An Albanian love story

relinquishing control, and eating good

My life has always revolved around food, I could go into great detail about how all of my fondest and most vivid memories are centered around the ethereal moment of a first bite.

I recently just finished Stanley Tucci’s memoir “My Life Through Food”, and sparked my desire to share more about my relationship with cooking and food. While posting fun little recipes and videos are great, they feel very “turn and burn”. I’ve been in love with food since I was sentient. The most fulfilling element of this pillar in my life is sharing food, the stories, the feelings, recreating those experiences for people I love, and the intimate and magical feelings that a good meal with good people brings to our hearts. I want to share more, so here we go.

I want to start with Albania.

Now, in 2018 I had zero intention of visiting, I had no reason or rhyme to take my Italian whimsical solo trip to the Albanian shores. But, I was in southern Italy, my friend was leaving Greece, and our paths needed to cross. Chris, fresh out of Italian Culinary school, and on vacation in Greece, shares the same appreciation and deep love for good food. He assured me that we needed to visit Albania and that it would be worth it, he promised. Throwing caution to the wind, considering it was out of my intricately planned schedule, I got on a sketchy plane to Durres.

I don’t relinquish travel control to many, there’s maybe one other person I’d trust to book, plan, research, and schedule a trip. Shout out to our beloved, Serena Arena, to know her is to love her, as well as know everything will be taken care of and top tier. I am someone who spends months researching the best restaurants, grocers, accommodations, flights, and activities before even booking. So letting Chris take the reigns was a jump for me, I digress.

We landed in Durres hungry for fresh seafood and a crisp glass of wine. Our Airbnb was on the beach, which I will say looked forgotten and empty. But we were optimistic and going in blind to Albania. Chris had promised me that the seafood was great and the hiking was gorg, I trusted Chris. We found an empty beach club, and dismissed the initial hesitation of us not speaking any Albanian and our server not speaking any English, Spanish, or Italian, and simply said, “Whatever you like, we’ll eat”. When traveling, I just tried to adhere to this method. They served us the daily special of fried fish, squid, and oysters. The fish was phenomenal, small, and flaky. Anyone who believes that you need copious amounts of bearnaise to enjoy fish is deeply sick. There is no greater joy than a quick grilled fish with lemon and a cold glass of wine. We sat there for hours drinking bottles of wine till we were just drunk enough to figure out how to say “përshëndetje”, or hello, to the potential cute boys we were sure we would run into.

As the days went on, we drank, did illicit things on the beach with strangers who shared no common language, ate uni fresh off the rocks from our neighbors, hiked into unmarked forests, searched for any sign of a party, and ate as much as possible. We let our hunger guide our days, asking anyone who’d look our way where to find the best meal. We were eating about every two hours, and falling over our ridiculous attempts to speak and Albanian.

The trip was short, but we ate and drank so much it felt like bender that left us 10 lbs heavier, a brain so fogged and dehydrated only a Gauloises cigarette could clear.

Looking back on this trip, I wish I had taken more photos to reminisce on the succulent lamb we ate on the side of the road, the tender calamari, the trachana and espresso combination, or the perfectly tart yogurts. To be free, for me, is to eat my experiences. I’ll remember this trip purely on the notion that we had no idea what we were doing there, we were just hungry.

Albania remains to be a bit of a mystery to my memory, long days in the sun with an ungodly amount of wine and little water will do that to you. But, I’ll remember the food, I’ll always remember the food.