Latin-inspired dinner with friends, Nov 21

Gourmet Magazine, November issue, had a feature on Thanksgiving Dinner, Latin style. It caught Joan Royer's attention and she decided we would have our own celebraton! She gave us assignments, set tasks for each day that week, and did the shopping. Be ready for more pictures of food than people! It was a spectacular dinner.

Chips and guacamole with pomegrate and cilantro.

Joan's menu




Susan, Pat and Joan, as we are getting started.


Appetizer #2 - meatballs!


Joan's prep board - lime, mango, peppers and pomegranate. Not visible, but used - cilantro!


Beth and Bill cooked the Turkey, happily stationed next to Carl's wine selections.


The most delicious potatoes with poblanos.


Missing were Leslie and Ray (ailing). Here we have (left to right) Beth, Susan, Dan, Joan, Bill, Pat, Carl and Dave.


Turkey with pomegranates and peppers.

Cranberries with pineapple and cilantro.

Awesome desserts: Leslie's cinamin/chocolate pie....

...and Joan's apple pie, served with Dan's homemade rum ice cream.

Halloween in Durham

Dave and Mitch ready for Halloween, not yet in costume.

Mitch, the cowboy.


Greeting trick or treaters
.


ready for bed


A walk in the park with Mitch in the lead.


Playing in the leaves

Lunch at Fosters in Chapel Hill with Cansu Karayazi (pronounced Jansu). She is Meltem's cousin Nabite's daughter and a sophomore at UNC, studying management. We saw Nabite in Istanbul in September, so it was fun to get together with Cansu.

Cansu had Dave and me over to her apartment for Turkish coffee and cookies. Five of six roomates came through and said hello.

The Artwalk in Durham

getting comfortable...

On the third day of the visit, Mitch went to grandpa, took his hand, led him to his chair at the table and pointed. He asked, in his own unique way, to be fed. Grandpa got the message, went to the kitchen for Mitch's dinner and gave him what he wanted. 

Intrepid Turkey Travelers - the six pairs

Thought we'd tell you something about our fellow travelers as you see them on the blog.

Pat and Dan Hottenstein live in Mount Gretna. Dan's a retired radiologist who is building a model train scene in the basement and a garden railroad in the garden. Speaking of garden, Pat is an amazing garden designer and quilter.

Carl and Joan Royer live in Mt Gretna. Susan and Joan met while buying vegetables from a sustainable farm some time back, and have been friends ever since, given a common interest in healthy and delicious food.

Andrea Anania and Jim Stewart we know from CIGNA. they live in Bryn Mawr, PA where they are building a new home. Dave and Jim worked together fand have been friends since their common actuarial roots way back when.


Julia and John Griffin live in Scottsdale, Arizona where Julia is a specialty nurse in oncology at Mayo Hospital. Susan and Julia met at the University of Minnesota where they were both tri-delts almost 40 years ago. John is the accounting manager for a tennis club.


Steve and Lynne Frazier live in Pinehurst, NC. We've traveled on bike trips with them! Lynne and Susan met through CIGNA in the mid-1980's when Susan was in SF and Lynne in Denver. All of us moved East. We've been playing together ever since. 

And here we are - a picture Lynne took of us the last day of the Blue Voyage.

Blue Voyage

The third segment of our trip involved the Stewarts, Fraziers, Griffins and Woods leaving Bodrum and boarding the MS Amazon Solo in Gocek for a week-long tour of the Mediterranean coast of Turkey - a "Blue Voyage", as they call them in Turkey. We took the eastern route from Gocek to Kas and Kalkan, stopping in coves to swim and anchor for the night, and taking an excursion to see ruins or a coastal village. The boats are called "gulets", made of wood, with motors and ornamental sails (we think). MS stands for Motor Sailor. It's a leisurely way to travel, with a chef preparing excellent fresh Turkish meals along the way. Veladare is the tour company who managed the blue voyage , as well as our land tour of Istanbul and the ancient sights. http://www.veladare.com/

We spent Saturday, September 13th driving from Bodrum to Gocek, where we boarded the MS Amazon Solo at 4 p.m.

