Whoa. My Travelblog is Evidence.

by Pam Mandel on


On Monday, September 22nd, 2008, I boarded a flight for JFK. I’d been invited to cover Conde Nast Traveler’s World Savers Congress on Twitter and CNT was picking up the tab. They’d booked my ticket, airport limo, and a shoebox room right off Times Square. Wendy Perrin had invited me to dinner; I was starry eyed over the whole thing. It’s a pretty fancy day for an independent blogger when Conde Nast Traveler calls and wants to fly you out for an event. I was psyched.

Then my plane broke, and I didn’t get to have dinner with Wendy Perrin, and that bummed me out a lot. I did get to be one of the first people to tweet about an airline emergency, a status that has earned me exactly…. nothing. I wrote a blog post about the landing that a lot of people read — it got linked to from local newspapers and aviation blogs. Later, I learned that one of the passengers, Jewel Thomas, filed a lawsuit against American Airlines:

Thomas said that after the cabin lights went out, passengers were told to prepare for a rough landing at O’Hare, and that many began to pray. She said she was terrified and called her children on her cell phone, leaving messages saying she loved them.

About six months ago, I got a phone call from the law firm that’s representing American Airlines in the lawsuit. And on November 1, 2011, I attended a deposition. I answered a lot of questions about what, exactly, I saw happen when the plane was diverted to O’Hare.

It was nearly three years ago; there’s a lot I don’t remember. I didn’t remember, for example, that there had been firemen on the plane until the lawyer showed me a picture I’d taken. He passed over a print out of the blog post I’d written that day, comments and all. It was kind of weird to see that little post that I’d scribbled on the continuation flight from O’Hare to JFK handed back to me in this context.

You’d think I’d remember that, right? I didn’t. I also didn’t remember much about the people in my row — I was in an exit row at a window seat. I have zero recollection of people crying, praying, or making phone calls to their loved ones. I don’t remember what I did on the flight, not at all. What did I remember? Something big happened, right?

I remember a landing that was nowhere near as bad as a typical landing at Vienna, Austria’s perpetually windy airport. I remember a shift in realization that, oh, all those emergency vehicles racing this way? They’re for my plane! I remember the guy in the blue jumpsuit — in the terminal he patted me on the shoulder, very kindly, after I told him what had happened. I remember the smiling face of the woman on the grass at O’Hare. I remember that the cabin got very hot, and I remembered a woman walking her cooing baby in the aisle. I remember the stewardess on the replacement flight bringing me a couple of bottles of scotch, which I stowed in my backpack and drank later at my hotel. I remember buying a sandwich from a deli just a few doors from my hotel. When I walked in, two enormous African American guys in big blocky specs were playing chess and they were wildly friendly. They asked me where I was from and when I told them, one of them, the guy in a white track suit, responded, “Damn, girl, what are you doing all the way out THERE!?” as though I was his cousin and had moved too far away.

I hate to fly, though over the past three years I’ve become more relaxed on a plane. I still get green pretty easily, a little turbulence will cause me to break out into a sweat and wish I’d chosen an narrower obsession, one with rail travel, perhaps. Coach aggravates me to no end. I can’t get comfortable enough to sleep, and I’m a pacer, I get up and walk to the lav very frequently. I think it’s because I’m nervous.

There were two points that the lawyer for the plaintiffs — they’re plural, I learned today — seemed to be trying to lock down. The first was that perhaps I’d somehow just missed what was going on around me. I wasn’t paying attention. Passengers may have been praying or crying or making phone calls to their loved ones on the ground and I just didn’t notice it.

The other was that I’m somehow biased positively towards air travel because I’m a travel writer. At this point, I really had to try hard not to laugh. “Would you say it’s your job to promote tourism and travel?” I had to think about that. I suppose so, but I’ve also written about seasickness and the tragedies of history and just recently about how I had to haul myself across the planet in a blaze of fever. The premise that I just might be a booster for the airlines — well, it’s not fair, really, the lawyer doesn’t exactly know me.

“Flying,” I said, “is a necessary evil. If I could take the train everywhere, I would.”

