the midwest.
it's not all corn and cheese and beer! the food around here is more diverse and flavorful than I expected it to be. like, when I think of the midwest, I just think of American Gothic. but, it has proved me wrong.
-or so far, at least.
Cities shown (so far):
St. Louis
Madison&Milwaukee (sounds like blonde sorority girl twins)
Minneapolis
... Chicago has its own section here.
when me and an ex (man, a moment of silence) went to St. Louis:
recs are thanks to him, not me, for once. he wasn't a 'foodie', but he did know what good food was.
we didn't spend too much time in st. louis- we were only there for a weekend, so i didn't get a comprehensive view of the city. i think the activity we did the most was eat, which i'm not mad about at all, because everything hit so hard- especially the fried eggplant at cate zone cafe. i'm like not really an eggplant person, but he was so set on getting the eggplant that i thought, "well, man, it's just gotta be good, huh".
man, it was my favorite thing at that lunch. probably during the whole trip, actually. on god, i'd never had eggplant like that before. eggplant so good that i forgot that eggplant's a vegetable.
we went to the st. louis art museum, which i really enjoyed. a really good mix of contemporary and older art, all for free. that whole place -forest park- was really nice, honestly- huge lake and art hill, with so much sky to see, especially during sunset.
highlight of the trip was definitely the food- it was interesting to see the different pockets of cuisines in the parts of the city that we went to.
what little of Wisconsin (Milwaukee & Madison) i have been to with a friend from home:
me and a friend met up in milwaukee for just a day trip, and we were so intent on finding cheese curds. we asked around where to get them, which really pointed us out as being from out of town. it was also odd that not that many people were out. like, yeah, it was a sunday, but we were walking around downtown milwaukee and at times we were the only people out and about. when we found a beer hall to eat cheese curds at, that's where all the people were- drinking and watching football.
the highlight of that trip for us? the national bobblehead hall of fame and museum. yes, we were sober. yes, we actually enjoyed ourselves. we spent way too much time in there as people who are just not into bobbleheads at all. and still aren't- it's not like the museum converted us or anything, but the people at the information desk were definitely really into bobbleheads and were eavesdropping on us and judging us for judging the museum.
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I visited that same friend in madison a couple months later. highlights off the top of my head- seeing a marcello hernandez show and the dane county farmer's market.
I love a lot of things, and standup comedy and farmer's markets are among those things. specifically with farmer's markets, I always make it a point to go to a farmer's market or food whenever i travel, because it gives me a feel for the food scene in a city: to understand food, I believe it's important to know where it comes from and how a region's farmers shapes its lifestyle. as consumers, it's easy for us to lose sight of the fact that what we're eating is a culmination of efforts and resources and is not just a final product.
actually, this is the real highlight of wisconsin. probably the only one. boring-ass state
Minneapolis with that same friend from home
pre-ramble
haven’t even gotten back to Chicago yet from San Juan and I'm already doing food research on Minneapolis.
judging by the food scene, I can already tell it’s a pretty diverse city. Looking from the map, it doesn’t look like the city’s sharply sectioned off into different ethnic neighborhoods- there’s a burger place across from an east african place across of a salvadorian and 2 mexican restaurants.
goal: to have every meal be of a different cuisine. No two dishes should look alike.
reminder to do some research into why minneapolis is incredibly diverse
it's big and blue
we went to minneapolis for july 4 weekend. not my favorite city, but what it makes up for in what it lacks it fully redeems itself in its food and people. in it, it told a story- one from the past, present, and what it hopes for in the future. its residents have a lot of faith in the city, and they show up for each other when they can. they really want to see the people and the place they love thrive and succeed. everyone there has some sort of vision, whether it's for themselves, others, their city, or all of the above.
pre-ramble goal of having every dish be of a different cuisine was accomplished, but there's so many more cuisines i'd wanna try in this city. there's such high populations of people identifying as somalian and hmong and i didn't get around to trying their food here, which was such a shame because this restaurant was one that i'd heard on the sporkful not too long before the trip and immediately put on my list to visit.
we ate palestinian, native american, colombian, vietnamese, japanese, and there's a ton more that we didn't. but all the more reason to visit again, right? i would come back solely for the food (i not-regrettably ate 6 scoops of ice cream in a siting. they weren't as big as normal scoops, but 6 scoops is 6 scoops, nonetheless.
a farmer's market that runs for consistent hours 5 days a week and clogs up the parking lot on a saturday? yes, please. there's traffic just to get to the market and there's traffic within the park. wow.
we spent july 4 going to the mall of america, which i'd argue is one of the most american things you could do on such a day, but not like i'm patriotic or anything. like, c'mon, going to a multi-level mecca devoted to consumerism and entertainment in such grand scale that it hails MILLIONS each year? filled with a margaritaville, rainforest cafe, bubba gump shrimp co (run, forest, run!) just feet away from each other? an entire aquarium? an entire theme park? on ms. merica's birthday?
it's so american in excess.