breeze, and the fact that my face is as smooth as a baby's tush and my hair has the softness of angora.

FOODEETAILS

Genna seems to cover all the major adventures in her blog so I suppose that leaves me to the details. The FOODEETAILS! Ha!

#1. Bittercorn: It tastes like it sounds and it sounds like it looks and I guess that means it tastes like it looks too. Bittercorn is the gnarliest little green pointy booger you ever did see. It hangs like it wants to be a fruit and perhaps that's what god should have put in the garden if he really wanted to teach Eve a lesson. Actually, the first bite wasn't so bad, the outside has a meaty vegetative texture and tastes much like the unrightfully but much maligned zucchini. The seeds, however, are another story. Their putrid taste leeks into everything that surrounds them, the rice, the sauce, the meat. I can see their plate compatriots running away in fear, but it is too late, all are infected. Genna and I make it through the first few bites with little hassel, and then it is only a teary-eyed race to the finish, a delicate balance of rice then rank, rank then rice with an eye always on having the rice finish last. I lose.

#2. Cherrapunjee tomato: Holy crap! Ok, so at first, to the unknowing eye, it looks like it could be any regular beefsteak. One is soon to discover, upon closer examination,that this gem shows not the slightest resemblance to its hide-bearing fish-inbred modern day "sibling". First of all, it's red. I mean this thing is actually, truly, really RED. It's not tinted orange-red over waxy watery nothingness labeled tomato #4171. It's that luscious red that makes you think Happy Birthday Mr. President. It's the type of red that says, "STOP now! Wait just a minute and take a bite of my ripe, toned, fleshy roundness and see what you think." So that is exactly what we did, and then came the revelation. I mean, if John had come down and told me from his own mouth what the end of the end would be like I would have to say, "No, my dear friend, this is what the end of the end is." It has the sweetest juice with ever so slight of a tang that cascades over one's tongue like you imagine that waterfall does upon those Sports Illustrated models wearing painted on bikinis. It has succulent flesh that exudes the zingy essence of earth, rain and piquancy. It has a tender skin, supple yet slim, easy to sink one's teeth into with not the slightest bit of force. Dear John, of all the revelations, I like this one the best.

#3 Pig parfait: It's kinda like parfait I decided. They cut it out as if they were removing a plug from one of those enormous wheels of aging cheese, only layered, like parfait. So there it is, core to surface: pig. The top layer, pig skin really, is like that tasty granola coating or chocolate frosting they put on top of the custard layer for pure tactile enjoyment. Makes mouth happy. In this case, it's a little different. I mean here I am burrowing into what is still clearly identifiable as soggy pale swine epidermis to get to its doughy interior. This custard relative is a section of fat so thick I can virtually see the entire piece dividing itself into artery sized globules to float itself down through my veins and waddle its fatty way to each valve of my precious ventricles. There it will stick its insoluble plump rump roundly into my cardiac organ and just bide its time. So, if we're talking custard comparisons we are talking custard made with cream and egg yolks, none of that Yoplait CarbSmart fake emulsified bullshit. The next layer takes custard to a new level: marbling. This ruffled fatty fun is some other kind of pig pleasure, layered on like a baby dressed for snow storm arms so stuffed they point out at right angles from their sides. The fourth and final layer is the reason we all lead ourselves to believe that parfaits, and pig, are something of a health food. The berries tell us, "Sure, it's better than ice cream then, right?" and that little slab of white meat clinging tenaciously to its fatty friends say, "I'm the other white meat, remember?" Still, though the health stuff might all be bunk with both parfaits and pig, when it comes down to it delving into those strata with its myriad layers of texture and taste is all the pleasure of each tier taken to the exponential power of combining it with each additional tier: a piled pig perfection to be admired.