Welcome to weirdcombinations! We’re glad that you’ve found us. We’ve been at it for a while now and finally think that we know what this blog is all “about.” Here we explore the pleasures and the limits of food, wine, popular culture and… computers.
Ahh, computers, truly we love you, but as wonderful as you are, you’re also so limited… you’re all zero or one, zero or one, zero or one.
Are things really that simple? We don’t think so. Of course, you can have wine without food, or food without wine; one or the other, zero or one, but, alas, who really does that?
Mostly, ideally, you have your wine with your food; or your food with your wine, and presumably you have other interests as well. That’s what we mean by weirdcombinations: appreciating the messy fullness of life with all of its complexity, excitement, frustration and delight. That does not translate well into a “normal” single issue blog.
things can't always fit into neat little boxes, and why should they, anyway?
Instead, we like to think of this as a blog one hundred percent dedicated to vegetarian and occasionally pescetarian food; while at the same time, we’re a blog totally dedicated to primarily Californian and French wine with a strong bias towards reds; while we’re also sincerely dedicated to other compelling and personally gratifying stuff. Sure, it can seem a bit confusing when so many blogs have a laser-like focus on a single topic, but, hey, real life isn’t like the movies, either.
We strive to be more than zero or one.
Here you’ll read about the culinary adventures of two guys in the kitchen as we cook healthy, satisfying, and flavorful food for ourselves and our understanding and, at times, brave friends. Like with most amateur cooks, sometimes things don’t come out quite as we hoped. Fortunately that’s not that often. We’re really into Indian, Southeast Asian and occasional Chinese inspired dishes. We try unusual fruit as satisfying (with rare exceptions) dessert alternatives. We’re big fans of Mediterranean cuisines, Mexican food, Brazilian country classics and traditional American comfort dishes. We’re not afraid to mix and match ingredients and cooking styles either.
Since we’re in San Francisco, you’ll be able to vicariously go wine tasting with us in Napa and Sonoma Counties and, once in a while, further a field.
The City by the Bay is famous for its tourist attractions and its fine restaurants. Here you’ll dine with us at sometimes good, sometimes just ok hot-spots. Though since taste is subjective, you should check these places out yourselves, regardless of what we say.
We believe that life isn’t complete without learning and reflecting on the world. So inevitably we read a lot. We’re thrilled to tell you what excites (and irritates) us about what we’ve been reading, whether that’s the Slow Food Movement, Julia Child’s biography, Bordeaux Châteaux, Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series, the latest by Mireille Guiliano, or blogging itself. Things, be it food, wine, books or other entertainment, are always more fun when shared.
Antonyms for “weird” from some on-line dictionary are “normal,” “regular,” or “usual.” That sounds like zero-or-one thinking to us. Normal seems so, how to say it… plain somehow: not bad, just a bit dull. If you agree, then welcome again to weirdcombinations, a blog mostly dedicated to vegetarian food, red wine and the search for the good life. Just like you, we want to live well, but we refuse to be put in a box.
Salut! Enjoy!
One note of warning: we are pescetarian: vegetarians that eat fish. This does not mean that we are radical, Northern Californian food crazies. Rather we have just made a choice about eating. And that’s the whole point of weirdcombinations, after all, trying to make meaningful choices about our lives. That said, we do not ignore or make judgments about meat, poultry and other “land animals.” Generally we simply leave it to you, our readers, to address these. The one exception to this rule is the site category: meat. This is a compromise for those of the weirdcombos crew that desperately want to comment on topics not covered elsewhere in the site: be these meats in the traditional sense, popular culture, travel or whatever floats our boat at the time.
