oświęcim.

I kind of expected simple outrage and/or shock and/or disgust and/or horror, or a simple combination of similar things. Maybe it had something to do with 2016's politics and the current dismal state of human discourse and global empathy, but I didn't feel any of those things very purely. Maybe a little horror and disgust. If there was anything shocking it was probably the sheer scope of the terrible, alien machinery at Birkenau and the overall lack of humanity that the place radiated. You could hardly believe modern humans not only came up with but actually realized it and continued to participate in and manage it every day....and yet it was as simple and familiar as an industrial slaughterhouse, its goals were so horribly simple and transparent, magnified to an abominable degree.

I guess the other primary feeling was realness. It wasn't a concept anymore about which you could say "I can't even imagine it," because, well, you kind of could. I don't mean the part where you cram 700 people into a building that would more comfortably hold 40 or 50...although I guess if you've been to an exceptionally crowded rock show or in the Jordaan on Queen's/King's Day the you have an idea of what that kind of human density feels like...I mean, you know...minus the starvation, sheer terror and imminent death.

I guess I mean a primary feeling of realness like real things you could see with your eyes: there were trees there, the buildings were brick and metal, there was mud. There was grass, lots of very green grass, but I later heard that this wouldn't have been there back in the day because the prisoners kept eating it.

I tried to take pictures that would remind me of the surreal normalness of it all. Like, below: this was just a nicely designed light fixture. Below that, the three windows at ground level in that yard are the windows through which some lucky prisoners would experience the outside world for a few days until they were killed. Below that, one of the very very few smiling photos of the doomed. Below that, a cliche photo of the grass that would've been eaten plus the omnipresent barbed wire. Below that, Block 10, where they sterilized female patients, or at least experimented with things they were pretty sure would sterilize female patients though it often just killed them instead. Below that, a real pile of human hair waiting to be made into thread and/or industrial felt. Below that, Block 11, the last interior of a house prisoners would see after being tortured in the basement there and before being taken out into the courtyard and shot. Below that, the little gallows where camp commander Rudolf Höss was eventually hung. Below that, a guard outpost at Birkenau. Below that, the unloading ramp/selection platform. Etc. Etc. Etc.

Anyway. You can't even feel like "Oh, unenlightened humans of the past" about it; just trying to research some details about everything I saw mostly turned up discussion boards full of Holocaust deniers, about which I can only think what it shame it is that the universe won't inhumanely pound them and their loved ones into the same useless dust as the subjects of their retarded, shameful faux-skepticism any sooner than it definitely will eventually.

wrocław to oświęcim.

Wroclaw's atmosphere was a bit addictive, it was half Haunted Mansion, half Lost Boys, maybe those are the same thing, anyway the Goth in me loved it.

After breakfast at the hotel I went to buy picnic supplies for Auschwitz, how often can you say that.

quedlinburg to wrocław.

groningen to quedlinburg.

spring break: auschwitz.

Insert humorous lead-in here, but not too humorous: we're going to Auschwitz for Spring Break 2017. My main non-WWII history goal is to eat some food from Georgia. The republic.

And yes, I know it seems terribly, awfully wrong to have food plans around Auschwitz, but we will have a 15 year old and a 70 year old in the car, and we'll have to eat lunch on the way to the ehm "museum", we're coming from Wroclaw, and so it's like either get something at a gas station, which is almost always the same shitty food everywhere in the world, or have a lunch that is remotely Polish.

+++

QUEDLINBERG
Hotel Theophano. So many of the hotel reviews say "great food" that we should probably look at the menu when we get there. If not, there's always....
Himmel & Holle: Heaven and Hell, a flammekuchen place that KK recommended from her travels a while back.
Vincent's Käsekuchenbäckerei. A place that only does big pieces of cheesecake, this is another KK recommendation, but it's hard to imagine where it could be squeezed in. But there it is anyway.

WROCLAW
Chinkalnia. Georgian, a chain, but food looks pretty good. Ambience, not very inspiring.
U Gruzina. Georgian. A snackbar more than a cafe, but good emergency lunch option. The whole point is chaczapuri po adzarsku. I guess I'd rather drive 10 minutes to get here for a quick lunch and get my Georgian needs taken care of than plan an evening meal around it.
Mleczarnia. In the hotel. It's a self-service restaurant maybe? Anyway, reviews are very good, seems worth a beer and a bite at least.
Mama Manousch. I had a really hard time finding a place that looked like it would be OK for everybody...this was the best I could do.
Przedwojenna. Well this sounds good: “Stinky place. Every night full of drunk people who don't require any social standard. Beer is awful, vodka as well." But the photos. Full of nothing but steak tartare and beer.
Sarah. A Jewish/Polish place, looks like it could be OK but I wouldn't lead with this. Wroclaw: difficult.

