Last week here in the Netherlands, Val and I went to the terrific Kröller-Müller Museum — a small but wonderful museum with a powerful collection and a famous sculpture garden situated in a national park. (more about that soon) It is near the little town of Otterlo, which like all little towns near national parks, caters to visitors with lodging and souvenirs and eateries.

On the way in, we spotted a large seafood-vending truck and on the way out we stopped to let Val sample the new herring, which by all accounts, is especially good this year — fat and delicious.

Val perused the case. It had all kinds of fish, shellfish and langoustines, some to be taken away, others to be prepared on the spot. He ordered one piece of herring, which came with diced white onions on a little silvered-paper plate.

He downed it country-style: grasping the tail, tilting his head back and dropping it into his mouth for a big bite. This won him an approving smile from the locals, who had watched with a mild curiosity to see how the buitenlanders would manage the local delicacy. (In Amsterdam, they serve herring cut into pieces, with toothpicks)

The review: Val is already back in the states, but he e-mailed me this description of his herring experience.

The vendor had skinned and boned the herring — the head was off, the spine removed and the two filets held together only by the tail and a small piece of backbone. The fish was slippery — it’s very fatty — so it took a couple of tries and a firm grip to hold it by the tail and raise it into the air. The white onions provided just the right sharp counterpoint to the smooth, fatty, salty, fishy flavor of the raw fish. One bite and I had about half of it — the meat was soft, with a nice texture. A couple of chews, then the other half. Great snack (but left my fingers smelling of fish), all that was missing was a cold beer! I wish we could get these at home.

Here’s a little video in English about this year’s new herring from Radio Netherlands Worldwide. Watch it to learn more about the fish, how it is cured, how it became a national delicacy, how it is prepared and eaten.

This beautiful place is directly behind our host’s home — it is working agricultural land and a nature preserve with public hiking trails. More on polders in this cool wikipedia entry — scroll down to learn polders’ role in democracy in the Netherlands.

But not this time. Finding, sadly, that the restaurants we enjoyed in our visits 10 and 20 years ago were no more, we opted for one recommended by New York Times food critic and PBS food show host Mark Bittman. I’d watched and read the cranky Bittman often — he seemed to know his stuff, has eaten and written about food and ingredients from all over the world, and I figured that I would not go wrong with his advice. But I did.

The restaurant he recommended — Tempo Doeloe — fell absolutely flat. The meats were bland and tough, tasting for the most part as if they had been boiled in one big vat of broth and then placed in ramekins with some thin, particularly unspectacular sauces spooned over them. The meal was not served in stages, but was brought out all at once. There were frozen vegetables and canned shrimp, tasteless soggy tomatoes. Too many dishes smelled and tasted the same as others. There wasn’t one thing that surprised or delighted me, not one thing that was any better than takeout I could get in Long Beach. I suspect that Tempo Doeloe was aimed smack at the American family seated at the table next to us who asked for a rice table of all mild dishes and especially no goat meat, but it was a total miss for us. And as this was the splurge meal of the trip — and because I have tasted what a real rijstaffel can be — it was a real let down.

It did provide us with a great excuse to walk around old Amsterdam at sunset and that was the highlight of the evening.

Earlier this week, we had a foodie hit when we had some really good Belgian-style fried potatoes with traditional mayonnaise sauce. In the densely touristed shopping area off the Helligeweg at Voetboogstraat 13 is Vleminckx Sausmeesters, a Beglian Frittes stand that claims to have been in business since 1887 and at this location since 1958. There’s always a line for these perfectly-cooked-crisp-on-the-outside-tender-on-the-inside potatoes that are fried in quickly-consumed batches and served in paper cones with a generous helping of one of a dozen or more sauces — from traditional mayo, to ketchup, satay and sambal. We picked up a couple of small orders and were not disappointed. (In fact it was our second visit to the stand — Josh brought us there on our first day in.) A worth-the-wait cone of street food perfection.

