I know almonds are supposed to be one of the best things people can snack on, but there’s just something so obnoxiously wholesome about them. In their natural state they taste like joyless tree bark. And the people who can eat bags of raw, skin-on almonds as their afternoon snack without immediately reaching for a bag of ruffles afterward exhibit a level of discipline that I find frightening.

On the other hand, I love the flavor of salty, roasted almonds on ice cream or with butter on my green beans. It took me an embarrassing amount of time to figure out that the worst thing about almonds as a snack is the skin (stupid, tooth-sticking nut-bark) and the raw-ness. And that both of these issues are easily fixable.

The secret to crave-able, snack-worthy almonds is blanching. Dunk raw almonds in boiling water for about 30 seconds, pull them out and shock them with some cold water, then salt them and roast them yourself. The result isn’t just better than raw almonds, it’s completely transformed. I would even go as far as to deem these almonds worthy of appearing next to a wedge of parmesan on your next cheese tray. Plus, with blanching and roasting, you haven’t even really altered the caloric content of the almonds, so yay.

Popping the almonds out of their skins is about a 15 minute time commitment for a full pound of almonds, but it’s worth it if you ask me. If anyone comes up with a more efficient skin-removal method than popping the almonds out one-by-one, I’m all ears.

I prefer eating these almonds plain, but they’re also really easy to jazz up. For this variation I just heated some oil in a pan, added some crushed garlic, a dash of curry powder, a pinch of cayenne, and tossed in the almonds for an extra layer of flavor. They don’t need it, but they do like it.

Naked Roasted Almonds

Ingredients:
raw almonds
salt

Variations:
olive oil or butter
garlic, crushed
your favorite spices

Method:
1. Set a medium-sized pot of water over high heat and bring it to a boil. Prepare a bowl of cold water with ice and set it aside. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Blanch your almonds in the boiling water about a cup at a time. The almonds may cause the water to bubble up, so add them slowly. After thirty seconds or so, use a slotted spoon to transfer them to the bowl of ice water.
3. After blanching the almonds, you will notice that the skins have wrinkled up and loosened around the almonds. One by one, pinch the almonds until they pop out of their skins and transfer them to a baking sheet.
4. While the almonds are still wet, sprinkle them liberally with salt and give them a stir. Roast them in your pre-heated oven for between 15-20 minutes, or until they are as brown as you like them. Allow them to cool and snack away.

* If you want to add extra flavor, heat a Tablespoon or two of olive oil or butter in a pan over medium heat and throw in a clove of garlic to infuse the oil. Once the garlic is fragrant, add a teaspoon or two of your favorite spices (I used curry and cayenne, but you could use paprika, black pepper, cumin, etc). It’s really hard to screw these up, so play around and find what you like best.

I love potato salad. It is full of potatoes – which I adore, and usually mayo – which is also delicious. I eat potato salad in all it’s iterations too: fully loaded, mustardy and eggy, german with bacon, etc. But sometimes they can get a little heavy and overly complicated with indistinct, muddy flavors. This recipe is great because it’s simple and  fresh tasting without being boring at all. In fact it’s rather punchy in the flavor department.

To keep the flavors clean and the texture interesting, I chose to highlight dill pickles with baby yukon gold potatoes. The rest of my ingredients are there support and compliment the main players.

You could use whatever potatoes you like with this same dressing, but I really like the texture of baby yukon gold potatoes and the way they hold themselves together when they’re cooked. Nothing mushy or muddy happening in this salad at all – it’s fresh, summery, rich and bright all at once.

Dill Pickle Potato Salad
makes 6-8 side dish servings

Ingredients:
-about 3 pounds yukon gold potatoes
-1/3 cup mayo
-1/3 cup sour cream
-1/3 cup dill pickles, chopped
-a splash of pickle juice (a few tablespoons)
-1 clove garlic, grated or finely minced
-2-3 tbsp. fresh dill, chopped
-2-3 tbsp. fresh chives, chopped
-salt and pepper to taste

Method:
1. Wash potatoes and remove any weird eyes or grassy stem pieces. Put potatoes in a pot, cover with cold, salted water and allow to come to a boil slowly (over medium to medium-high heat). Cook potatoes until a knife inserted into a potato will slide back out without sticking at all.
2. While potatoes cook, make dressing by whisking together your favorite mayo, sour cream and pickles. Add pickle juice, garlic, dill, chives, salt, and pepper. Taste the dressing and add more salt or pickle juice if necessary. The dressing should be pretty strong – remember it has to give flavor to the potatoes which don’t have a lot going on by themselves.
3. Once the potatoes are done cooking, allow them to cool slightly and cut them into bite-sized pieces (if your potatoes are very small you may only want to halve them). Stir the still-warm potatoes into the dressing and taste the salad for seasoning. Add more salt if necessary. Serve chilled or at room temperature.

