On an island on a lake in a volcano on an island

Coffee, volcanoes, civil war, orangutans, epic surfing and the epicenter of the 2004 tsunami make Sumatra a well-known island in Indonesia. However, it is not very popular with tourists (yet) probably because of the lack of infrastructure and fear of something going down in Banda Aceh where most of the violence occurred several years ago. 

Padang: great for food! But that was about it

Sumatra is a great place to visit but perhaps not during Ramadan. Although food was generally available to non-Muslims (and those Muslims who decided to cheat), it was tough to find good food. 

In spite of this hiccup, we still had a lot of fun especially because one of our good friends from California came out to visit. The top two destinations in Sumatra, in our humble opinion, are Lake Toba and Pulau Weh. As a side note, the biggest trap in Sumatra, we found out, was the Mentawai islands, one of the world's surfing meccas. The locals have taken advantage of the surfing fame and charge insane prices for food, lodging and transportation. A simple 10 minute round trip on a local wooden boat to a surf break will cost you $200 US dollars and most people buy instant noodles in Padang, the launch point, because local food is outrageously expensive. No thanks!!

Joyriding around Lake Toba

Lake Toba, on the other hand, is an amazing destination just a couple of hours outside the terribly crowded and polluted city of Medan. Lake Toba is actually a lake inside the crater of a giant volcano and it is, in fact, the world's largest crater lake. An island called Samosir sits in the middle of this crater lake and is larger than all of Singapore. 

Tuk Tuk, a small village on Samosir, is home to the Batak people, one of the few Christian communities in the world's largest Muslim country. 

Batak architecture 

Batak culture is very unique and they have their own architectural style, consisting of beautiful wood carvings on large roofs dominated by red, black and white colors. The island has many lake front guesthouses, great cafes and lots of delicious little hole-in-the wall restaurants. 

Chilling and kayaking on the lake (with Guiness on board!)

Each night, you can enjoy fresh, locally caught fish which is barbecued to perfection, along with an ice cold beer plus fresh fruit salad for no more than $6 bucks total. The fish at Lake Toba was definitely some of the best we had in all the countries we visited (up there with Masqouf in Dubai and the fresh fish in Zanzibar) due to its freshness and the slow roast preparation over coals. 

The lake is surprisingly clean and really fun for swimming or kayaking. Our day activities consisted of lounging by the beaches on the lake, taking a cooking class (Batak cuisine was one of the best we had in Indonesia), renting bikes to explore Tuk Tuk, hiking up to see the small lake on the island on the lake in the volcano on the island or grabbing scooters to see the incredible views from the top of the island. 

You can easily spend two weeks on this awesome lake eating like royalty, relaxing and exploring.

Pulau Weh's pristine waterfall

Pulau ("island" in Indonesian) Weh is an awesome little island off the north coast of Banda Aceh. Banda Aceh itself was a very nice city and we wouldn't have minded spending a little more time there. Anyway, Pulau Weh sits very close to the epicenter of the 2004 tsunami and is a gem of a spot. 

The humidity is remarkably low and temperatures are not too high, making the weather in Pulau Weh extremely pleasant. Pulau Weh is a big island, completely covered by dense jungle where tons of monkeys and snakes thrive. 

There is a beautiful waterfall tucked away in the thick of the jungle but accessible by foot and there's even a local 'volcano' where sulfur hot springs abound. A tour of the whole island can be done one a scooter in just a few hours.

The view from the top of Pulau Weh's hills

The fame, however, behind Pulau Weh is its awesome diving and snorkeling. The northwest part of the island has the best beaches and diving spots so we parked it there for almost three weeks. Although the local reef suffered very intense damage and bleaching from a freak rise in water temperature back in 2010, the abundance of marine life is amazing and definitely makes up for the lack of color. 

Fine diving with the folks at LumbaLumba

We saw some of the largest schools of parrot fish we had ever seen, there was a honeycomb eel the size of Eliot (he's 6'3"!), sea turtles, reef sharks, psychedelic crazy looking octopi and hundreds upon hundreds of colorful little reef fish all over the place. 

Unfortunately accomodation was mediocre at best and the food, unfortunately, is just average. However, we were lucky enough to find lodging at the only Italian restaurant on the whole island for our last week. Drea got to practice her Italian with the owners and their ridiculously cute multi-lingual child. We ate heaps of lasagna, pasta puttanesca and drooled over some of the best tiramisu ever. 

Tiramisu madness at the one and only Italian restaurant: Bixio

Pulau Weh sucked us in a little bit and we suddenly realized we were running out of time. Although we would have loved to go white water rafting on some world class rapids that apparently rival the Karnali in Nepal and hiking on some of the volcanoes north of Lake Toba, we couldn't make anything work because of the craziness of the week after Ramadan. We can't wait to get back to Sumatra during a different time of the year so we can avoid Ramadan, find some cheaper surfing spots and get our paddling on!

But for now, we were going to escape to the nearest Buddhist country: Thailand...

Co-posted on www.eliotpeper.com 

Our backyard for a week @ Pulau Weh!

You say you like Ethiopian food? Wait 'til you read THIS!

