Home Away

Auckland is a lot like home (Seattle). In fact even the weather has been very reminiscent of the Pacific Northwest. Day one of my trip was sunny and with the palm trees all around it had me thinking of LA, but everyday since has been wet and overcast and has me thinking of home.

There are other similarities too. Auckland is a port city and an economic hub which means lots of tech and fish from what I can tell (just like home). It's also very hilly and there is coffee everywhere you turn. Also, the Pacific rim nations are all well represented in terms of food options. In short I feel like I never left home at all.

One of the problems with all these reminders of home is that I am suddenly struck by the strong urge to do nothing at all. Yesterday I spent mostly reading which is all well and good, it's my vacation and I'll spend it how I like, but I only have a short time here. It's not like it's the first time I've been vacation in a beautiful foreign city and spent most of a day reading, but at least when I spent most of a day reading in Granada I did in the gardens at the Alhambra, and in London at Trafalgar square. I can't let a little (or a lot of) rain stop me. So today is get in the car and drive day and see where it takes me.

Food of the Gods

I probably should have jumped right into exploring the art, and culture, and parks of this wonderful city, but I like to settle in to a place so instead, yesterday afternoon, I explored the supermarket.

New Zealand purportedly has the best dairy products in the world. Having been to Switzerland I am dubious but definitely excited to try so I went to the supermarket in search of yogurt and I found a wonderland of delicious and facinating items.

For starters there are unsurprisingly a number of similarities to British supermarkets. Most notably the Kiwis seem to share the Brits (and my) love of rhubarb. I don't think rhubarb yogurt was an option in Switzerland, but I'll try to be objective about the yogurt quality and not focus on the rhubarb.

The multitude of varieties of cheese definitely speaks to a national appreciation of dairy as well and, along with the inexpensive and plentiful paté options makes me want to spend my entire trip picnicking in parks and on beaches (both of which also abound around here).

My brother would certainly be pleased with the variety of smoked tiny fishes available (not just sardines and oysters for this lot), and with the variety of Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese foods available.

I suppose I'll have to bring home some smoked fishes for him. I'll also for sure be bringing back some Manuka honey which is another point of great culinary pride here.

One of my favorite things is the coffee bags. Like tea bags, they're individual serving bags of ground coffee that enable you to brew a single cup of coffee without need of any special equipment. Having been born in 1978 in the greater Seattle area, and having lived there my whole life, and having worked for an organic coffee company briefly, and being a huge Alton Brown fan, I'm aware of drop in quality that comes with not grinding your coffee beans immediately prior to brewing, but I love the convenience. And the quality of the coffee's doesn't suffer to badly.

The cream situation is a bit confusing I'll admit. There is double cream and single cream both of which seem thicker than the half and half I'd normally put in coffee (if I normally drank coffee). I went with single cream which is pretty good in the coffee but definitely too thick for tea. I suppose they must do milk in there teas here (like the Brits again), but it seems odd to me to need two separate things. Also, I couldn't find milk in a small enough bottle for only using it in my tea so I'm sticking with cream for both.

I definitely need to address the pickle situation. When I asked one of my hosts what I could bring from home she said, "dill pickles", because you can't get them here. When I came through customs and had to declare any food items I was carrying the customs agents all gave a nod as if to say, "of course" when I said I had pickles. It must be a common request.

The supermarket I went to had gherkins in a myriad of sizes, but no dill pickles.  I find it odd that they don't have them. My only guess would be that there's no dill here because they are so particular about not bringing in non-native plants. Maybe they just aren't allowed to grow dill. If that's true I'll be interested to see how they prepare salmon because that they have a lot of.

As I've been writing this I've been eating breakfast (I know, I don't usually do that,  but my internal clock is still 5 hours ahead...or 19 hours behind I guess). My breakfast included coffee with cream, bagel and cream cheese, and yogurt. I have to say New Zealand definitely gives Switzerland a run for its money in the dairy department. I suppose a side by side blind taste test is impossible, since the transporting of dairy products from New Zealand to Switzerland (or vice versa) would impact on their quality, but it's definitely too close to call without one.

My last stop at the supermarket was the bakery section and while I didn't buy anything there I was extremely tempted by the carrot cake. It didn't have raisins. None of it. Not a single raisin in any of the carrot cakes.

If it seems from the title (or the contents) of this post like I'm getting attached to New Zealand and might not want to return home...well, that would not be inaccurate. Although, if you didn't catch the Almighty Johnsons reference in the title you really should run, not walk, to your nearest Netflix streaming device and start watching immediately.