REBRAND, because alliteration.

Question Five: What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever eaten?

When it comes to food, the word “crazy” brings me back to the seven course tasting menu at Le Jules Verne inside the Eiffel Tower. I had pigeon. Overlooking Paris. Five years later and it still sounds weird. Except that it really isn’t because pigeon is just poultry. Cousin chicken.

Besides that, I can’t say much. So, I’m going to interpret the word as I will. Crazy… is for those meals I always come back to. Consider this my starter guide to Eating The World — so far.

The best nachos of my life were in Montreal. A small Mexican joint suggested by a friend who went to McGill… which I weirdly cannot find on Google Maps. Very unlike me. I ordered said nachos because the table I sat at had drawers in which people could write and leave notes. The first one I picked up said “GET THE NACHOS” and yeah, they were perfect. I think it had something to do with the ingenous layering of cheese and the chip to topping ratio. There was also chai sangria involved. After a long day of walking around in the cold? Primo.

Café Savoy is one of the most famous restaurants in Prague. The kind of place where walk-ins are pretty much always turned away — even at lunch. Enter: perks of eating alone. There’s always a table for one somewhere to be found. Okay… might cry but… fruit dumplings. Look.

Baked strawberries boiled inside a light dough on a bed of sweet curds, served with melted butter, ginger cinnamon, and powdered sugar on a literal silver platter. I know you are confused. I was too. But my grandma is from Prague. I grew up with my mom making this sort of hard to find Czech comfort food, though it was nothing like this. Sorry Mama. I sat there - alone - moaning like Sally Albright in Kat’z Deli. Every. Single. Bite.

The most expensive meal of my life was courtesy of my parents and Major Food Group - but of course. We went to The Grill for my birthday. Line up: freshly-shaved truffle pasta. A lobster dish I will not dare to explain (also featured on their website’s homepage). Prime Rib rolled out on a trolley. Dessert lit on fire. You get the idea. It was absolutely sublime and disgustingly extravagant. I loved every minute of it.

Bored yet? Sucks.

On the Never Gets Old list: the first time I ever had the Miso Cod at Nobu. I ascended. Basic and beloved for good reason. Similarly, Clinton Street Baking Company Pancakes. Crammed between two equally hangry tables of hungover LES brunchers. Getting elbowed and spilling maple butter all over yourself. Nothing better. And then there’s Winkel 43 Apple Pie. The last time I was in Amsterdam I got a slice at least every other night for two weeks. Never gets old. If anything, it gets better. Makes my blood boil to know that expression is “as American as apple pie” when the Dutch did it first and better.

Now consider the opposite of crazy: normal.

A dollar slice in New York. Street tacos in Mexico City. A 2am nutella crepe in Paris. Normal. Easy to find. I was thinking maybe I just like eating on the street. But no. These are the staples. This is culture.

If you couldn’t tell in all my rambling, the craziness described here is about more than the meal. It’s not just the food. It’s the entire experience. The company. The ambiance. The memory. The feeling of the damn thing.

And for me, there are few things on this bastardly planet that I love more than a shitty slice of Two Bros at closing time. Talk about crazy.