Postcard from Bilbao, Spain: Pintxos to pasteles

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Above: Always crowded at pintxo-time in the iconic Cafe Iruna

Starting our ABC-listing of food experiences in Bilbao with Al Margen. Yes, a photograph should be worth well more than 1,000 words, but don’t let these photos mislead you. The kitchen at Al Margen turns out amazing dishes from amuse-bouche through dessert.

Even George H.W. Bush could not help but love the broccoli. Singed on the outside with spring onions and a sauce brightened with lime zest, this broccoli could star as a main course. Heirloom tomatoes were flamed before taking a cool bath in a pickled peach and tangerine sauce.

Pomegranate seeds added a colorful touch to eggplant, while leeks and crisped pork belly flavored pan-seared gnocchi. For dessert, Malta cake was topped with marscapone and pistachios, and Al Margen’s unexpected take on tres leches cake was crowned with grated Parmesan. Not inexpensive, yet all delicious. Although the menu changes seasonally, regulars insist the broccoli be ever-present.

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Postcard from London, England: Globe-spanning collection ignites imagination

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Above: “Tippoo’s Tiger,” Tipu Sultan’s automaton seized from Seringapatam, Mysore, South India, by the East India Company in 1799, eventually ending up displayed in the Victoria & Albert Museum.

It’s a giant mechanical tiger… and I just was so enchanted by it. Because I’d seen British propaganda – you know, cartoons and ethnographic representations of Indians – but I’d never seen Indian art depicting the colonizer or the English…. I think Tipu Sultan, who commissioned it… was so contemptuous of the British and so determined to drive them out of India…. This was a gift to his sons, who had been taken hostage by the British.”

Tania James, author of the novel Loot, interviewed in 2023 by Ari Shapiro for All Things Considered on NPR

By chance, I had recently read Tania James’ Loot when we visited Victoria & Albert Museum last year. Spying the 18th-century automaton tiger one grasps how it sent the author’s imagination flying back into history to investigate the tiger’s origins. The soldier-mauling tiger serves as a mighty symbol of conquered nations’ contempt for their colonizers.

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Postcard from Palermo, Sicily: Architectural and actual gems of Monreale

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Above: Monreale offers a sweeping view of Palermo from the mountains to the sea.

The immensity of the 12th-century Benedictine cloisters adjacent to the Cathedral of Monreale is best grasped when viewed from the church roof. Walking around the monastery’s inner courtyard, graceful arches supported by pairs of delicate columns evoke a sense of intimacy.

The craftsmen erecting these did not apply a cookie-cutter approach to their construction process. I don’t believe the figurative designs of a single capital is repeated, and many columns boast colorful mosaic inlays. Perhaps these were meant to entertain restless monks not always keen on completing the requisite number of daily contemplations.

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