Where the Herengracht meets the Amstel: a view of the new Hermitage museum. It has been one of those rigorous museum-going days. Fun and tiring. Too beat to elaborate tonight. For now, this picture.

Today, Giethoorn is visited by many travelers, but we were lucky, and in the drizzle we had the walkways and cafe practically to ourselves. Here are a few of our pictures from a rainy-day stroll in Geithoorn.

Our sweet hosts are off on vacation — leaving us with paid transit passes and coupons for museum entrance (!) — and we took a quiet day to enjoy our peaceful Amstelveen digs and plan our sightseeing. Today we went to the market to pick up some local meats and cheese and Val prepared a take on a Dutch ploughman’s lunch. He paired dark brown fries roggebrood (pumpernickel) with Dutch butter and aged Gouda cheese, and a grainy wheat bread with zonnepit (sunflowers seeds) with mild goat cheese, Cobergham and Ossenworst.

Cobergham is a mild smoked ham of this region of Europe. We got it in glassy thin slices.

Ossenworst is a sausage originating in Amsterdam in the 17th century — when as the world’s powerhouse trading center, it had spices and steers in abundance. Traditionally, aged steer meat — coarse-ground and mixed with pepper mace and nutmeg — was smoked so slowly and gently, it created a sausage which is essentially still raw. Our still-tasty, but mass-produced, supermarket version was made of lean beef and was probably not aged. Later this week, are going to try to find one of the Amsterdam butchers who still make the sausage the old fashioned way.

Also on the menu: cucumber and butter sandwich, olives, a doughnut peach, a small cherry tart and Cotes du Rhone.

Later we walked through the polder (more on this tomorrow) with its profusion of wildflowers and birds, sheep and calves. And of course, there was an afternoon nap. And, a roasted chicken for dinner. Tomorrow, more countryside exploration.

Gieterse soes met advocaat.

In the meantime, some things to be thankful for: Smart friends full of ideas; great and talented partners, smooth working relationships, and a business lithe enough to turn on a dime; a genius husband of 23 years who supports you in all you do. Happy launch day to all!

An ethereal, gently warm fall day. Leaving the famous vine-lands of Sonoma under sunny skies, rolling north and into the NorCal leg of the trip, we headed for Ukiah on a chowhound tip. We were looking for The Sagely City of Ten Thousand Buddhas — a Chinese Buddhist monastery — and its Jyung Kang (To Your Health) Restaurant. The monastery was founded by Venerable Master Hsuan Hua, a prolific founder of Buddhist institutions and the teacher of the Six Great Guidelines: not contending, not being greedy, not seeking, not being selfish, not pursuing personal profit, and not lying. The restaurant is of course entirely vegetarian; its emphasis is on “the love of fresh organic ingredients and the well being of all living beings.” They use no MSG, onions, garlic, chives, scallions, leeks or eggs. Still, we’ve heard their food praised for its flavor and the savory deliciousness of their tofu and gluten dishes.

The monastery is not a tourist attraction, but a quiet, contemplative working religious community and school. All visitors are asked to sign in at the visitors center, where we parked, signed in and set out across the campus to the restaurant. A peacock wandered by and as we walked along, passing the Instilling Goodness School, we were struck by the stately institutional architecture of the many buildings on the large park-like compound. It seemed late 19th/early 20th century, with Arts and Crafts dignity, and it spoke of a previous purpose for campus. Later, we were to learn what this was.

But on our visit that morning, we walked through the peaceful campus and by the great hall adorned with fantastic and gigantic painted figures, heavenly kings shod with curling slippers, surrounded by curling clouds in the Chinese style. Monks and students were gathering at the hall for midday devotions. We passed one small procession, lead by a bell ringer and accompanied by chanting students. Up the path an older nun walked with a younger companion who shaded the elder woman’s shaved head with a parasol. They talked softly. A school girl tagged alongside.