About a year ago I posted a formula for scones that could be made savory or sweet. At the time I chose to highlight the recipe’s versatility by making cheddar chive scones, but I want to remind everyone, and make sure you are all fully and viscerally aware that my old recipe works just perfectly for sweets.

Plus, whenever I eat strawberry shortcake, the shortcakes are really dry and um dry. These scones are the opposite of dry because they are full of butter and cream and topped with crackly sugar and the textural contrast is just incomparable (especially fresh out of the oven…mmph). They are also simple to make and an appropriate substitute for shortcake (in my opinion) because they aren’t overly sweet.

You can top them however you like, but I do recommend whipped cream and berries. It’s the right thing to do this time of year.

My sister’s weasely little chihuahua, Bandit, agrees. But he’s not allowed sweets like this, so eat one for him, will you?

Scones with Strawberries and Cream
serves 6-8

Ingredients:
for scones:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 Tbsp baking powder
3 Tbsp brown sugar (plus more for sprinkling)
1 stick butter
1 cup heavy cream (plus more for brushing)
for toppings:
about 1 pound strawberries, sliced
2-3 cups heavy cream (make it a full quart if your guests are enthusiastic about it, adjust sugar as needed)
2-3 Tbsp granulated sugar
pinch of salt

Method:
1. Follow instructions outlined (with illustrations) for making scone dough and baking it properly in my “last scone recipe you’ll ever need” post – the photos are really helpful in getting the texture right. For plain, sweet scones use the flour, salt, baking powder, and brown sugar for the dry ingredients, butter and cream for the wet ingredients. Cut packed/refrigerated dough disks into six even slices for larger scones (like the one pictured) or eight slices for smaller scones. Brush with cream, sprinkle with brown sugar, and bake at 400. But seriously, go back and read my last scone post – you will be glad you did.
2. Wash and hull strawberries, then slice however you like. If they are a little on the tart side, sprinkle them with a teaspoon or two of sugar, stir to distribute, and set aside.
3. Pour 2-3 cups cold whipping cream into a bowl with 2-3 Tbsp granulated sugar and a tiny pinch of salt. Whip with a stand mixer or hand mixer until fluffy (I like mine a bit stiff, some people like it drapey – follow your heart or whatever, just don’t let it become butter). Taste and add more sugar if you like it extra sweet.
4. Split warm scones with a bread knife, pile with whipped cream and strawberries, and eat up.

Zucchini is one of those vegetables that’s kind of hard to get excited about. It’s mild in flavor, spongey when raw, watery when cooked, and it does not know moderation. When zucchini grows, it grows abundantly and with enthusiasm, which is kind of adorable, but also pretty inconvenient. If pinterest is any indication, everyone is up to their eyeballs in zucchini right now, and fresh out of ideas for how to use it. Zucchini bread, grilled zucchini, zucchini gratin – the veggie is versatile for sure, there’s just way too much of it.

And does anyone really want to bake in this weather? Gratins and breads are out for me, but grilling is something I can get behind. That slightly charred grill-flavor just screams summer. Add some sweet grilled corn, blistered poblanos, citrusy dressing and salty feta and I’m actually pretty stoked.

It’s summer in a bowl. The grilled veggies retain a bit of their texture which makes for a more interesting and tasty salad if you ask me.

A crave-worthy salad you’ll probably actually miss this winter. Get it while you can.

