Before I reveal our two “G” meats, first an aside about that expression “tastes like chicken”. It actually came up the other day when we were trying one of these new G things.  But how did that expression come to be a cliche in the first place,  I wondered.  And why do so many things actually taste like chicken?

Glad you asked.  According to the Wikipedia entry for that expression, the reason so many things taste like chicken could be for a variety of reasons due to evolution, cuts of meat, and something about fibers. Or, sort of. I’m oversimplifying because the entry didn’t provide me with a very satisfying  answer. In the end, I think it’s probably just funnier to say everything you’ve never tried before tastes like chicken, rather than trying to explain whether or not it really does.

However I did learn from that entry that there is a website called Improbable Research. They have a whole page on this chicken taste question. That’s probably more information that you’d want to know, but I love the name of the website, so I thought I’d pass it along.

My Internet search to find out who said it first, though, was more limited. However, I learned that some people attribute the expression to a log book of Christopher Columbus, as he apparently wrote that description down after he ate snake meat for the first time in the New World. But I’m skeptical that this site is actually serious about that – so, FWIW, that’s the only thing I can offer on the origin.

Anyway, , I have digressed enough.  The post is really about the fact that since we’ve been in Florida, Chris and I have stumbled upon opportunities to eat two unusual meats that are perfect for our Plan G. Why are they perfect? Because both of them start with G. But of course.

So, the two meats are

• Goat:  A meat that Chris had in Mali, and that we’ve enjoyed in various parts of the world since then. It wasn’t common to find it in either Italy or Germany, however.  But there’s a local produce/Mexican market that sells a goat stew that is very tasty. The meat is dark, and tastes a bit like a cross between pork and beef.
• ‘Gator: as in Alligator. We ordered the “basket of [deep-fried] gator bites” appetizer that we spotted on the menu at the lunch place in Daytona. After all, for two people who have eaten (and liked!) deep-fried silkworms, how could we not try this unusual Florida food? It was the first time either of us had had ‘gator:
  

  Gator Bite

  

  Inside a Gator Bite

BTW, a quick note for those of you that have talked with us since we’ve been back in the U.S.,  you might now be wondering whether or not we are still vegetarian. We weren’t vegetarian in Europe, but since coming back to the U.S. we have reverted to being the style of vegetarian that we’d been before in the U.S.  That is, we try to avoid eating animals and fish that are raised on grain.  What’s been interesting to see this time around here in the U.S. is that the mainstream supermarkets actually sell grass-fed meats now. If it’s grass-fed, we’ll eat it.  Since typically goats are fed grass, not grain, we decided to go ahead and get some – it was exotic — and delicious.

As for the ‘gators, well, I have no idea about how the alligators are raised, and I haven’t bothered to look it up now. I mean,  it was definitely fun to try once, but probably once was enough for me.   It was OK, but not  very exciting as it turned out that in fact it really did taste like chicken!

The museum is on the campus of the Daytona State College and is associated with the Southeast Center for Photographic Studies department at the college. An exhibit currently on view  in the  museum celebrates the 50th anniversary of the program.  It was impressive to see the number of alumni active in Central Florida, most of who have commercial photography studios. One example was David Roark, who is the photographer at Disney Studios. A couple of his advertising photos for Disney made me smile, including this clever  “The Force is calling” ad,  which is the photo at the bottom of the page at this link.

Another fun set of photos were action shots involving things on water by a photographer named Tom King. Here’s a link to my favorite one of his in the show, which is a multiple exposure stop-motion shot of a wake-boarder flying over the wake behind a boat.

Another current exhibit Chris had seen on the museum’s website turned out not be at the museum at all. It was done by then, but mounted off in a community center somewhere else in town.  We used Gigi to navigate to find the building, and I thought she was taking us the wrong way at one point when she had us turn left off the main road onto a narrow side street surrounded by lots of vegetation and few buildings.  But I need to learn to trust Gigi: just when I was thinking we should back, the vegetation on the left of the road suddenly opened onto a clearing and revealed a parking lot and a community center building where the photography exhibit was displayed. Chalk one up for Gigi!

Now, the exhibit had been billed as a sort of “then and now” type of show with photos of the Midway neighborhood in Daytona taken in 1943 compared with ones from 1999. The 1943 were by American photographer Gordon Parks, and they were interesting to see, since they included quite a nice cross-section of people and life in the Daytona Midway neighborhood.  However, there wasn’t much information about the 1999 photos, and there weren’t that many of them to begin with.   Ah well.  At least the historic ones were fun to see.

We didn’t really have much time to roam around Daytona Beach other than our driving to the museum locations, so it felt like we just took a little dip into what the town might have to offer.  Of course, the big thing it’s known for, other than the speedway, is the beach.  We did take a quick peek at the beach, though, because we stopped for lunch at a place right on the beach. I only took a few photos, though, mostly from the parking lot where we parked to go to lunch. I kind of liked this one photo  for a little bit of wave action. But check out the sign on the pole on right:

“Illegal” Water Activity?!”  Daytona Beach, Florida

I guess the waves didn’t get the memo that “water activity” is prohibited  to the left of the pole.