I don’t watch the lawyer shows anymore, so I’m not exactly sure what happens next. I know I’ll get a copy of my deposition and I’ll probably read it over and think, “Oh, did I really say that?” Still, I stand by my potentially poorly observed and possibly pro-airline biased story: You’ve been in worse landings. And when a pilot puts a broken plane on the ground and everyone walks away, well, I’m all for that. Though I kind of want my New York dinner with Wendy Perrin. I feel like I got cheated out of that.

Photo credit: Pam Mandel. I took it while walking from the plane to the shuttle they’d brought to bring us to the terminal.

SkyMall Monday: Protein Ketchup

by Mike Barish on

The other day, while relaxing in SkyMall Monday headquarters, I was about to enjoy a juicy hamburger with some french fries when an alarm went off in my brain. I realized that a burger and fries was not a very nutritious meal. Here I am, trying to get in shape for my wedding and I’m denying my body what it really needs. I immediately put the burger down and thought about what I could do differently to ensure that I was eating healthier. This hamburger situation was dire and needed to be corrected. I had to take better care of myself and treat my body with more respect. That’s when it hit me. I had to turn to some real nutrition experts to fix this mealtime dilemma. Surely SkyMall could teach me to eat better. And thanks to our favorite catalog, I ended up having a healthy meal. What did I eat? That very same hamburger and french fries…smothered in Protein Ketchup!You see, the problem isn’t with what you’re eating. The issue is your choice of condiment. Currently, the ketchup that you are eating (probably Heinz since Hunt’s is for losers) has zero grams of protein. ZERO! How do you expect to get any protein if the meaty hamburger that your devouring is smothered in ketchup with zero grams of protein?

Think that condiments don’t need to be a source of protein? Believe that ketchup is just an unhealthy sugar sauce that you don’t need to eat at all? Well, while you’re cleaning mustard stains off of your shirt, we’ll be reading the product description:

With 15 grams of protein, zero fat, and two servings of tomatoes in every “dipper-style” one-ounce cup, Protein Ketchup delivers the taste and mouthfeel you expect, with the nutrition you want.

The problem has always been that we’ve wanted a more protein-rich ketchup but haven’t been willing to sacrifice the mouthfeel. Well, our day has come.

Why have a family-sized bottle of protein-less ketchup when you can stock your cupboard with dozens of one-ounce cups of protein-rich condiment ready to fuel your body and fill your garbage with excessive amounts of waste?

Now you can eat all of the burgers, fries and ice cream sundaes that you want so long as you coat them in some rich, properly mouthfeeling Protein Ketchup. It’s guiltless eating that’s sugary sweet. Enjoy!

Check out all of the previous SkyMall Monday posts HERE.

Five sustainable alternatives to turkey this Thanksgiving or holiday season

by Laurel Miller on

If you expected to see “Tofurkey” anywhere in this article, you clearly aren’t familiar with my work. Nope, no textured vegetable protein here.

As a kid–an obnoxiously picky eater, at that–turkey was on my lengthy list of foods to avoid. I suspect it was the notoriously dried-out birds of my youth that caused my aversion. Today, I like turkey, but it’s honestly not one of my favorite eating birds: I much prefer a good roast chicken or a game bird.

Game birds–both wild and farmed–are popular throughout much of Europe, especially in the UK, France, and Italy. Goose and duck are frequently seen in Asian cuisine, depending upon the country and region. And now, game birds are growing in popularity in the U.S.. Quail and duck aren’t difficult to find on menus, but there’s also squab, guinea hen, partridge, wood pigeon, etc.. Some birds, such as goose, heritage breed turkeys, or wild game birds may be seasonal or require order well in advance; just to give you an idea, the turkey farmer at my local market has people start signing up for Thanksgiving birds in March.

If you can’t find these birds at your local farmers market on butcher shop, you can order them online. The important thing is to ask or research how the animals are raised, and make sure it’s in a humane, ecologically responsible manner (see end of article for more information).

With the proliferation of farmed birds (mostly small-scale operations) in the U.S., I’m hard-pressed to recommend you shoot yourself some dinner (although I’m behind roadkill), but hunting is a discussion for another day. For the record, while I don’t participate in it myself, I support hunting wildlife as a means of population control, as long as the animal in question is fully utilized.

