Travel has been in my blood since I was a baby with my first trans-Atlantic trip aboard the SS America. Using my Grandparents house in Germany as our summer base for many years, my family of five hopped into a VW beetle for a week or two, traveling throughout Europe and as far as Egypt and Morocco.

While we occasionally indulged to experience the “finer” local fare, we dined mostly at wonderful outdoor cafés or visited the local market squares bursting with fresh ingredients. Learning to live off the land, a picnic of rustic bread, a chunk of cheese and some fruit along the way served me well on a student’s stipend during my junior year abroad in Austria.  Of course I always had a couple schillings to enjoy a glass of wine or beer with fellow students in old caverns or have a cup of coffee and a piece of sachertorte.

With the luxury of a strong dollar diminishing and being an adult with my own family, my budget and travel itinerary changed a bit but never halted. We spent a good deal of time in our vacation villa, as I lovingly refer to our tent. Whether, it was Canada, Maine, Colorado, the Outer Banks, the US and British Virgin Islands or Belize, when we weren’t trying some of the local haunts, we always found some fresh ingredients and pulled out our trusty Coleman burner for some tasty one pot wonders.