Buddha Bar - Dubai, UAE .......Sculptures - Water - Imagination.

and the old Scrapbook says; Buddha Bar/Paris/France...

and now....

You think it is a mirage - It is not -
Welcome to Buddha Bar - Dubai, UAE....

...

Buddha Bar is located adjacent to the Grosvenor House Hotel

A 15 feet tall Buddha is centered in the restaurant.......

a view of the marina outside.....

(All photos in this post by Tavarua)
Enjoy an evening with good music - experience the Pacific Rim Cuisine (Buddha Bar - Paris - got to be a new experience for the Europeans in the early 90s).....and now - is time we exit - to dive in to a world of water, art, and people....

Sculptures - Water - Imagination

Destination Dubai, UAE............

Leather & Canvas......

...

It is a long wait for fresh white truffles from Piemonte, Italy.

(Photo by Fred Lyon)

It could be herbs and herbs gardens as spices are the fundamental catalyst to a culinary experience as the Tuscany sun will make you smile and your dreams come true. White truffle has a short season between September and December. I am craving it already in April....it is just fabulously delicious - the dining room filled with the pine smells of autumn, the fireplace is cracking and bringing in the sounds of memories, the air clear as crystal, the leafs on the trees are changing their colors, the warmth from the candelabra, toasts for Hubertus and Diana. Old and new tales are taking place of conversation. It is about the - White Truffle it is named the "Grey Diamond" and found in the Piemonte region in northern Italy.

In Italy truffles are hunted by hounds. They white truffle only grows wild. It is rare and has a much stronger taste and aroma than the black truffle When the frost is on the ground and cold winds are changing the season their are no more truffles to be found a culinary experience end of season. Everybody knows that the Italian Truffle hounds are well educated and speak the Piemontese dialect. The hounds sniff the ground for the hunt of the white truffle when found the truffle hunter will clear off the dirt, smell it and put into his satchel and guard it with his life and then the hunt goes on. The hunters all have their secret grounds as the white truffle is rare and highly priced....Grey Diamonds.

White truffles are generally served raw and shaved over mushrooms, pasta, or game.

Fonduta con Tartufi

This is common in Piemonte and the Val d'Aosta regions.

Ingredients:
1 1/3 pounds (600 g) Fontina
1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
6 egg yolks
4 ounces (100 g) fresh white truffles, brushed clean and finely sliced
1 1/2 cups milk

Preparation:

Dice the fontina and put it in the upper half of a double boiler with the milk; season the mixture with a pinch of salt and let it sit for about an hour. Then heat it gently, stirring with a whip, until you obtain a dense, cheesy cream. At this point incorporate the yolks, one at a time, and then the butter. Divide the fonduta up into 6 previously heated bowls, sprinkle the shaved truffles.

(Photo by Nina Leen)

White Truffle Aioli

Ingredients:

3 tbsp white truffle oil

2 egg yolks

1 tsp lemon juice

1 cup olive oil

1 pinch white pepper

1 tsp garlic

1 pinch salt

Preparation:
In a food processor, using medium speed, add egg yolks, garlic and lemon juice.
Slowly add truffle oil and olive oil to form an emulsion.
Season and refrigerate

Preparation time approximately 15 to 30 minutes

(Photo By Carlo Bavagnoli)

As we talked about white truffles the mind travels to - Château Lafite Rothschild Paulliac 1989 - berry/tobacco character, with touch of chocolate and cedar. I am no wine Connoisseur but it is outstanding - full bodied - silky.

Would you care for some "Vintage" Chateau Lafite - 1949 (1 Grand Cru Classe Paullic) ?

Alimento - Vino - Conserto -

Evgeny Kissin & Herbert von Karajan - Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto nº1

"My tastes are simple: I am easily satisfied with the best." - Winston Churchill

Clubland - Paris, France - Where will you find me?

Clubland Part II

Cercle de l’Union Interalliée

then........

and......

now.

If you do not find me at a little family Bistro on one of Paris back streets - then you will find me at Cercle de l’Union Interalliée- 33 rue du Faubourg Saint Honoré or in the evening at The Travellers - Champs-Elysées . 


Shopping - I recommend -  Maison Goyard and Hermés  -  Ladies nothing wrong with beautiful things in life - you deserve it. If you are a bohemian with a touch of elegance or casual continental - you can visit and shop at Arnys so did Jean Cocteau, Le Corbusier and Hemingway.

Tavarua at Cercle de l’Union Interalliée


Do not forget Au Petit Matelot (the green store, figure that one out, Green is the color of...where we come from-we always had it, we grew up like that green, green, green). 


If you like something engraved please visit Maison Agry located between Tuileries and Place Vendome this store will take you back to the old world - they have been the engraver for the French aristocracy since 1825.


One more - Gastine Renette, Gunsmith/Clothing/Accessories If you needed a shooting outfit for the country, this was the store - It would have reminded you of Holland & Holland, London. Unfortunately gone - and so is Sulka.

Where do i stay? Hotels to recommend..not this time. If I live under the canvas in Paris? No, If it is under a mosquito net and a cot in the Tropical Zone or in a hotel at Place de la Concorde in Paris -it is all the same - Is it special? Not necessary - it is all about your outlook on life.  Who brings a cot to Paris? I like nice little places with some character, personality and charm . Yes - I occasionally need some quite time in "Clubland" - you will find me in the library. 

Click to listen - Malcolm McLaren "Paris is Jazz"

Exotic Foods - Look No Further

Gene Rurka

Exotic Food Expert Gene Rurka - for the Explorers Club - could help out with some recipes for that special night, trust him he has been preparing the Explorers Clubs Annual Dinner for 6 Years;

Rotten/Fermented/Herring

If you have a taste for adventure but ...there is nowhere to go at the moment.