As for you city slickers, just be aware that wild birds are much stronger in flavor, less tender, and in most instances need to hang for a few days so the proteins can break down and render the meat edible. So put away your bird call and shotgun unless you have the experience and permits, and do your shopping locally or online. No muss, no fuss, and trust me, plucking birds is a serious pain in the ass. Farmed birds are bred for more tender meat, are usually hens (also more tender and mild), and a great choice even if you’ve never cooked anything beyond a chicken breast.

Do note that goose and duck, are very fatty (the extra padding helps keep these aquatic birds buoyant) and you’ll need to render the fat before you can cook the meat. The key to successfully preparing most birds, however, is to not overcook them. Your butcher or any number of cookbooks will be able to tell you how to prepare them. Some good resources: Nose to Tail Eating (Ecco) by Fergus Henderson, and River Cottage Meat Book (10 Speed Press) by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall.

Sourcing information for all of the following bird species can be found at the end of this article.

1. Goose
Goose was once a British Christmas dinner favorite (oddly, turkey is now the bird of choice), and it’s still popular in Germany. According to esteemed food writer Joan Nathan of Joan Nathan’s Jewish Holiday Cookbook (Random House), German Christians traditionally ate goose for Christmas, and Jews cooked it for Hannukah. In her book, she provides a lovely family recipe for roast goose stuffed with chestnuts and apples that would make any Thanksgiving table proud.

[Photo credit: Flickr user turtlemom4bacon]Goose is considerably more fatty than other birds, so it’s not a good choice if you’re watching your cholesterol or calories (stick with white meat turkey). But it’s that layer of fat that makes the meat so succulent and juicy. It’s very rich, so a little goes a long way; ideal if you’re feeding a crowd.

2. Pheasant
The Common Pheasant is native to Asia, but there are over 30 subspecies that have been introduced all over the world as a game bird; it’s naturalized in Europe. In the U.S., we’re most familiar with ring-necked pheasant: the males are striking, with emerald- and crimson-colored heads. Farmed pheasant is growing in popularity on menus, and is similar to dark chicken meat in flavor

3. Quail
While tiny and full of bones (imagine gnawing on a giant hummingbird drumstick), quail is a great choice if you’re having a small gathering because you can serve one bird per person. They’re very dainty and require simple preparation. Just butterfly them, thread on skewers and toss on the grill, or pan-fry. Quail meat is dark, juicy, and non-gamey; it pairs beautifully with dried fruit such as figs, dates, or cherries. Toss grilled quail atop some bitter greens dressed with a bacon vinaigrette, add some plumped dried fruit, and let the cooking juices wilt the greens. Dinner is served.

4. Duck
Duck is commonplace on fine-dining menus nationwide. While technically white meat (as is goose), it’s similar to red meat: rich, rosy, and juicy with burnished, crackling skin. Many people are intimidated by cooking duck, but it’s one of the easiest alterna-birds to work with, especially if you just use breast, thigh, or leg meat. Breasts will have a thick layer of fat beneath the skin; you’ll need to score the skin in a cross-hatch pattern to help the fat render (Don’t throw it out! Store it in a clean, sealed jar, and use it to fry potatoes or other foods for extra crispy goodness). Grill or saute breasts; legs take well to braising or confit.

There are three main breeds of duck sold commercially: Pekin, Muscovy, and Moulard. Pekin are the most tender and mild, while Muscovy are large, meaty, and stronger in flavor. Moulard are a Pekin/Muscovy cross; they’re larger, more fatty, and stronger in flavor than Pekin, and are usually raised for foie gras.

5. Squab
A more civilized term for pigeon, these aren’t your standard “rats-with-wings” variety. Squab are eating pigeons, and the meat is similar to duck–very juicy and rosy in color, with an almost livery flavor. Think of it as a smaller duck in terms of cooking technique.

Speaking of park pigeon, when I lived in the Bay Area, there was a semi-factitious activist group advocating the consumption of the out-of-control resident pigeon population (something I’d be completely behind if these birds weren’t such carriers of disease). To prove their point, they cooked up a bunch of captured birds in a San Francisco park one day and had a well-documented pigeon picnic. I’ve always found that hilarious.

