Comfort Food

LisbonThey travel the world in the search for ‘authentic’ experiences but here they stand, lined up fifty deep, desperate for a fix of comfort food.

“How was the food?”

That’s a question friends will ask when they return home from the far ends of the earth.

Experiencing a region’s cuisine, whether Sri Lanka, Hungary or Patagonia is part of what we have in mind when we book our itineraries.

Travel only exacerbates the reality that what we eat and at what time of the day we eat it, plays a role in our well-being. Hotel breakfast buffets are filled with foods your stomach may refuse to recognize before noon.

Sometimes the miseries we blame on food poisoning is actually caused by overindulgence – too many shop windows with irresistible temptations.

We crave simple sustenance when we’re under stress from boarding the wrong train or reserving a hotel room for the wrong date.

Travel sites know that ‘comfort food’ is an powerful magnet, ditto for burgers or the mention of bacon (although what’s served up as such may be unrecognizable.)

The draw of an insanely popular restaurant in Lisbon’s Restauradores Station district is a humble roasted chicken. Travel-weary tourists stroll or uber back to their hotels with renewed strength to face yet another day on vacation.

Note to world: Is peanut butter too much to ask?