Ahhh... Ethiopian food: injera topped with spicy, unique stews and dips served with a nice honey wine and topped off with a sweet, sweet, delicious bunna (coffee) at the end. For us foreigners, this is what we know as Ethiopian food. It's tasty. It's delicious. People love it.

Although "Ethio-pizza" does not qualify as one of the three hidden gems below, it was  still fun to eat!

But there is a whole 'nother side to Ethiopian food that I did not know existed until I visited Ethiopia. Ethiopian food has three "hidden gems," to which I had no previous exposure. The first time I encountered them... it was like love at first sight.

Behold, I unveil to you the three hidden food gems of Ethiopia!


#1. FRUIT SPRICE

Layered Goodness!!

Sprice (sounds more like "spreece") means "mixed" in Amharic, the national language in Ethiopia. Ethiopians make this delicious layered smoothie with fresh, ripe fruit and serve it with lime on the side. You can drink it using a straw or spoon it all up to make the pleasure last longer. A good Sprice is thick and full of flavor, never watered down.

The layers usually consist of: creamy avocado smoothie in the bottom, followed by a middle layer of thick guava juice, topped by naturally sweet and thick mango juice plus a final thinner layer of papaya or banana smoothie.

This flavor rainbow is brought out in a huge mug and sometimes topped with vinto, a super sweet sugary sauce that we always opted out of.

The best part of Sprice? It's a great way to start the day plus you get at least 3 servings of fruit.

We usually found Sprice in most fruit shops, especially in bigger cities like Addis Ababa, Gondar, Lallibella and Bahir Dar. Unbeknownst to us, most fruit shops have a small 'restaurant' inside where the secret Sprice as well as gem #2 are served...

#2. SALAD "ATAKELT"

The strangest, best salad ever: Atakelt

Oh yes, we found legit salad in Ethiopia! After having Sprice for the first time, we indulged in an enormous plate of fresh and amazing Atakelt, a unique and incredibly filling salad.

I would have never, in a thousand years, thought to put all the ingredients in an Atakelt together and serve it as a salad. Good thing someone else did because this thing is amazing!

Atakelt salad consists of a bed of lettuce topped with an entire, sliced avocado, an entire sliced up, boiled, peeled potato, chunks of ripe, sweet tomato, sprinkles of red onion, carrot and green hot peppers PLUS sliced bananas! Atakelt is dressed with vinegar (OMG had not had vinegar in months!!!), a bit of salt and, if you want, a dangerously spicy and tasty powder that tasted like a mix of ground pepper and chili.

I know it may not sound good but this strange concoction is one of the best salads I've ever had! We often had a giant Sprice followed by a giant Atakelt (it's so large we had to share one!) for lunch and were incredibly satisfied and full of healthy energy. I'm definitely adding Sprice and Atakelt to my diet back in California! Can't wait to make it, especially during Hass Avo season.

#3. REAL AUTHENTIC ITALIAN FOOD. I REPEAT, REAL AUTHENTIC ITALIAN FOOD, JUST LIKE IN ITALY.

Delicious italian appetizers @ Castellis in Piazza, Addis Ababa

A long, long time ago (2004), I lived in Italy for a little while. One of the saddest things about leaving was knowing that unless I went back to Italy, I would never, ever again have the opportunity to indulge in one of the world's best cuisines. Italian food elsewhere is not the real deal. In order to have the good stuff, one must go to Italy.

Or Ethiopia.

Several decades ago, Italy decided to try to invade Ethiopia and failed. Twice. Ethiopia's army kicked Italian butt and protected Ethiopia from becoming yet another European colony. Ethiopians are very proud of this part of their history and although the Italians were swiftly kicked out, they left a bit of culinary legacy behind. Many of the macchiatos and espressos found throughout the country's cafes are, of course, made in Italian espresso machines. Many Ethiopians even adapted spaghetti as part of their diet.

But one of the best parts of this culinary legacy is a restaurant in the heart of Addis Ababa called Castellis.

Italian food: oh how I've missed the REAL you!

One random night in Addis, we saw a sign for an "Italian" restaurant. There's only so much injera we could eat so we decided to give it a shot and boy am I glad we did! Apparently we lucked out because we needed a reservation but managed to sneak in the second they opened their doors at 7pm. Dining at Castellis was like being zapped back to Italy. Eliot had never ever had real authentic Italian food and was completely enamored by it. I couldn't believe the authenticity of the food here- even our Ethiopian waiter spoke Italian. A fellow Italian diner commented on my "good pronunciation" (wohoo!) when I ordered the fettuccine al nero di seppia con calamari and he vouched for Castellis by saying it was indeed like a little part of Italy and that the food here was absolutely excellent.

That night we indulged in the insalata di casa plus some home made cheese, sun dried tomatoes and grilled veggies as appetizers. Sadly, they were out of the fettuccine so we ordered the lasagna and some porcini mushroom raviolini as our primi piatti - to top it all off, all of the pasta was home made and they use real e.v.o.o (extravirginoliveoil)!  

Raviolini with porcini mushrooms: yes please, I'll have one of those!

Well, there they are! I have to admit when we decided to go to Ethiopia for the "food", I never thought I'd find these three gems there. Thank you, Ethiopia for a healthy and unexpected dose of FRUIT, SALAD and ITALIAN FOOD!