R.I.P. Pedro & Vinny’s

When all seemed hopeless at my dead-end internship gig in Washington, all I needed was a Pedro & Vinny’s vegetarian burrito to pick myself up again.  For four measly bucks, one could get a huge burrito with beans (black and tan), salsa and hot sauces of various scovilles and hues.  On top of that, York peppermint patties and samples of the proprietor’s habanero mango sauce were gratis.  The line at the cart felt like a queue on a mountaintop, each of us waiting to ask the grizzled old wise man a question.  ”What is the meaning of life?” I’d ask.  ”Is there a God?”

 

“Here’s your burrito.  That’ll be $4.” 

 

The cart has since closed, the proprietor lost to the wilds of South Carolina.  Thanks Pedro & Vinny’s, for making my stay in D.C. bearable.

 

Into The Heart of Darkness, pt. 3

The glorious end to our tour of Vietnam brought us to my family’s hometown of Vũng Tàu; who can resist a trip back home to partake in a frustrating trek through unfamiliar neighborhoods to find one’s ancestral home? (We couldn’t find ours, of course.) Apparently the house is cursed or something? I don’t know, Vietnam makes no sense.

When we finally gave up our fruitless search, we took on the vastly lighter task of finding banh khot, the specialty of the city. Banh Khot is a rice cake with a shrimp in the middle of it which is shaped and seared in a special pan and covered with shrimp powder. And yes, you dip it in fish sauce. These were fucking amazing! I highly recommend that you motherfuckers make the trip out to Vũng Tàu to try these, because there is no happier dish in the whole world. Stare at this and salivate, you swine.