Mark and Mark

Mark and I have this great cooking app we have been using for the last couple of years and that we recommend to all our cruiser friends. It is called “How to Cook Everything” and is written by Mark Bittman. Most of the recipes are with ingredients we have on board and there is always room for some substituting or creativity. He also has heaps of tasty variations on the main recipes. The iTouch app is amazing; it is easy to use and interactive. It even has a timer built into it. Many times, we think about what we have in our fridge or cupboards, enter some of those ingredients and come up with a wonderful dinner. Unless we discover – halfway through the cooking process - that one of the specific food items actually had been eaten another time.

Mark likes to cook. Me, not so much. 

One of the luxury purchases we made while we were in the US, was a nice car radio with decent marine speakers. One of the first projects on Irie for Mark was to install his new toy and what a joy it has been for him! After years of listening to good music through crappy speakers, his favorite music now sounds like it should be: crisp and clear. Every day. He is rediscovering the band “The Grateful Dead”. Every day. Loud and clear. 

He loves them. Me, not so much. (Well, not daily, not blaring, and not all their songs. Some of them actually drive me crazy with all their electrical guitar noise and no end in sight.)

So, one relaxing evening in Irie’s cockpit, while we were listening to said band, Mark suggested this “great” idea: if we would cross the Pacific Ocean (if, not when), he would want to listen to the Grateful Dead non-stop. He was sure that people all over the world would send us Grateful Dead songs so we would have enough versions in order to hear different songs the whole 30 (or more) days (how many minutes is this?) it would take us to reach French Polynesia from the Galapagos. (Does he really want me to join him?)

On top of that, he wanted to cook only recipes of our Mark Bittman app during the crossing. (That sounds better to me.) I guess if I want to eat good food, I have to put up with the “Dead”. That is, if his “great” idea takes root and if we decide to go to the Pacific. 

The name of our music and cooking project? “Mark, Mark and the Dead”! If you’ve seen the great (without quotes) movie “Julie and Julia”, you know what inspired him! Personally, I think “Just Mark and Mark, or I’ll be Dead”, would be a better title.