Sourcing

Even if you decide to just stick with turkey or switch to chicken this holiday season, the most important thing–besides technique–is to start with a great bird. It’s worth the extra expense to get a pasture-raised animal that’s been supplemented with exercise, sunshine, plant matter, and foraged bugs. You’ll taste the difference, but it goes beyond just flavor.

Industrially-raised poultry (i.e. chicken and turkey) are the taste equivalent of Styrofoam with bland, watery meat plumped with saline solution; their feed is often supplemented with arsenic to produce pinker meat and act as a growth promotant and antiparasitic. They’re hybridized to grow quickly and possess outrageously oversized breasts (because that’s the part most people prefer to eat). Factory farming is also an inhumane, environmentally devastating industry with far-reaching impacts upon human health (Click here for more information on sustainable-vs-industrial turkey farming).

Sonoma County Poultry sells Liberty Ducks (actually a strain of Pekin ducks adapted to a slower, less stressful growing process) ships nationwide. Grimaud Farms of California’s San Joaquin Valley sells Muscovy duck and guinea fowl online

D’Artagnan is a well-regarded purveyor of specialty foods. They have a strong focus on sustainability and humane poultry and game bird production and procurement, and sell farmed quail, pheasant, quail, goose, squab, poussin (technically, young chicken, although sometimes game hens are sold under this name); capon (castrated rooster, which makes for flavorful, tender meat); guinea hen, and wild Scottish wood pigeon, grouse, pheasant, and Red-legged partridge online

Mad Hatcher Poultry in eastern Washington produces quail, squab, poissin, and quail (heritage turkey and rabbit, too).

[Photo credits: roast goose, Flickr user Herman Saksono; cook, Laurel Miller]

Think Small: Why Small-Batch Champagne Is Better

by David Farley on
There’s a quiet revolution underway in Champagne. A grape-accented battle against the goliaths of the bubble-laced industry. It’s called terroir, that mostly untranslatable French word that refers to the influence of soil and weather on wine (it’s also creeping into the food world too).

Big Champagne doesn’t really have any terroir. It’s one soiled little not-so-secret aspect of the Champagne industry: that the grapes used by the big guys — Moët & Chandon and Veuve Clicquot, for example — don’t come from just one vineyard. They come from all over the Champagne region, as many as 1,000 different places. Which is fine. Champagne like Veuve are great thanks to technique. But, like wine, if you want to really taste the influence of the area (or how the terroir has shaped the taste), it’s not going to happen.

That is, until now.

Meet grower Champagne. This is a small movement that’s been gaining traction in recent years. In a few words, grower Champagne is small growers using grapes that they cultivated. There are about 5,000 grower Champagnes in the region, but the reason you may not have heard of them is that they only produce a small amount and few of the bottles end up across the Atlantic. After all, Moët & Chandon and Veuve Clicquot dominate the market, making up 55% of sales of sparkling wine in the United States. Save for the aficionados, bubbly buyers are likely choosing based on name recognition alone. One criticism of grower Champagne is that it’s not always great. The key is to find a Champagne house who has the technique down and the boutique operation.

I’ve met a lot of travelers who have gone to Champagne to seek out the big names and take tours of the vineyards. When I go, I’m going to hit up the small Champagne vineyards.

One such small-batch grower that I’d put on my list (and whose Champagne you can get in the United States) is Louis de Sacy, a family-run outfit that that has been making Champagne since 1633 (Jonathan Sacy is the 13th generation of bubbly makers in the family). Louis de Sacy is located in Verzy, one of 319 villages in Champagne that make the bubbly stuff. But it’s only one of 17 that can use the “Grand Cru” appellation. I recently tasted the vineyard’s brut grand cru. It had toasty elements to it and a lot of spice with a super smooth finish. Until a friend recently introduced me to Sacy, small-batch Champagne was something I didn’t know existed.

For a list of other good grower Champagne, check out this extensive compendium here. Or you can buy grower Champagne from this site.

How can you tell grower Champagne? You just have to look for the “secret” code. The big Champagne producers will have NM. Grower Champagne, though, has RM. You’re certain to arouse suspicion in the wine shop but at least you’ll walk out with a nice bottle (and for about the same price or cheaper) than those well-known labels.

