Roses ‘n’ Cream Ice Cream at Baskin Robbins

I hate to admit it, but I’m much more likely to complain about my negative experiences than acknowledge the positive ones, which is why my experience at Baskin Robbins in the Marina Mall last night is such a stand-out experience: it was not just amazing, but amazing enough to write about!

First, I noticed there was a flavour called ‘Fuji Apple’ so I asked for a sample. It reminded me of and made me feel wistful for the apple mint ice cream that BR in Korea serves seasonally, so I told the guy who was working about how much I loved apple mint ice cream. He offered to mix some Fuji Apple together with some mint chocolate chip for me. I declined, but he went ahead and gave me a small sample. It just wasn’t the same as the real apple mint, but the gesture was one of the sweetest gestures I’ve received in a long time from a person in the service industry.

I was about to order a scoop of cotton candy ice cream, which is my fallback choice when no other flavours appeal to me when the guy behind the counter suggested I try rose ice cream. Before I could say anything, he’d run over and spooned out a small sample for me. It was delicious, so I changed my order to roses ‘n’ cream ice cream. Well, now, the other guy who was working that evening, who had been quiet up until now called out, “Be careful! It has a thorn in it! Get it? Because it’s roses?!” Ba-dumtsch! What a couple of jokesters. They sure made things fun, anyway.

And there you have it, ladies and gents: as South Korea Baskin Robbins brought us apple mint ice cream, Baskin Robbins in the Middle East has given us roses ‘n’ cream ice cream.

Twix White

I’ve seen this in both Dubai and Kuwait, but I’ve never seen it in Canada or Asia, so I think it’s about special enough to share here.

Actually, though, while the concept is special, I think the traditional Twix enrobed in milk chocolate tastes much better.

Stuffed Vine Leaves

I love stuffed vine leaves. They’ve got rice and lemon and mint and tomato all wrapped up in a vine leaf and they’re just delicious (not to mention healthy).

Samboosa

I love samosas (they’re called “samboosa” here), and I also love the few tiny Indian restaurants I’ve now found, but I’ve quickly come to the realization that, if you like your food to not be cold/a little frozen in the middle, maybe it’s best not to order samosas from these places. I love all the other food I’ve had at these restaurants and even the samosas are tasty, but three out of four times that I’ve ordered samosas, they’ve arrived with still cold centres.

Speaking of samboosa, here is an awesome Kuwait music video called “Samboosa”:

Halloumi Sandwich at Starbucks

The other week I promised a photo of the halloumi sandwich at Starbucks, so here it is. It’s pretty delightful.

McDonalds Beach, Kuwait

Since I’m on a McDonalds roll, I’ll talk about this. In Kuwait, McDonalds has its very own beach, accessible through several pairs of giant Golden Arches. Is this your idea of heaven or hell?

McDonalds in Kuwait

This is a blog post I’ve tried to write before, but at the moment I’m managing this blog on an iPhone. Last time I made this post, I was nearly finished when I pushed one wrong button by accident and it all went away. Wish me better luck this time.

Here is the McArabia. It comes in some neato packaging so you don’t have to get your hands dirty when you eat it.

After the McArabia, I was feeling a bit baleful because I didn’t think there was much unique about McDonalds in the Middle East. Then I realised that I have never seen a Chicken Big Mac anywhere but in the Middle East, so here it is. It’s basically just a chicken burger constructed like a Big Mac. It’s just okay, but it could be made much better if it had actual Mac sauce instead of plain mayonnaise.

There is also the McFizz, which I’m realising was just a limited time offer. No matter, as it’s basically just a glorified soft drink, anyway. I chose the blue one mostly because I like the colour blue, but also because it claimed to have passion fruit flavouring, and I like passion fruit. And I’d be lying if I said its name (I think it was called the Blue Lagoon) and the mention of the word “curaçao” made me think of a cocktail and whetted my thirst just a bit (but alas! this was not a cocktail, just a simple soft drink– we are in the Middle East, after all, and alcohol is haram).

Throwback Thursday: McDonalds in Kuwait

McDonalds in Kuwait now uses more environmentally friendly packaging for their Big Macs but last time I lived here, just five short years ago, they were still using styrofoam Big Mac boxes!

More food in Souk Mubarakiya

Even though my mission at Souk Mubarakiya this weekend was to get Christmas gifts for my dad and brothers, I managed to fritter away the afternoon people-watching and checking out the various other stalls, as well.

