I love visiting the Big City. You see all kinds of interesting things while driving the freeways and downtown areas. Recently in Seattle, I saw on the side of a beautifully painted mini-van the words “Falafel King.”
“What’s a falafel?” my travelling companion and I said simultaneously. Then we both burst out laughing.
“Google it,” I said. “I’m driving.”
He typed the word into his iPhone and read me the description on the display: “a deep-fried ball or patty made from ground chickpeas, fava beans, or both. Falafel is a traditional Arab food, usually served in a pita, which acts as a pocket, or wrapped in a flatbread known as lafa. The falafel balls are topped with salads, pickled vegetables, hot sauce, and drizzled with tahini-based sauces.”
“Sounds… interesting,” I ventured.
“Sounds fal-awful,” he joked.
“You just think it’s fal-awful because you can’t think about fava beans without connecting it to ‘Silence of the Lambs’.”
He agreed, we drove on, and that would have been that, except for the fact that the Universe was listening in, and when lunchtime came, we found ourselves in the Seattle Center food court. And there it was—my golden opportunity to have a falafel taste adventure.
Now, except for an unfortunate experience in Italy with octopus, and the blood sausage in Austria, I’ve been pretty lucky when I try with foods outside my generic meat and potatoes upbringing. Most of them have been quite tasty. And so I ordered the falafel, and it was so good, I might even have it again sometime… but never with a nice Chianti.