by Michelle Moran | Feb 21, 2021 | #BestofBlueRidge, #ChefDannyMellman, #dannyandmichelle, #litlpond, The Writer
We planned to set out early in our usual organized chaos but missed the first three ferries. I wanted to catch the first boat to the mainland and begin our discovery tour. But Danny wasn’t stirring, even with my five alarms. He’d been pretty wiped out since coming to...
by Michelle Moran | Sep 10, 2023 | #BestofBlueRidge, #ChefDannyMellman, #dannyandmichelle, #Homestead, #litlpond, The Writer
My husband Danny and I were in the jungle of Belize having breakfast, bird-watching, and being entertained by an acrobatic group of Howler Monkeys. We began chatting with a couple at a nearby table. They were raised in the Midwest and living in Texas. As always with...
by Michelle Moran | Aug 25, 2023 | The Writer
A menu map of Karpathos. The beauty of Pigadia. Heaven on earth. Achat Beach. Our trip to Karpathos, Greece, began as a joke. Well, not really, Here’s how the story goes. We were visiting Danny’s niece and her husband in New York City. It was a reunion delayed by the...
by Michelle Moran | May 12, 2023 | #ChefDannyMellman, #dannyandmichelle, #litlpond, The Writer
The ocean below me, I watched the waves smash into rocks, listened to the kids bickering on the trail ahead of me thinking, this would not be a good time for an annoyed sister to give her brother a mischievous shove. The hike, a condensed version of the original...
by Michelle Moran | May 12, 2023 | The Writer, Uncategorized
The water is coming in from every direction. And the constant roar of the reef is keeping my mind off the fact that I can’t get my laptop working. My hopes of spending the day seem crashing like the waves on the natural rock jetty offshore. Instead, I find myself...
by Michelle Moran | Mar 14, 2021 | The Chef
An Adventure in Horseshoes and Grenades, Not Really So this is not really an extended story of our last journey, but a new one altogether. Don’t worry; I will get back to Chaa Creek and the creature to blame for my swollen arm. But today, I wanted to write about our...
by Michelle Moran | Feb 21, 2021 | Uncategorized
I have been quiet for a while now. Last year was, well, y’all know, it was 2020. ‘Nuff said?Anyway, while I haven’t written, I have also not been idle. We’ve redesigned the blog site and a few other websites for the Lit’l Pond group, built a small retreat on Ambergris...
by The Chef And The Writer | Sep 5, 2020 | Uncategorized
Last night was the first time I have dreamt in six months. Or let me say, it’s the first time I vividly recall dreaming. The memories I hold may be non-sequential, but I don’t think that matters since the image shards my brain was tossing at me had very A Clockwork...
by The Chef And The Writer | Aug 23, 2020 | Uncategorized
I’ve been a little quiet down here. Yep, I am still in Belize. The airports are still closed. We had expected to open in August. In fact, Danny Mellman was to arrive on August 20, but just 12 days prior, COVID-19 cases popped up on Ambergris Caye and the country...
by The Chef And The Writer | May 19, 2020 | #BestofBlueRidge, #ChefDannyMellman, #dannyandmichelle, #litlpond, #MasseriaKitchen, #saverestaurants, CovidChronicle, Uncategorized
There are so many ups and downs in this quarantine. This began as one of those down weeks. Struggling with the idea of opening, something that 65 days ago, when we were submerged by the knowledge that we would have to close our restaurants, we were buoyed only by the...