So, with the Champagne-toasting season upon us, let us raise our glasses to the small guys.

Maldives in Peril: An interview with Daryl Hannah

by Jon Bowermaster on


Given her decades of success in the movie business, environmental activist and actress Daryl Hannahcould be lounging on any beach in the world today, drinking rum punches, working on her tan or perfecting her mermaid’s kick.

That she recently spent a week in the Maldives, much of it indoors participating in a pair of eco-symposiums focused on climate change and the future of island nations — just days after being arrested in Washington D.C. as part of the protest against the planned $7 billion Keystone XL pipeline — says a lot about her priorities.

It’s easy to cast a dubious eye at celebrities who align themselves with environmental causes since often it’s clear managers or agents have encouraged them hoping to better a client’s position based on image rather than sincerity. With every actor under 40 (and many older) attempting to gain environmental cred these days it doesn’t take too much effort to scratch the surface and find out who of them really bleeds green.


Having participated with Hannah in a bunch of roundtable talks and spoken on a panel together with her on ocean biodiversity during the recent, third annual SLOWLIFE Symposium,I can vouch for her dedication, commitment and truly green blood. On a quiet beach we talked about how she came to this level of commitment and how, having grown up in America’s heartland, she became so impassioned about the ocean.

“I grew up not only in the heart of the city of Chicago but on the 42ndstory of an apartment building, so I was really disassociated with the natural world in a strange way. There was a park nearby which I thrived off of, but I felt kind of strange and alien as a kid. It wasn’t until my dad sent me off to a camp in the wilderness that I formed a bond with the natural world and understood that’s where things made sense for me.

“It was also around that time that I started diving, at 13, with pony bottles, and it was just magic. It was like being a bird in the ocean, giving you a feeling like flying. Whenever I’m in the water my heart rate slows, I get really calm … it is a constant sense of wonder every time.”

I’m specifically curious how she came to a life committed to environmentalism, whether it was imbued in her Illinois youth or dawned later on a sunny California day.

“I used to think that the most important thing I could do was to live as ethically as possible, which I still think is a really important step for people to take. But once I began to really understand the crises that we are in the midst of — extinctions, over population, ocean acidification, and more — I started to realize that it was absolutely imperative that we all do everything in our power to change.

“It wasn’t really a decision. I just feel compelled. I’m like one of those mamas trying to lift a car off her baby, I have no choice, I just have to (be involved).

Have her acting jobs, like “Splash,” informed her sufficiently? “I don’t have to be a scientist or an oceanographer to see that the coral reefs are bleached and that there are no fish left, I can see those things with my own eyes. I’ve seen things change in such a short amount of time

“And not just in the oceans. We are in real trouble if we don’t start living more ethically and mindfully and employing all of the solutions we have available to us.

I remind her of a common theme among committed preservationists, which is that people generally protect best what they love most. If we expect people to truly take better care of their little patch of land or sea or sky, they must have great affection for it first.

“That’s absolutely it, we protect what we love. But I think the ocean has a particular challenge. Less than one percent of people have spent any time under it, so they look at it from the beach, from the shore, and it looks just fine. But it’s not fine. Once people understand the interdependence of all life on this earth, that we are all interconnected — that when we fix the problem with our energy consumption and dependence on fossil fuels — we would also fix some of the serious issues facing the oceans.”

Back home in the U.S., one of Hannah’s major disappointments is recent change in laws allowing corporations to spend unlimited amounts of money on elections and lobbyists.

“I never put my faith in government or politicians,” she says. “It’s people who are going to change things. If we each took responsibility for our own lives we wouldn’t be in the mess we are. But there’s no way we have a voice unless we insist upon it.

“As long as people get out there and start sharing information with each other then people can make their own decisions. Most people wouldn’t make a decision to commit suicide or poison their own children … or kill their loved ones. They are going to make wiser, more informed decisions if they know that choices are available.”

She returns to the core belief that individuals can, and must, lead. “We have to hold people accountable, hold corporations accountable and hold politicians accountable. But we have to hold ourselves accountable first.”