Airfarewatchdog's top 10 tips to find low airfares

It'd be great if there was one way to get a great deal on airfare. Unfortunately that's just not the case. Like everything you have to take a little time and educate yourself. George Hobica had a some helpful tips on Airfarewatchdog.


Airfarewatchdog's top 10 tips to find low airfares - Airfarewatchdog: "- Sent using Google Toolbar"

Gift Ideas for the Techie Traveler - Featured - Travel Gear Blog

It's that time of year again. Here are some great techie gifts for the travelers in your life from the TravelGear Blog.


Gift Ideas for the Techie Traveler - Featured - Travel Gear Blog: "- Sent using Google Toolbar"

Vegan Yum Yum

Vegan Yum Yum has a huge cache of creative and beautifully shot vegan recipes. Lauren Ulm, of Vegan Yum Yum, has published a Vegan Yum Yum cookbook, and has an iPhone app that ties in with the recipes on her blog. There's an impressive array of ingredients and recipes for all occasions, as well as useful information that can help you go vegan. Looking through her site, I'm not sure she's still posting new material, but there's still an impressive amount of content.

Goulash

Thanks to Betty Crocker, most of us who grew up in the 1960's and 70's can remember having goulash at one time or another. It was a great comfort food. There a lot of ways to prepare it, but typically the ingredients are meat, onions, potatoes, carrots and paprika. Here is a vegetarian version of the classic Hungarian shepherd's soup. Serve it over rice, on it's own, or with a side of mashed potatoes.

2 tablespoons of olive oil
1 large onion, chopped
2 medium carrots, peeled and sliced
1 medium parsnip, peeled and cubed
3/4 pound vegetarian chunks or burgers, cubed
1-2 tablespoons paprika
14-oz can of tomatoes and juice
3 tablespoons tomato puree
1 (2) teaspoons caraway seeds
2 1/2 cups of vegetable stock or water
2 medium potatoes, diced

sea salt and black pepper to taste
1 cup sour or soy cream (optional)
paprika or finely chopped parsley to garnish

Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the onions, carrots, and parsnips. Heat until the vegetables begin to brown. Add the burger chunks, paprika, tomatoes, tomato puree, and caraway seeds. Heat for about 5-10 minutes. Add the water, or stock and the potatoes. Bring to a simmer. Cover and cook for about 30 minutes, until the potatoes are tender. Season with salt and pepper and adjust the seasonings. Stir in the sour or soy cream, heat through and server.

Notes from a Small Island

Arriving in England in the early 1970's, American travel writer Bill Bryson worked as a journalist and editor for a number of British newspapers. In 1994 he made the decision to bring his family back to America. But before doing so he decided to take a trip around the island he'd called home for so long.

I've read many of Bill Bryson's books over the years: 'A Walk in the Woods, In a Sunburned Country. I've always enjoyed his ability to mix humor with the scholarly, and his ability to cast himself as the everyman, Iowan that he once was.

In this homage to Britain, a place where he married and raised his kids, Bryson sounds as much like a Briton as an Iowan. Bryson travels by rail and on foot through the tiny towns and great cities of late 20th century Great Britain. He  reflects on the places he's been, and what's changed in Britain and himself as the years have passed. At times he's laugh out loud funny, at other times, borderline offensive, but nearly 20 years on, it's still one of the great travelogues, and one of my favorites. When my boys were babies and I'd grown tired of reading, 'Good Night Moon,' for the millionth time I would lay on their floor and read chapters aloud from it, laughing at Bryon's depictions of the people he met as he walked around the island that was once at the heart of the British Empire. When I went to England in 2007 I brought it along with me and wrote notes in the margins about what I saw in the Cotswolds.