Grilled Corn and Zucchini Salad with Poblano, Feta, and Honey Lime Dressing

Ingredients:
juice of one lime
1 clove garlic, grated or finely minced
2 Tbsp cilantro, chopped
2 Tbsp olive oil
1-2 tsp honey
2-3 zucchini
3-4 ears fresh corn
2 small poblano peppers
1/3 cup (approximately) feta cheese

Method:
1. Whisk together lime, garlic, cilantro, olive oil, and honey in a mixing bowl to make dressing. Add salt and pepper to taste.
2. Cut zucchini into thick slabs (about 1/3 inch), brush with oil, sprinkle with salt, and grill over medium-high heat until well marked. Brush corn with oil and grill until marked, and grill whole poblanos until blistered.
3. Peel papery skin off of blistered poblanos and cut the flesh away from the stems and seeds. Dice poblanos and grilled zucchini, and cut the grilled corn away from their cobs.
4. Add diced poblanos, zucchini, and corn to the honey lime dressing, toss to coat and add crumbled feta. Taste and add salt and pepper if necessary. This is meant to be a savory salad with sweetness in the background, so season accordingly.

It’s time to eat tomatoes! We are in the thick of the season, so can them, obsess over them, bathe in them – because this time is fleeting. But you probably already know this. Maybe you’re even a little sick of gazpacho and caprese and tomato sandwiches by now. But you also know that by the crisp end of fall you’ll be wistfully reminiscing about the perfectly meaty, juicy tomatoes of summer, so to you I propose a new way to maximize tomato season: the fresh tomato tart.

There are a lot of tomato tarts out there, but most of them suggest baking the tomatoes in the crust. But cooked tomatoes are for the off-season. Summer tomatoes should not be trifled with. Eat them raw.

Blind bake a pie crust, whip up some mascarpone cheese with lemon juice, chives, basil, and salt, and lay on slabs of heirloom beauties. I am so serious about tomatoes right now.

Fresh Tomato Tart

Ingredients:
-your favorite pie crust
-one 8oz tub of mascarpone cheese
– juice of 1/2 lemon
-1/4 cup chopped chives
-2 Tbsp chopped basil
-two perfect summer tomatoes
-salt and pepper

Method:
1. Press your pie crust into a tart pan (preferably with a removable bottom – but you’ll survive without it) dock the dough and blind bake it using your favorite method (instructions will be included if you use packaged pie dough). Or if you are making your own crust (bravo) use this blind-baking method.
2. In a mixing bowl, whip your mascarpone cheese with a whisk until light and fluffy. Stir in lemon juice, basil, and most of your chives (reserve some for topping). Add salt and pepper to taste. Spread cheese into bottom of baked tart crust.
3. Cut your tomatoes into round slabs, spread them on your cutting board and salt them. Then, layer your cut tomatoes in some sort of aesthetically pleasing manner, and scatter them with chives and more black pepper. Cut into wedges and eat as quickly as possible (because fresh tomatoes don’t do so well in the fridge).

More guacamole! Too much of a good thing is actually pretty great, amiright? Avocados have a mild and buttery flavor that is a bit more adaptable than most people recognize. The fruit is native to Mexico, so Mexican cuisine is the most obvious place for avocados to turn up. But Asian cuisine, with it’s use of onion, garlic, acid, and heat also makes for a lovely foil to the richness of avocado. I can’t be the first person to figure out this awesome combination, but eating it made me feel like a bit of a genius.

Tortilla chips just wouldn’t do for an Asian guacamole, so I picked up some raw wonton wrappers and baked them up.

I knew I wanted sesame oil in this guac, in addition to garlic and scallion and lime. The lime makes the dip sort of skew Vietnamese/Thai, so I took it further and added basil to the flavor profile.

Large-diced avocado for extra chunkiness.

I started eating before I remembered to add sriracha (the smell was taunting me) – but it’s really good with sriracha. It kind of needs that hit of heat. Now honestly, why isn’t Asian guacamole already a thing?

Asian Guacamole

Ingredients:
2 small avocados
2 Tbsp scallion, sliced fine
2 Tbsp basil, chiffonade (roll together and thinly slice)
1 small clove garlic, grated
1/2 teaspoon toasted sesame oil
juice of one lime
salt to taste
sriracha for topping

Method:
1. Brush a baking tray with oil and lay out wonton wrappers, brush wrappers with additional oil. Bake at 350 degrees for 7-10 minutes, or until golden brown.
2. Slice scallion, chiffonade basil, and grate garlic. Combine in a mixing bowl with lime juice, sesame oil, and a pinch of salt. Set aside.
3. Cut open avocados, remove pits, and take off the peels while keeping the avocado flesh as intact as possible. Dice and add to bowl with scallion mixture.
4. Stir and mash slightly with the back of a spoon. Taste for seasoning, add more lime juice or salt if necessary. Top with sriracha and serve with baked wonton chips.