When I was having fun visiting with the butchers in the market, there was a man there who felt I needed “rescuing”. He offered to buy me tea, and since I have a hard time saying no, I accepted. I would have preferred to have finished my chat with the butchers in my own time and then wandered at will, but die some reason I have a very hard time telling people what I want and what I do not want, so I let this man lead me in circles around the market. I didn’t like it at all, as true butchers were right next to the place I wanted to be and I felt like this man was getting me lost. Finally, I voiced my displeasure at feeling lost and at the fact that he had lead me so far away from the part of the market I wanted to be in, and he was able to find a tea shop within seconds. Funny. I politely sipped my tea and made small-talk, but also tried to make it clear that I had firm plans for my visit to the market, so I couldn’t spend the whole afternoon sitting there sipping tea with a stranger who, frankly, made me feel pretty uncomfortable.

Finally, I was able to make my escape (I feel bad that I feel like I needed to ‘escape’ as the man was probably just trying to be hospitable, but anyway), and I made my way back to the part of the market I wanted to be in. I knew I was close when I found the vegetable vendors. In this part of the market, there are murals depicting grocers selling vegetables. Not far off from this part of the market are the fish vendors, and you know you’re getting close to the fish vendors when you start to see murals of– you guessed it– fish vendors.

After wandering around enjoying the vegetables and the murals, I wandered into the spice part of the souk. The spice vendors have tiny little shops crammed with containers brimming with all sorts of spices. As I love to cook (and also as the intense scent of bulk spice brings me back to my childhood in the butcher shop), I cannot get enough of spice markets.

After the spice, I wanted to check out the gold shops. Either I wasn’t able to find any gold shops or that part of the souk isn’t open on Fridays. Regardless, I was walking around, going nowhere, looking for something I couldn’t find, when I came across a sweet shop. Mmmmm, there was halwa and Turkish delight and other yummy stuff in the window. I had to hold back from buying it all up because I’ve been gaining a lot of weight in the past few months, and I’ve finally made a decision to do something about it, starting with cutting back on the amount of food (especially sugar) that I eat. Otherwise, I probably would have bought a little of everything in they window.

I didn’t really have anything special planned for after the spice market. I’m kind of a loner, so I didn’t have any Friday night plans or anything, but I wasn’t in the mood to go home just yet, so I wandered some more into the part of the market that sells kitchen wares.

I also gawked at all the kitties. I LOVE cats, and there were so many of them in the market. The only problem with cats in Kuwait is that they are so feral that you couldn’t (and probably wouldn’t want to) get terribly close to them. Anyway, I thought these kitties hopefully watching the people in this restaurant were pretty adorable.

Mutton Market in Souk Mubarakiya

Today, I went to Souk Mubarakiya in Kuwait City to buy some Christmas gifts for my family. Last time I was there, I found some beautiful hand-crafted leather-bound notebooks, and I wanted to buy some for my dad and brothers.

Souk Mubarakiya is huge and, to someone who’s unfamiliar with the place (like me), it’s easy to get lost/disoriented. At first, I just wandered around aimlessly, a little frustrated cloud growing overt head because nothing was looking familiar and I felt like I was looking for a needle in a haystack. Then I remembered that the stall I was looking for was fairly close to the Mutton Market in the souk. Last time I came to the souk, it was with one other new teacher at my school and the school’s driver. He had mischievously suggested that we pay a visit to the mutton market. In hindsight, he’d probably expected that this pair of western girls would be totally grossed out and insist that we didn’t want to go. And that was exactly the other girl’s reaction. But me, my parents bought a butcher shop when I was four years old and I grew up around it, so I have quite the fondness for and interest in butchers worldwide. I said I was interested, so he was then obliged to take me to the mutton market. Thank goodness he had tried that prank because it was the only way I was able to orient myself when I came back to the souk alone today.

When you get near the mutton market in Souk Mubarakiya, there are butcher-themed murals. Turn towards them and then you are in a wide “alley” crammed with butcher stalls. Today, probably because I was a single, unaccompanied white girl, I caused quite the sensation in the mutton market. Soon all of the younger butchers wanted me to pose for photos with them while the older butchers sat and looked on, expressions of amusement or weariness on their faces.

My family sold our butcher shop ten years ago, so it’s been years since I’ve properly been in a butcher shop. Just like Proust’s Madeleine brought him back to a long forgotten memory, as soon as I stepped inside the first butcher stall to pose for a picture with one of the butchers and the slightly sweet scent of a raw side of beef wafted into my nostrils (technically it was mutton, but my family dealt mostly with beef and the scent is mostly the same), I was brought clear back to my childhood, to time spent doing hard work with my brothers and my father, which wouldn’t have been very much fun for a young girl except I loved spending time with my brothers. And I’m actually proud to be (or have been) a butcher’s daughter. Working in that meat packing plant is the only reason I’ve never become a full-blown vegetarian. A lot of people think animals that get slaughtered are treated cruelly or they think that all kinds of disgusting things happen to their meat, but I know that if you find a quality butcher, neither if those things are true and you can be assured that your meat is ethical and sanitary.

Technically, this post isn’t about anything I ate, but since this is a blog about food, and since butchers sell food, I figured I’d share this story with all y’all.