Before boarding the boat that Saturday, we stopped at sights along the way.

A hotel in Akyaka – a village with wooden houses by architect Nail Czakerhan.

Is it a boat? No it's a land-based home!

Red peppers drying in the field. They grew pine nuts in the same area.

Our guide, Lale Kasogan, at a rest stop where we sampled gozleme – pancake filled with herbs, potato, spinach, not sweet, parsley, meat

Our driver, Demiray, suggested Yuvarlakcay, a restaurant ON a river serving fresh trout stew, meatballs, peppers and the best pita bread!

Meatballs, peppers, onions...

view from the table

Fresh trout and salad

A drive to Gocek, and embarking on the Amazon Solo.

Here's the Noodle Bar in Gocek, meeting point for voyagers going on the Amazon Solo!

THE BLUE VOYAGE

First adventure - Steve and Jim make a trip to town for provisions (beverages of choice).

Amazon Solo crew – Captain Safak, Chef Yusuf, Ozcan, Serkan

Navigation map where Safak showed us our route East from Gocek to Kalkan.

We hiked to the St Nicholas Church, and saw the Amazon Solo from the top.

Life aboard the Amazon Solo.

Dave, Steve and Lynne observe parasailers coming off the mountain at Ouloudeniz (dead sea).

Susan and Andrea chat

The water was warm (80's). Here's Andrea in a shot that shows the color and clarity.

Steve dives off the bow

We anchored in this quiet bay, where there was a cold spring off the shore.

One morning, as we finished breakfast, a gulet (motor sailor) pulled up it's anchor and motored by us with it's Russian passengers waving - all nude!

The diving contest.

Result: legs together - Steve, size of splash - Jim

Lynne and Susan, finned.

It is discovered that Julia, an oncology nurse, worked with Scott, Susan Casey's late husband. He was a revered pediatrician at U of M. Susan C is Kevin Odegard's friend. (future wife as it turns out)

Julia and John goin' in.

The underground city - about a mile of ruins near Kas


Yusuf cooking - it looks like beets. What healthy and delicious meals we had!

A red and green lunch.

We took excursions to the ruins of Xantos and Patara, when docked in Kalkan. This stone is at Xantos.

This is Patara. with our excellent guide, an archeologist who was working on the site.


Steve beside the giant palm. (can you see Steve?)

Learning about Patara

The lighthouse at Patara

Patara was once a harbor, now filled with sand. It's been excavated recently, revealing vast ruins. The mayor of the town has arranged to sell the sand to farms nearby. Agriculture in the valley is phoenomenal - zuchini, eggplant, peppers, corn, oranges, mandarins, pomegranates. Turkey is one of seven countries that is self-sufficient in food production. They can feed everyone and export food to others.

Dave swims and hikes to an island

The cat caper - Lynne and Andrea provide food for a cat who lives on an island.


The drop, and the swim back to the boat.

Julia at the street market on shore where the ladies weave jewelry.

The gals convene for a morning swim and chat.


The dingy goes to shore.


Several climbed to up to the castle at Simena. Dave and I watched and took a photo.

Steve and Lynne on the summit.

We think the tiny people on top are our people.

A harbor view.


The big swells from Kalkan to Gocek. On Thursday, we departed from a bay near Kalkan at 6 a.m. to almost avoid high winds. It was a haul West for 5 hours. Some did better than others in swelling seas!

Dave got a series of pictures showing boat movement with swells in "sport mode". This is one moment. The faces show more about the experience.

some snoozed

A relaxed group relaxes in a quiet bay in the evening with books and beverages.

Serhan Cengiz, owner of Veladare, the company that provided land tour and blue voyage. He met us at the end of the trip at the Noodle Bar.

Moonrise was the subject of photos each evening, with a full moon rising.