I tend to gravitate toward recipes that are really simple, to the point of being obvious. Like my ideal salsa, the ideal guacamole doesn’t need to have secret, outside-the-box ingredients to taste incredible. It’s about getting the ratios right, balancing the acid and the heat and the subtle sinus-burn of raw onion with the right amount of salt. If you hit those points, you’ll end with guacamole that’s clean tasting, bright, satisfying, and addictive.

Lets talk about avocados though. I know a lot of people who go to the store the day they want to make guacamole and stand in the produce section squeezing every avocado in the bin until they find one that’s ready. Then they go home, chop their cilantro, squeeze their limes, and when they crack open the avocado, it’s half brown inside and utterly hideous. This has happened to me more times than I care to admit, and it took this next piece of information for me to see the light: avocados don’t ripen until after they are picked. That means the avocados that are soft in the bin are also old.

So now, and forever more, I buy avocados when they are green and hard (hard enough to survive the rough journey from across the country) and let them ripen on my counter, free from the squeezes of strangers. I haven’t opened a disappointing avocado in years. The price you have to pay for perfect avocados is planning. Buy them at least 3-4 days before you need to use them.

Besides avocados, you need a lime, a handful of cilantro, a jalapeño, and a red onion.

And because I like my guacamole very chunky, I try to get the flesh away from the peel in one piece, and dice instead of mash.

The Ideal Guacamole

Ingredients:
2 small, ripe avocados (yielding a little over a cup of diced flesh – double or triple the recipe for a big batch)
2 Tbsp cilantro, chopped
2 Tbsp jalapeño, finely minced (about one small pepper, remove seeds if you’re a wimp like me)
1/4 cup red onion, finely diced
juice of one lime
salt to taste

Method:
1. Dice onion, chop cilantro, and mince jalapeño. Combine in a mixing bowl with lime juice and a pinch of salt. Set aside.
2. Cut open avocados, remove pits, and take off the peels while keeping the avocado flesh as intact as possible. Dice and add to bowl with onion mixture.
3. Stir and mash slightly with the back of a spoon. Taste for seasoning, add more lime juice or salt if necessary. Serve with chips.

It took me longer than it should have to discover karaage. Traveling abroad is something I’ve always pined for but never had the opportunity to do, so when I finally got to go to Japan I was determined not to waste a minute of my time eating food for Americans. I wanted to immerse myself in the culture and stuff my face with real Japanese food.

Bad luck, along with my own lack of preparation, conspired to throw me in the deep end of the food scene, and in my first few weeks I had eaten (without meaning to) many of the most challenging foods in the Japanese repertoire, including: natto (fermented, sticky and stinky beans), salted and dried fish (with bones, for breakfast), squid sashimi (soo chewy), and cheap curry (which was toothache-sweet). I was on the ropes, desperate for something I could just devour when I finally caved and ordered the seven-dollar fried chicken special at my favorite lunch spot. I expected chicken tenders, but what I got was a bonafide Japanese epiphany – breading that’s shatteringly crisp yet somehow delicate, and juicy, soy-marinated chicken. This chicken is what motivated me to find Mari’s cooking class, because I needed to know how it was made.

And it’s laughably simple. The secret, magic ingredient that makes Japanese fried chicken special is potato starch. Dunk well-marinated chicken in a single dredge of potato starch, fry it, and you end up with something so impossibly crispy and delicious, there aren’t words.

I used small pieces of boneless chicken so my little nuggets would cook quickly without burning the delicate breading.

Mari mentioned that cornstarch is a decent substitute for potato starch if you can’t find it, so I did a side-by-side comparison below. For me, the potato starch makes the chicken. Bob’s Red Mill sells it, so check your grocery store’s health food or gluten-free section if you don’t find it with the regular baking supplies.

Cornstarch on the left, potato starch on the right. I love how the potato starch piles on itself and makes pretty, crispy flakes when it’s fried. Ugh I’m hungry.