AUSCHWITZ
Chata na Zaborskiej. This looks like a lodge with supposedly great food.
Karczma Mlynowska. This looks like Disneyland. With supposedly great food. Could be, eh, fun.

KRAKOW
Przystanek Pierogarnia. Pierogies. Another chain, with four locations.
Guliwer. Looks like a civilized breakfast option.
Moment. Supposedly good breakfast, but looks way lounge-y.
Kolanko No. 6. Mm, they have a breakfast buffet, but still individual things sound good, kind of an emergency cafe option.
Klezmer Hois. Our hotel, in the Jewish Quarter, a total tourist attraction and the restaurant looks exactly how that sounds, but I could imagine succumbing to this after a long long day.
Khinkalnia. Same Georgian chain, just in case Wroclaw doesn't work out.
Miod Malina.
Haha Bar & Grill. Can't remember why (oh right, zapiekanki).
Wesele.
Cafe Mlynek. Vegetarian cafe, recommended from several places, but sounds like "good but not mind-blowing" is the general consensus.
Zielona Kuchina. Beetje gourmet, zeg, not much vegetarian but one option per course.
Introligatornia Smaku. Also.

MEISSEN

Not totally sure this is happening.

sabih + amba.

VDuck has a bit of a tradition of loving multi-component street-foodie kinds of things, kind of almost more than anything else when they're really good. Chipotle corn cakes. Fish tacos. Bao. Bhel puri. Maoz Falafel.

I think the above is about ready to join those storied ranks. Indeed, it's essentially a Maoz Falafel salad box without the messy hassle of making falafel. Or a sabih without the bread and eggplant. Anyway the main delivery vehicle here is a cheela made with a handful each of chopped and sauteed spinach and iceberg lettuce, yes iceberg, I think this helps keep it moist and a little crunchy. And then there's only cumin and curry powder as the spices, basically a big falafel pancake.

The other components are zhoug; tahina and/or hummus (storebought); a tomato cucumber onion salad that's basically Momofuku's cucumber pickle plus tomatoes and a red onion; a drizzle of pomegranate molasses, a small pile of pecans, why this works so well I have no idea, you could probably combine the pecans and pomegranate molasses into an interesting spicy sticky nut thing come to think of it; and finally amba, an Israeli mango ketchup that kind of almost stole the show. There should also be fried eggplant in here but I was kind of cooked out when it came right down to it.

Anyway, it's unsurprising I guess that all of this works together so well, but with the addition of amba and its combination with zhoug and hummus it kind of becomes something I'd serve to "guests". In Israel they add a hard-boiled egg, which sounds fucking great. You could probably add a drizzle of yogurt and/or sriracha and that would also be great. Fuck, just keep drizzling things until there's nothing left to drizzle. Drizzle.

+++

amba. 

250g frozen mango pieces
2 or 3 cloves garlic
1/4 cup white wine vinegar
juice of a lemon
2 tbsp honey or agave syrup
1 tsp ground turmeric
1 tsp toasted cumin seed
salt to taste
1/2 cup to 1 cup water

Mmm, yeah, just blitz everything except the water in a food processor, adding enough of the water to make it blitzable, and then cook it for 10-15 minutes on the stove, adding the rest of the water to get to a ketchup-like consistency. Adjust to get to ketchup-like levels of salt and sweetness and sourness. Use liberally.

+++

brown note.

Difficult to photograph, but yeah another surprise from the Anna Jones cookbook. Don't know where this idea came from originally, she said she got it from a Japanese place in London, but Ottolenghi's got one too...it seems to just work. I found that adding a little of this to some buttery cabbage and mushrooms was not a terrible idea.

+++

miso-walnut paste. 
2 tbsp miso
100g toasted walnuts
2 tbsp date syrup
splash rice vinegar
1 tbsp soy sauce or ketjap manis depending on what direction you're headed.

Blend.

+++

pech onderweg.