I have had Central American river turtle, green turtle, Iguana and Iguana eggs, ants eggs and ants, frogs, snake, silk worms in Korea, Raw whale meat, Muskox and Mattak which is raw whale skin with a thin layer of blubber cut in small cubes in Greenland, Seal Meat in the Arctics as well as the Swedes fermented herring (If you can call rotten fish exotic)and their Moonshine........Crocodile, Emu and Kangaroo, to name a few (not so rare and exotic - but extraordinary) - so what about a recipe from Gene Rurka.If not - you could fly to try deep-fried scorpions in Singapore, or have fruit Bat Soup in Guam and go for a drink of bat’s blood in Saigon.

Succulent Scorpion on Endive with Herb Cheese

Ingredients
12 scorpions (preferably 2” or larger)2 cups of Cabernet Sauvignon
1 lemon
2 tablespoons of honey
12 endive leaves (3 inches in length)6 oz crème fraiche (can substitute crème cheese)
1/2 cup of fresh chopped basil (can substitute parsley)

Preparation;Marinate scorpions in Cabernet Sauvignon, and refrigerate for 30 minutes. Blot excess wine with paper towel. Add lemon zest or spice of your choice or lightly glaze scorpions with honey and lemon.
Transfer scorpions to baking sheet and slightly dry in oven at 250 degrees for 3 to 5 minutes (smaller scorpions will require shorter drying time). Be careful not to bake or over dry. The scorpions should remain supple. Remove from baking tray. Allow to cool.
Wash and dry endive leaves. Mix basil into crème fraiche. Add a dollop of cheese mixture to each endive leaf and gently place a scorpion on the bed of herb cheese.

Or Not so Exotic BBQ Alligator

This is a Killer - Fugu Puffer - Sashimi would be nice.

This is one of the most dangerous dishes you can ever put into your mouth. The Fugu fish is a pleasant looking little fish - a puffer fish, - Lethal -The Fugu fish organs has a deadly venom —tetrodotoxin - a natural defense system that renders its attackers paralyzed - A delicacy and one of the most dangerous dinners you can have, ingest a little bit to much of the Fugu and you will die a slow death from conscious paralysis and asphyxia. There is no anti-venom but if you are an adrenaline junkie, Why not try it?

..Oysters... Pearls......and an Artist..

(Photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt)

(Photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt)

Artist/Design by Katie Decker

If we eat Oysters and find a Pearl - We think about the Ocean - If we think Mother Ocean - Facination of Mermaids or more direct of women as Living Sculptures - and Pearls enhance the Beauty of the Woman - Simple little Pearls out of their shell in the hands of an Artist..could possibly be a Master Piece........

(Photo by Alfred Eisenstaedt)

"I would like to adorn the necks of all the women of the world with pearls."- Mikimoto Kōkichi

In the City at the moment - thinking back on Guyana......

El Dorado Rum with a dash of soda........and my thoughts bring me back to..Guyana....

The Amerindians are descendants of the original inhabitants of Guyana. Most of them live in tribal groups in the coastal regions and further inland. The coastal tribes are the Caribe, Arawak, and Warao.

On my way on the slow flowing Demerara River which, is located in Eastern Guyana. It rises in the forests of Central Guyana and flows northward without important tributaries for 215 miles to the Atlantic Ocean at Georgetown.

Jungle Cabbage - Sabal Palmetto - and suprisingly it taste like...... Cabbage...

Guyana is one of the primary countries for the export of birds - here is a boy who lived in the jungle with his very pleasant family and a vicious little parrot.....

The angry parrot....

Amerindian Village....

Canoe - River - Blackwater.........light to dark stained water from the vegetation of the jungle...

A captured Macaw...

Another headless photo....in the jungle hunting for Labba....

Here is a photo of the highly priced Labba... it is a large rodent, which prefer and live close to water and rivers. A rodent with many names depending on where it is found in the tropics/sub-tropical Americas. The meat is a delicacy.

Amerindians playing at the river in the last minutes of daylight.....

Desire to travel, to see, to smell, to hear, to explore, to live, a windwalker.....

Look to the blue sky and not the building and you will find in your mind that...

"In the sky, there is no distinction of east and west; people create distinctions out of their own minds and then believe them to be true" - Buddha

"The way is not in the sky. The way is in your heart" - Buddha

“It is from the quiet and secluded scene of beauty found in the Arabian court-garden that Arabic poetry traces its beginnings.”

- Kamel Louafi

...and behind these wooden doors....

Beauty .....the interior of a mosque.............

“There are not more than five primary colors (blue, yellow, red, white, and black), yet in combination they produce more hues than can ever been seen”

“In the attitude of silence the soul finds the path in an clearer light, and what is elusive and deceptive resolves itself into crystal clearness. Our life is a long and arduous quest after Truth.”

- Mahatma Gandhi

(All photos in this post by Tavarua)

“Anyone who keeps the ability to see beauty never grows old.” - Franz Kafka

The Americas and Trans Darien Expedition..........

(All photos in this post by Mr. Amado Arauz)

Trans Darien Gap Expedition -1960 - From Panama to Colombia. In 1957 there were discussions about a research expedition for adjoining the Pan-American Highway. A couple of Land Rovers were custom built and of they went.

They had to drive to goopy mud under the triple-canopy jungle, snakes,vampire bats, boa constrictors, bugs, more dense and endless tropical jungle, river crossings, malaria, humidity, log bridges, difficult mechanical, logistical and topographical problems were a present part throughout the expedition. Leadership skills are essential in any successful expedition, think Sir Ernest Shackleton and our days Sir Ranulph Fiennes. The leadership skills were there and 4 moths and 20 days later they finished. AP McGee "Sons of Savages" you would have loved this Expedition.