Where I talk about what it means to me to cook well and encourage you to show some love to my entry in Anthony Bourdain’s essay contest.

A tale of adventure and intrigue that culminates with a recipe for a tasty treat. In the interest of full disclosure, it may be less like adventure and intrigue, and more like rambling snarkiness. But there is still a recipe!

Those of you who are my friend on Facebook or follow The Magical Buffet on Twitter know that this past Sunday I got to see Anthony Bourdain from the television show “No Reservations” give a lecture and attend a meet and greet with the author/television personality. I wasn’t sure I was going to write about attending the event, but I’ve had so many people ask me what the event was like that I figured it would be easier to write about the whole experience here than to send out many, many emails. Seriously, you guys really want the Bourdain dish!

Readers will remember that last month I had been anticipating trying mofongo, which had fallen through but introduced me to Goya Malta. Well folks, this little lady finally got herself some mofongo, and it was magical.

When I know in advance that there is a restaurant I’ll be going out to eat at, I generally look to see if they have a website with a menu. This is a good way for me to see if there is something that looks tasty that is low in calories and fat (Thank you restaurants that provide nutritional information!), or if it’s hopeless and I should just order whatever the heck I want. Well a while back, in anticipation of trying mofongo (which fell through), I was looking at an online menu for a Caribbean restaurant. Listed amongst their beverages was Goya Malta.

Here’s a hint, it involves using hot dogs in a new way. Click into the article…I dare you.

As you will remember from my attempts to master the flaming mojito it was decided that flaming mojitos just weren’t worth the effort or the nasty Bacardi 151 taste. Upon that decision I asked my husband, Jim, what are we going to do with the 151 that’s left? He told me that we would flame drinks again, just not mojitos. And so I foolishly asked, what the heck mixed drinks are you going to set on fire? How about non-alcoholic ones? Ha, how about a Shirley Temple?

If you’re like me, you love watching “No Reservations” on the Travel Channel with Anthony Bourdain. And if you do watch, you know that Bourdain has a thing for Vietnam, and even more specifically a Vietnamese noodle soup called pho (pronounced fuh, like duh with an f). Every time he’s anywhere in Vietnam you get treated to watching him and his cohorts slurping down this soup while an elaborate voice over explains why this is the soup to end all soups (I suspect the voice overs are because he doesn’t want to stop eating to discuss.).

Now many of my readers live in large cities and I suspect getting yourself a bowl of pho isn’t too rough if there’s any kind of Vietnamese population where you live. With a little research I found two places about 30 minutes from where I live that serve pho, so I picked the one that had good reviews for its pho and was located somewhere I felt confident I could find. So, at the end of May, for my birthday, my husband took me there for lunch so I could finally try pho.

I can’t clearly recall when the idea struck my husband and I, but at some point we just went, “We should make flaming drinks for our friends.” And thus began our quest for fire.

Another food article that was originally on Greg Bullard’s website, www.whatgregeats.com.