When I wrote this note, it was actually day three…not that it really matters. Here’s what I took down: Well we are getting ready to start day 3 in Paris. I did not write anything yesterday, and to be perfectly honest, I was entirely too exhausted! Rather than disclose what we did yesterday, a simpler undertaking would be to ask, “What did we not do yesterday?”
“I find myself stargazing, mostly finding you amazing, by the moon.” -Joshua Payne
Moonstruck that is, and the introduction to the “Mint Tingle.”
Dear reader,
There comes a time in everyone’s life when he/she makes…the face.
You know of what I speak: that look, that ray of sunshine, that starry-eyed “I have not lived until this day,” look of enlightenment!! If you have not experienced this, be patient. When it happens, you’ll know.
Brace yourself.
My moment, which I have the privilege of sharing with many others, came in a quaint local workshop of the gods called Moonstruck. Moonstruck…even the word brings to mind some sort of celestial awakening, a night of endless stars, endless wonder, and…endless chocolate?
Well, perhaps not. But once you’ve entered Moonstruck, located in the Alphabet district on NW 23rd ST, you’ll be thinking the moon is made of chocolate despite popular belief in cheese. (Total respect for cheese BTW, but we’ll save that for a later post).
Let me set the scene for you. My first experience with Moonstruck was in the Fall of 2010. The smell of rain lingered for only a second as the door opened onto a scene from a chocolate lover’s fantasy land. Decorated walls of chocolate leaves, little Frankenstein caricatures, and all manner of creepy, crawling chocolate monsters practically demanded consumption as my lovely friends and I filed into the little shop. I despise spiders, but chocolate spiders? Ok, exceptions can be made. It’s funny how candy and chocolate makes you feel like a kid again, and pressed up against the glass case full of wonderful little truffles immediately transported me to a time when consuming copious amounts of chocolate would not be coupled with weight gain…sigh. Anyway, back to the purpose of this post. The star, the one, the only, the direct cause of the face: ladies and gentlemen, the Mint Tingle.
People, resistance IS futile. Let me break it down for you.
A milkshake that is minty, chocolatey, with crunchy bits of honeycomb. Fresh, rich, heavenly, slap you in the face good…this milkshake will always be good to you.
If that doesn’t sound delicious to you, you might not have a soul. This milkshake is the best I have ever tasted and I’m pretty sure cannot be improved upon. A Portland classic, you (yes YOU) should experience it at least once. And then, like any good friend, return frequently to visit it. The Mint Tingle, it even sounds a bit sinful. Indulge, please. Do yourself the favor.
Happy milkshake consuming!
Your faithful dining companion,
Lauren
(I hope you enjoy the Casablanca reference as well. As a side note, if you didn’t catch it, please rent the movie and watch it immediately as repentance)
The following Paris series is from the journal I kept during my trip:
I think I finally understand the Paris obsession.
We have just arrived at our hotel after having been awake for the past 24+ hours. Clarissa and I opened the door to find the most charming little room accessorized with a floor-to-ceiling window, a mini chandelier, and a view of one of Paris’ numerous Gothic churches. The church provides an enchanting focal point that commands our attention, but fortunately I tore my eyes away to peek slightly beyond to see an intricate dome barely cresting the top of one of the church’s spires (a dome that would soon be known to me as the top of the Pantheon!). My immediate reaction is to open our secluded little sanctuary to the world and let Paris in. The sights of the Latin Quarter (our home for the next four days), the sound of the bells, the musical French language floating up with sweet intoxication into my unassuming vantage point.
Driving through Paris for the first time was everything; a dream and a nightmare, a joy and a pain, beautiful and repulsive.
Like any great city, the jewels are, in a sense, quarantined to a few square miles, buried beneath layers of cast off businesses, forgotten apartments, and their somewhat miserable looking inhabitants. They might rebuttal my praises of this grandeur. But grandeur is often reserved for a city’s guests and is replaced by a certain amount of repression for those that remain, fixed in their city and their tired views of it. I know this feeling. It’s the feeling I get after I have spent too long in Portland. I have to leave, for when I come back my eyes are no longer tired. I can look upon the city fondly and with a fair amount of delighted exasperation, exasperation that would border on malice if experienced in conjunction with an extended amount of Portland rain.
But, happily, I am a stranger to this place, and the Parisian grandeur does not fall upon unenthusiastic eyes. Every second that passes presents a beautiful snapshot into a world that makes me want to lavishly cast my money towards things I do not need. Each building draws me in, and begs the passers by to peek through its windows. The sky is grey, but the city bursts through it with every color I know and dares me to name the new colors it generates, created for me by my kaleidoscopic town.
My reverie is grossly brought to an end as our French cab driver spouts off some angry sounding remarks. We had fallen prey to side street construction and were about to be treated to a beautiful display of French patience. “Oh God….” I think to myself as the cab driver lurches forward to “tap” the worker out of the way. More angry comments, this time from both parties. The exchange is drown out now by an exceedingly bad compilation of American music, music from an era filled with peace, love, bumming around the California coast, and probably a fair amount of weed. I have heard some strange remixes in my days, but it takes a special breed of desperation to remix the Beach Boys with jazzy French beats and “sultry” interjections.
As I pondered this disastrous cultural hybrid, my stranger eyes caught glimpse of the Eiffel Tower, shrouded in clouds, an elegant dagger as soft as it was severe. I could feel the butterflies in my stomach active with excitement. The only fitting description is likening it to falling in love for the first time, completely alive with delicate clarity. But for now, I must leave you, it’s adventure time…let us pursue this new love.
To Hope and Madness, Lauren.
Field Notes From Wonderland 