Mark the Dates for Cochon555 Around the Country

Cochon555 is returning - a time of celebration for pork lovers. Each Cochon555 event pairs five chefs to five heritage pig breeders to prepare a nose-to-tail feast. One chef will be crowned Prince of Porc and will go on to compete for the title of King of Porc at the Grand Cochon finale.

In Los Angeles, Cochon555 will be at Viceroy Hotel Santa Monica on March 11 and you can purchase tickets here. There's no signature event in Boston this year, instead there will be a Heritage BBQ on August 5. You can check out the rest of the national schedule on Cochon555's website.

Last year, I was in Boston for their Heritage BBQ event, which is run very similarly to the signature event.

Barbacoa on chicharoon by Juliet

Whole pig break-down

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Travel Talk Essential Jordan Tour, Part 2: Ajloun and Jerash

On the first full day of my Essential Jordan tour  with Travel Talk Tours, we visited Ajlun and Jerash and then returned to our hotel in Amman in the evening.

The tour guide picked us up at our hotel in Amman. We had the same tour bus, driver, and guide throughout the trip. The bus was a bit old, but it does have wifi!

The first stop was Ajloun (Ajlun) to visit a 12th century Muslim castle that sits on top of a hill in Jabal Ajlun (Mount Ajlun) district.

When we got off the bus there was a guy selling hot mint tea for 1 JD. December in Jordan is a bit chilly (40-50 Fahrenheit) and Ajlun being at the top of a hill was a bit windy, so it was nice to hold a hot cup of tea in my hands, although the tea itself was a bit too strong and bitter for my taste (the tea at Hesham Restaurant in Amman was much better).

Ajloun Castle was a Muslim castle, but it was in fact built on top of the ruins of a Byzantine church, and you can see remnants of this as you tour the castle.

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Travel Talk Essential Jordan Tour, Part 1: Amman

Last Christmas holiday, I took a tour with Travel Talk Tours to Jordan, to tick one off my bucket list item: to see Petra! I chose Travel Talk because the dates worked perfectly with the Christmas holiday at work, and it was cheap. Travel Talk frequently has deals (including 50% off last minute tours right now). The base price I paid was $599, although there is an additional local payment of £160 (approximately $215) that you pay on the first day of the tour. The price also doesn't include entrance fees to the attractions, but you can get a Jordan pass for about $100 that also includes the Jordan visa fee, so that's not too bad.

The Essential Jordan tour with Travel Talk is a 7 day tour that takes you to some sites in Amman (the citadel and the Roman theatre), Jerash, Ajloun, Wadi Rum desert, Petra, Dead Sea, and Kerak Caste.
Since talking about the whole tour in one post would be too long, I'll be dividing it up into parts! First is the part surrounding Amman, the capital of Jordan and where you will be flying into.

We stayed at The Art Hotel in downtown Amman (also called Al-Balad). This is the hotel you will spend the most time at, with 2 nights at the beginning of the trip and returning here on the last night. Downtown Amman is a pretty good area to be a tourist in. You can walk to restaurants, small shops selling souvenirs and clothes on the cheap (if you haggle), the market, and some other attractions. The cheap stores help if the airline forgot to transfer your luggage like they did to mine ...

The room was good. It was clean, there was wifi and enough power outlets. The top mattress pad kind of slides though, and if you have a room facing the street, be warned that it will get rather noisy when traffic starts up in the morning!

All the Travel Talk hotels provide free breakfast. Here, it's primarily falafel and hummus. Most of the other meals are not included in the tour, though, which was fine with me. I like going out for food on my own anyway so I can choose exactly where I want to eat.

The best thing about the hotel for me was the proximity to a few great restaurants in Amman!
I first had fresh kunafeh at Kareem's in Watertown, MA and fell in love. Naturally as soon as I woke up, I headed to the most famous kanafe / kunafa shop in Amman, Habibah Sweets. It's a tiny take-out only place on an alleyway in downtown Amman, right near the hotel.

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