Japanese Fried Chicken
(adapted slightly from a recipe given to me by Mari)

Ingredients:
2 boneless chicken breasts or 4 thighs, cut into 2-bite pieces (if you de-bone yourself you should leave the skin on because it’s delicious)
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup sake
about 1 Tbsp fresh ginger, grated or chopped
3-4 cloves garlic, grated or chopped
2 tsp sesame oil
about 1 cup potato starch
oil for frying (choose a high smoke-point, neutral flavored oil like peanut)
lemon, for serving (optional)

Method:
1. Mix together soy sauce, sake, ginger, garlic, and sesame oil. Marinade chicken pieces for at least two hours, but up to overnight.
2. Remove chicken pieces from the marinade and drop them directly into a bowl of plain potato starch. The residual marinade will be enough to make the potato starch stick really well. Turn each piece to coat, and set aside.
3. Heat about two inches of oil in a dutch oven or deep pot over medium-medium high heat until a wooden spoon handle lowered into the oil bubbles actively. If you have a thermometer, shoot for a steady 350 degrees Fahrenheit. If you don’t have a thermometer, fry a few tester pieces to make sure your oil is hot enough to achieve golden-brown deliciousness. Fry the chicken in batches, turning as necessary. Move the cooked chicken to a paper towel lined plate or a wire rack over a pan.
4. Taste for seasoning – if you’ve marinaded your chicken long enough it shouldn’t need any, but if you did a quick marinade you may want salt. Serve while hot, with a squeeze of lemon if you like.

My absolute favorite Tokyo adventure was taking a cooking class from a native named Mari in her actual home. We booked her for the whole day and spent the morning at Kappabashi street, which is known as a cook’s and restaurant-supply mecca. With her help we were able to make a few informed additions to our kitchen gear.

We weren’t in the market for any, but we couldn’t help checking out the plastic food. It’s a real art form in Japan, and these little plastic sculptures aren’t cheap. That plate of fried rice below is 4200 yen, which is about 42 dollars. For plastic food.

Mari learned to speak english from teaching her cooking classes to tourists, so her near-fluency is pretty impressive. Something I learned about myself in Japan is that I am incapable of noticing and eliminating idioms in my speech, but she wasn’t thrown. She was indispensable as a translator in the Japanese shops full of foreign words and tools.

After a few hours shopping, we went to her apartment to cook.

I had her teach me to make gyoza, karaage (Japanese fried chicken), teriyaki chicken, chahan (a Japanese interpretation of Chinese fried rice), sesame and spinach salad, and octopus with green onion and miso. She commented on the abundant meatiness of the menu, so I made it clear that I wouldn’t be eating these all at once on a normal day (we can be pretty carnivorous in the US, but come on). My point was to learn as many of the popular but frequently screwed-up-in-America main-dishes as possible.

So we chopped.

We measured.

We got messy.

And I tried my hand at folding gyoza. It’s pretty easy once you get the hang. My folding was not so tidy though.

We crushed our own sesame seeds. In Japan I discovered my intense love of sesame. Finding new food loves is the best thing about traveling.

Mari is a competent enough cook that she doesn’t need a thermometer for deep frying. Legit.

And just before we passed out from hunger, we sat down and stuffed our faces with homemade Japanese food.

It was all delicious, obviously, and I was sent home with detailed recipes to cook from on my own. This day of cooking was the best money I spent the whole trip. And if you’re ever in Tokyo, you can meet the adorable Mari and take a cooking class too.

This Tokyo post is way late, (4 months but who’s counting?) and I was planning to chop it up into a few posts but I don’t think I can wait this long and be calculated about it. So it’s a photo-dump, but hopefully a nice one. On our way home from Tanegashima, Cody and I decided we’d better take advantage of the opportunity to explore Tokyo, and chiseled out a ten day stretch to enjoy the city. We used Airbnb and found a nice, clean, and cheap studio apartment in Shinjuku, which is an area we had already explored a tiny bit. Our host was great, spoke very good english, and gave us a list of restaurants to try in the area, which we did, as well as maps to local sights and transit, and a wi-fi hotspot card, which was SO nice for me because I had my phone in airplane mode for the entire trip (to avoid international calling and data fees), so having my own wifi card felt pretty luxurious.

Our first day in the city we decided to explore on foot and found our way to Yoyogi park and the Meiji Shrine.

We were lucky enough to arrive during a wedding procession and got to see the bride, groom, and families decked out in traditional kimonos. The procession moved slowly and was very quiet, but the bride and groom were all smiles.

