Originally Posted by
GrumpyKenyan
I wander all the time. Only when I'm trying to consciously push my performance the entire ride do I stay on set routes (and I only do these runs once or twice a week). I usually run into a stall vendor I haven't seen before and buy a piece of fruit, or I find a new hotspot for cow dung. Either way, learning the neighborhoods is fairly rewarding for me.
Kenya has to be a fantastic place to wander. Why do you want to find cow dung?
Your post reminded me of some of my own wandering. I do most of my riding in the city, but almost every early autumn I wander out into the countryside until I find a roadside stand that sells fresh tomatoes. I load up my big bacpack with tomatoes--about 15 pounds worth.
As soon as I get home I make and freeze a quick sauce. All winter, I have sauce that tastes like summer, and also reminds me of that beautiful warm day when I rode my bike out of the city to get the tomatoes. Here's my recipe:
Quick Carfree Tomato Sauce
Heat a few sppons of olive oil in a large skillet. Chop the tomatoes roughly,
retaining the skins, seeds and juices. Add tomatoes to the pan, but not more than
about one inch deep in the pan. (Cook the tomatoes in batches if they don't all fit.)
Season with salt and pepper only. Bring to a boil, then continue to simmer
on medium heat for about 10 to 15 minutes. You want to cook the tomatoes until
they have broken down some, but not so long that you lose the fresh flavor.
They should still look more like chopped tomatoes rather than sauce, and the juices
should be somewhat concentrated.
Let the sauce cool. Spoon it into single servings in plastic sandwich bags. Freeze
the bags quickly, then bundle them together into a large freezer storage bag or plastic
container. At serving time, heat the frozen tomatoes in a little olive oil and continue to
cook as you like. At this point you can add seasonings like herbs, garlic, mushrooms, etc.