Bulla Gastrobar

Overall rating:★★★★

Last week my family and I ended up in Bulla Gastrobar almost by accident. We were looking for a Spanish restaurant in Coral Gables and voila! It was a Tuesday night so it was not very busy.

We ordered different tapas (small appetizers), one main dish, and two desserts to share. It was more than enough.

The food was really good. I was particularly surprised with the gazpacho – for a cold soup it was much better than I expected. Our entrée was one of the specials: monk fish with clams, shrimp, and calamari in a red sauce, very good as well.

We had a great time at Bulla. Our waiter, James, was very nice and attentive. I would go back.

Service:★★★★

Value:★★★★

Yellow Green Farmers Market

Yellow Green Farmers Market is located in Hollywood, FL and it is open all year round on Saturdays and Sundays from 8:00 am to 4:00 pm. I love going there to buy fresh vegetables and fruit at a great price. Also, I like to see and taste some of the local vendors with their baked goods, accessories, soaps, etc. There is live music, which makes the experience even more enjoyable.

More recently, there are new stands of wild caught fish, and products from the Wisconsin Amish - I have tried the cheese and eggs; the taste, texture, and consistency of the products is so different than what we are used to from the supermarket. These items are more expensive so we try to buy them every other week or so to balance the house economics. At the end of the day the extra dollars are totally worth it!

House of Spirits by Isabel Allende

Overall rating:★★★★

House of Spirits was Isabel Allende’s first novel. By coincidence of magic, it became the third book of the unusual trilogy (Daughter of Fortune, Portrait in Sepia, and House of Spirits). In this story, narrated by Esteban Trueba and his granddaughter Alba, we follow the events in the Trueba family, its branches, and the other families connected to them. The events take place, according to my calculation, approximately from 1900 until the military coup to Salvador Allende in the mid 1970s.

This novel tells the story of at least four generations having Esteban Trueba and Clara Del Valle as the central couple. Esteban Trueba is a man who acquired a huge fortune by angrily working first in the gold mines, and later in the farm inherited from his father. Later in his life, Esteban becomes a senator for the Conservative Party. This man is so angry all the time and has so many episodes of wrath that his existence has to be necessarily fictional – a real person would have died of a heart attack much earlier.

Clara Del Valle is an ethereal woman who is more concerned with the whereabouts of spirits than the common activities of the everyday life. She married Esteban and they had three children: Blanca, and twins Jaime and Nicolas. Clara was the center of the family and she gave Esteban the stability that he needed.

This is the second time I read House of Spirits. I liked it as much as the first time. It is a story of love, passion, sensuality, anger, and the desire to change the destiny of a nation and society. Ms. Allende cleverly incorporates important events of the Chilean history giving even more significance to the story.

This book is available in paperback.

Originality:★★★★

Beauty and use of language:★★★★

Goat Cheese and Leek Quiche

This quiche was a very pleasant surprise. The combination of tastes of goat cheese, leeks, and nutmeg was amazing. The result is a light and tasty quiche that goes well with a green salad. This recipe is very easy to make - I bought a pie crust and just took care of the filling. 

To access the recipe, click here. 

Museu Calouste-Gulbekian - Lisbon, Portugal

This museum is one of the best ones in Lisbon. It was built in 1960 and its collection ranges from tapestries, Persian rugs, Chinese porcelain to Rembrandt and Rubens.

For art lovers it is possible to spend the whole afternoon without being bored. It is not as big and grandiose as other museums in Europe but it is exquisite. I was fascinated by the rugs, vases, and illustrated bibles from Armenia and surroundings.

To get there, take the red or blue line to Sao Sebastiao (both red and blue) or Praca de Espanha (only blue line). The entrance costs 4 euros per person and it is worth every dime.

The Leader's Code by Donovan Campbell

Overall rating:★★★

‘The Leader Code’ by Donovan Campbell gives an overview of the 6 virtues that all leaders should cultivate: humility, excellence, kindness, discipline, courage, and wisdom. In addition to developing these qualities, the writer suggests, and I think he is right in doing so, to define a mission and become a servant for the people or teams we lead – I personally prefer the term service provider since servant could be so easily misinterpreted.

Donovan Campbell makes a good attempt at explaining the “leader-servant” model as well as the six traits that all leaders should have. The book is full of stories – too many in my opinion – some of them interesting, some of them not so much.

I liked the idea of creating the mission statement and becoming a service provider for others, especially those we are assigned to lead. The six qualities described in the book – humility, excellence, kindness, discipline, courage, and wisdom – are great to have not only if we have the role of leaders. Not much is new in this book; mostly is common sense, but it is good to have a reminder.

Mr. Campbell is part of the Marine Corps. Most of the stories and examples in the book come from the military. This concentration of source makes the book boring for people, like me, who are not part of the military environment, and frankly does not see it as the greatest organization in the world.

‘The Leader Code’ is a good read for someone who is starting his/her path in self-improvement and to learn about leadership. For seasoned readers on the subject of leadership, it may be repetitive, without substance; for the civilians, it may become boring after the third story about war, battle, or military exercise.

This book is available in hardcover and Kindle.

Applicability to real life:★★★

Comprehensibility:★★★★

Top Ten Wednesday (TTW) - The First Ten Countries to Obtain Their Independence in this Continent

Since we are about to celebrate the 237th anniversary of the U.S.A. independence I thought that an appropriate subject could be countries who became independent after the U.S.A.

I am not a historian and clearly no expert in independence subjects… I can only imagine the strength of the desire to be free and become a sovereignty that people go to war, kill each other, and so at the end of the day the rest of us get to belong to the newly formed country.

Here is the list of the first ten countries in the American continent that became free. This time the order is from first to last one based on the declaration of the first independence date (some countries became colonies after the independence from the conqueror country).

1. United States

Independence was declared on July 4th 1776. Main figures in this event: George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Capital: Washington, District of Columbia.

2. Haiti

Independence was declared on January 1st 1804. Main figures in this event: Jean-Jacques Dessalines and Toussaint Louvertoure. Capital : Port-au-Prince.

3. Ecuador

Independence was declared on August 10th 1809 lead by Antonio Jose de Sucre. Capital: Quito.

4. Argentina

Independence was declared on May 25th 1810 lead by Jose de San Martin and Simon Bolivar. Capital: Buenos Aires.

5. Colombia

Independence was declared on July 20th 1810. Main figures in this event: Simon Bolivar and Francisco de Paula Santander. Capital: Bogota.

6. Mexico

Independence was declared on September 16th 1810 lead by priest Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla. Capital: Mexico City.

7. Paraguay

Independence was declared on May 14th 1811. It seems that there was no one leader but a series of events that resulted in Paraguay becoming independent from Spain. Capital: Asuncion.

8. Venezuela

Independence was declared on July 5th 1811 lead by Francisco de Miranda and Simon Bolivar. Capital: Caracas.

9. Chile

Independence was declared on February 12th 1818. Main figures in this event: the Carrera brothers (Jose Miguel, Juan Jose, and Luis), and Bernardo O’Higgins. Capital: Santiago.

10. Peru

Independence declared on July 28th 1821 lead by Jose de San Martin and Simon Bolivar. Capital: Lima.