Yoyogi park is also known as an area for cosplay enthusiasts to congregate. I think I missed the main crowd in their anime getups, but managed to catch an interpretive Elvis-dancing group named the “Lebels” (according to their custom leather jackets). They played Elvis music and did a lot of knee swiveling and attracted a substantial group of gawkers.

Another highlight of our trip was Hakone park, which is at the foot of Mt. Fuji and offers really great views of the mountain. We paid about $50 for each of us to have a park day pass, train fare to and from the park, and access to all the transit inside. We started with a train at Shinjuku station that took us all the way to Hakone, and within Hakone we rode the railway that made a lot of switchbacks climbing up a Fuji-adjacent mountain, and the ropeway which gave us some incredible views of Fuji-san. A lot of people go to Hakone as part of a tour group and stay overnight to take advantage of hot springs and fancy hotels in the area, but we felt like it was easy to do on our own, and pretty good for a day trip.

Cody was sick during our trip to Hakone and was happy we got to spend a lot of time sitting and enjoying pretty views from the ropeway. Hakone is a relaxing little jaunt.

Up at the top of the ropeway is a gift shop that sells Fuji-related gifty things and specializes in little snack bags of eggs boiled in the sulfuric hot springs. The sulfur turns the egg shells black, so it’s a pretty cool novelty item. But I have to say, those hot springs smell pretty intensely, and that violent eggy aroma tickling the back of my throat didn’t really make me hungry for more egg. Anyway, that little cage on a rope below is a fresh delivery of sulfur eggs from the hot spring.

The hot springs, while smelly, look pretty dang cool, especially in the late winter when it’s chilly out and the steam comes off the water in big puffs.

Oh and Fuji-san!

This is the forward-view when you ride the ropeway, a little scary but really cool.

Back in Tokyo, on another of Cody’s sick days, we stayed close to home and visited the government building across the street from our apartment to check out the views from their public observation deck. That’s a shot of Yoyogi park below.

And that’s the government building, shot from the foot.

Later in the week, when we were feeling better, we visited Tsukiji fish market, and holy crap. It was so crowded and everything was moving and have you ever been dizzy just from looking at things? Because that’s what happened to me.

This place is kind of stressful when it’s crowded because the little trucks that people drive around have the right of way over pedestrians and tourists (they are there for business) and people are trying to buy things on your left and your right and there is no space and you are literally always in someone’s way. We didn’t get many photos because we felt like we couldn’t stop walking long enough to do a lot of snapping. But still, you need to see it if you’re ever in Tokyo. It’s mindblowingly big and busy and it smells shockingly good – like ocean water and not at all  like your local grocery store’s fish department.

A large slab of tuna and some kind of dried cuttlefish stacked like paper.

Below is a shot from the exterior market surrounding the fish market. They sell everything from cookware to spices to nori and souvenirs. It is also crowded.

We found some breathing space afterward in a nearby park. I can’t remember the name of the park, but it was home to the Kyuinao shrine. Maybe it’s Kyuinao park?

And later in the week, we ate some ridiculously good sushi at one of those conveyor belt places. I learned to like sushi in America, but Japanese sushi is completely different. The fish tastes cleaner and it has a texture that’s somehow firmer and meltier than American fish at the same time. I couldn’t ever understand how someone could want to fill up on sushi in the states, (it’s just not that good here) but in Tokyo I had to restrain myself. This place was in the basement of a subway station and it was very busy. We were lucky to be seated directly to the right of one of the sushi chefs, so we would just grab one of whatever he put up on the belt. I ordered a few pieces from the menu too, but had to repeat myself because of my bad accent. The sushi chefs were kind about it though, and willing to help. If you go and aren’t confident in your Japanese, I recommend pointing to what you want on the menu (after saying your “sumimasen”) or just taking what’s on the belt. It’s all delicious anyway.

That’s some tuna, somewhere between toro and chutoro – not the fattiest but not the leanest. It was lovely.

We did lots of shopping in Shibuya while we were there, and crossed the famous crosswalk many times. It’s a lot easier than most crosswalks in New York somehow.

And walking around Shinjuku at sunset. Going through these photos makes me want to go back sooo bad!

If anyone wants specific info about the Airbnb host we used or how to get around, don’t hesitate to comment or send me an email. To those of you planning trips there, take me with you!