The small restaurant is in a pleasant but plain lunchroom with large windows. It reminded me of a classroom from my country grammar school in Ohio. When we arrived, a large three-generation Asian family was sharing a feast at a table in the middle of the room; the food looked great and the smells were enticing.

We sat near an open window and made our selections from a large menu filled with unfamiliar dishes, but thankfully, with many pictures. The friendly woman who took our order suggested the stir fried broccoli and house special fried rice, to which we added Vegetable Dumplings, Hot and Sour Soup, Seaweed Soup, Golden Balls with Ginger (savory fried gluten balls). Now, I thought the broccoli and fried rice might not be the most exotic things I could try, but she was so friendly, and so sure we would like them, that it only seemed polite to accept.

And, they were so good, the distinct flavor of each ingredient still fresh tasting, bright. The big bowls of soups were tangy. The seaweed soup tasting of the ocean. The hot and sour broth was light and complex with tender mushrooms and a delicate bean curd mesh. The dumplings were tender with a yummy mixed veg filling. And the Golden Balls were golden! These were little balls of salty savory wheat gluten fried and served with thinly shredded ginger. Nice texture, not too chewy. Very snacky. Very easy to pop one after another.

All this was served to us in giant portions, easy enough to feed four off any one plate and two on our “small” soup orders. So we feasted and packed up plenty of leftovers for dinner. $32 dollars for two meals of impeccably fresh, local and lovingly prepared food. Perfect.

On our way back to the car, the doors to the great hall were open to let in the day and we stood with our backs against an outside wall to listen to the resonant chanting, and then we peeked into a side hall filled with hundreds of golden and gilt porcelain Buddhas smiling serenely into the quiet. We visited the bookstore and then headed out the Mountain Gate, north for the great redwood forest.

As I drove for the Humboldt woods, Val iPhoned up the history of the 400+ acre campus and found that it was once a State Hospital, opened as the Mendocino Asylum for the Insane in the 1890s. Many buildings were being added to the site through the 1930s. The hospital was closed in the 1970s during a drought which made its further operation impossible. Venerable Master Hua purchased the property in the late 70s and used his “wisdom eye” to find a well that now feeds the whole complex.

In two hours we made the Humbolt Redwoods State Park. Humbolt is the home of one of the Great American Car Touring Roads, Highway 254, The Avenue of the Giants. The road leaves the busy 101 and winds gently through the spectacular redwood forest. It is lined with turnouts and parking areas, where visitors can just pull off, hop out of the car and in a few short steps be in a quiet grove of ancient and enormous trees, shaded by the high canopy, walking on trails carpeted with fallen needles and lined with sorrel and fern. So idyllic, you expect the fairies or your spirit guide or the leprechauns to show up and take you on some sylvan adventure. There are also the roadside attractions, like artifacts of vacations gone by: the tree you can drive through, the chimney tree, the house made of one tree, the eternal tree.

We took the Avenue and rolled along at 40 mph, stopping at this grove or that, as the day wore on. There’s no explaining the feeling of being in the presence of these trees; their scale throws off your perception, giving you an off-kilter other-worldly feeling. Each curve of the road reveals a wowing view and and you drive through the forest open mouthed. We pull off mid-afternoon and walk a trail down to the stony bank of the Eel River. We sat on the stones, shared big bites of Healdsburg Farmers Market marionberry pie and watched the river roll silently by. Birds fussed from the trees towering over far side of the river. Tiny fish darted in the shallows at our feet.

Then it was back up the trail that winds under fallen giants and through verdant underbrush to the car. Back onto the road. It was almost twilight when we got to the Founders Grove, a most spectacular and easily accessible old-growth grove that has been a preserve since the 1920s. It is the home of the Dyerville Giant. One of the forest’s largest trees, it was more than 370 feet tall — that’s 30 stories or as tall as Niagara Falls — and 1600 years old when it fell in 1991. It is more than 50 feet in circumference. A burl on the fallen tree is expected to sprout new growth, in keeping with the species name: Sequoia Sempervirens, or ever living.

