Kazan — summer 2012

I wanted to head back to the market today for a couple of reasons. First, there are some packed lunch stands there that are always full of people, but alas, when I arrived, I was still full of veal from last night and breakfast from this morning, so no lunch.

The market is amazing. Let me give you just a few shots. First off, the juice venders make an amazingly colorful presentation. Mostly they sell fruit juices for a euro a cup. I got myself and honeydew melon and mint juice. Very tasty.

Many of the stalls sell fruit salads, really just chunks of fruit cut up and neatly packaged. Again, beautiful presentation.

Spain is known for its pork products, and their are butchers everywhere.

But my main goal was to find a couple gifts. There are two women who I gave perfume to last year. Don't want to do that again. The gifts went off well, but giving perfume is always a risky business. Plus you don't want to be boring in your gift giving. So I had settled on some of Barcelona's chocolates. Barcelona is an incredible chocolate city; I can't imagine it's outdone anywhere except perhaps for Austria or Switzerland. Anyway, there is a confectioner at the market that caught my eye. I wanted to get one of their ½ kilo truffles, basically rectangles of layered chocolate, but then I worried that I wouldn't successfully transport them. Too much heat or getting crushed in my backpack amid boxes of iPads and computers... Tricky. So I asked the saleswoman which ones would travel well. She pointed out three types of turrones. A turrón is a nougat, which in this context means an almond paste. I chose turrones that additionally had some hazel nuts and hazel praline intertwined with them.

I'm hoping that makes them happy. After all, it's not every day an American brings a Russian a Spanish confection, right?

And last but not least, I want to show you the t-shirt I bought. I actually bought it in the old city on the way back from the chocolate museum, but I'm too lazy to make an independent entry. It's a mosaic lizard, not really like the one at the entry to Park Güell, but I liked it nonetheless.