Walking through the grove — alone, in the late of the day — was like being in the nave of a great cathedral with soaring ceilings, sacred perfumes, dappled lighting, velvet quiet. And when the sun was getting low and we knew we could linger no longer, we headed back to the car and walked up on a doe and her two fawns grazing on sorrel and stepping silently through the sword fern. We stood still, breathing quietly and watched the little family until they moved off into the deeper woods. Then we walked quietly back to the car.

^ On the Eel River trail

^ In Founders Grove

^ With the Dyerville Giant

^ Fallen trees become home to thousands of species

^ A fawn in Founders Grove

We stopped for the night at Rio Del at the very humble, but perfectly fine, Humboldt Gables Motel. We got there just before the fog started to roll into the spaces between the hills. There in our little room, we laid out a left over supper of our Jyung Kang food and our salads from Bangkok Cuisine in Berkeley. Then we cuddled up in the cool night to dream our woodland dreams.

Motelling Sidebar: We love the old 50s motels, but they share one problem: tissue thin walls. At the Humboldt Gables, the German guy in the room next to ours was snoring an aria from the Gotterdammerung and it sounded like his head was on the pillow next to mine. A 21st century solution: my iPhone app, Ambiance that lets you select from a menu of sounds to drown out noise in your environment. To counteract a German tourist snore, I found rain on a tin roof to be perfect. Soon I dropped off and was probably snoring the harmony like a Rhine maiden.

^ Humboldt Gables Motel, Rio Del CA Click here for a map of this day’s locations.

Last month, while we waited for the skies to clear over Hollister so we could go up for our breathtaking glide, we drove up the road to see what was on offer at the locally famous Casa de Fruta. The Casa is a fruit stand/roadside attraction on steroids with an overwhelming amount of stuff. The whole place was hung with new garlic braids. A new braid was on our shopping list for in this area — which is famous for its garlic production — and, the price was right, so we found a nice one and checked out.

We put the braid in the back of the truck and headed off to soar through the now-clearing skies. But when we got back to the car after our glide, the heavy garlic smell hit us as soon as we opened the door. Whoa! Val wrapped the braid in two plastic bags, put the package in a brown paper bag and then tucked it deep into the kitchen stuff in the very back of the Element.

A short time later, we were on our way to Berkeley and I had to roll down my window for some fresh air. Pew! Afraid to leave it to embed its essence into the car, we took the braid into our room at the Berkeley Rodeway Inn. We stored it in the little alcove off the bathroom and we opened our window onto the courtyard. But as I reclined in bed, blogging our day, I could still smell the garlic and it was starting to get to me. Finally, I’d had it. I took the garlic out to the parking lot and put it under the front wheel of the car, where, Val pointed out, it looked like a suspicious package. A stink bomb, I said. By then, I was crabby about it — I don’t care what happens to it, I just can’t stand to smell it anymore, I said. Let some fool steal it, then it will be his stinky karmic problem. Val said he thought it would be better if he bungeed it to the roof of the car, which he did.

Back in bed, I was thinking I didn’t like the way the weird little package called attention to the car. I knew I couldn’t breathe its perfume for another two weeks. We have to get rid of it, I told Val. Cut our losses. We couldn’t mail it to ourselves, because our mail was on hold at the post office for three more weeks and you can get yourself in trouble by stinking up government workplaces. Then it came to me: we’d mail it to Laurie with instructions to hang it in one of her out-buildings, where its scent would not offend. And let me just say: you know you have a good friend when you can mail your stinky problems to them. (Thanks, Laur, you’re the best!)

So the next day, with great relief, I slid the braid into a Priority Mail box and handed the stink to the USPS. What a free feeling! In a couple of days, Laurie reported the package’s receipt and the braid is now hung safely in her garage, where the dogs give it an occasional curious sniff, but human noses remain unassailed. This weekend the braid will finally come home to Covina. It will be stored in our garage, where we hope it will mellow, or at very least, inhibit termite colonization.