Guidebooks always tell you what the “staple” dish of a place is, but sometimes more interesting than the ingredients is the history of the dish.  Sometimes you can get this from a recipe book, but better yet, get it from actually going to the place where the dish originated.  We love the history of food, for it’s really the history of human exploration. Given that globalization started happening centuries ago, it’s not hard to draw similarities between the dishes of exploration centers like Portugal and far flung ports in Mozambique or Brazil.  Enter one of the best examples of Portugal’s dominance in world exploration- the simple, yet delicious feijoada.

Feijoada is one of those “traditional” dishes that calls multiple countries, separated by a vast ocean, home.  Originally from Portugal, Feijoada is a bean, beef and pork stew that we saw in Brazil, Mozambique and pretty much anywhere we traveled along a coastline that the Portuguese had explored. The Brazilians in fact, call it their national dish. Why? Well, like so many of the “great” dishes of a culture or region it’s simple, homemade food.  Although you can find it at the best restaurants and although you can find it at any Portugal hotel or restaurant, it’s a dish beloved by many and found in all levels of Portuguese cuisine. There’s nothing pretentious in feijoada, just beans, pork and oh let’s say the most delicious mix of spices you’ve ever had.  Think of it like a Sunday supper meal that stews all day.  The name, feijoada actually comes from the Portguese word for beans – feijao.

Although I love anything that has the word “stew” in it, for me the most interesting aspect of feijoada is its long history.  Just as their ancestors did hundreds of years ago, Portuguese families still make this dish, albeit with certain variants for a delicious weekend supper.  Food made at home and meant to be consumed family style is the best, especially for those travelers looking to get a taste of regional flavor and take it home with them.

Maybe on our next trip through the Iberian Peninsula we’ll make a tour of feijoada….who’s with me?

Photo Credit: Shared via a creative commons license from flickr user Fotos Gov/Ba.

The first checking account is what we used while abroad.  This account paid our credit card bills (the few times we were able to use our credit cards) and was the account we drew on while at ATMs around the world.  (The great part was that it reimbursed ATM fees and didn’t charge us foreign exchange fees.)

The second account handled the ‘other payments’ we still had to make while on the road, namely those pesky student loans.  We did our best to never access this account either online or from an ATM.  Mostly, this account was a backup account in the event we lost our other ATM cards.  If we had the ATM cards with us to the first account, then the ATM cards for this account were safely stored in our hotel room.

Having and maintaining a separate bank account for travel is important.  It is a big safety factor that cannot be understated.  Equally important is the use of separate savings account.  In our little money laundering scheme, most of our money was in this third account.  Every month it automatically transferred spending money to our travel checking account.  If we needed extra I sent an email home to my father asking him to log into the account to make the transfer.  That savings account also sent the exact amount of money to pay those student loans to that backup checking account.  We also kept money in both checking accounts but never too much money.

We took the time to carefully research our options online before setting all of this up for our trip.  Our credit cards were set to bill themselves to our bank, not all cards can do this.  All banks are a little different and it is really important to compare bank accounts online and make sure you’ve selected the right one for you.  Some will work for some people but not for others.

You never want to be abroad without access to cash to just remember to be safe and keep a backup plan handy.  Once in Tanzania an ATM counted my withdrawals twice and in China I left my ATM card in the machine.  In Guatemala one of the girls in our Spanish class had their ATM info skimmed off their card by the ATM and the bank was withdrawing money from their account every day for a week before they realized.  Setup your extra accounts and play it safe.

Yea, this would be an inexpensive way to fly, but really would you trust him as your pilot?

Our strategy now though is to focus on an airline and just simply amass a ridiculous amount of frequent flier points.  Sound simple right?  Well actually it was.  We decided on which airline based on our home airport and our most common routes.  Then we looked at the airline’s policies, mainly how easy was it to use free last minute vouchers or book flights with our points.  That left us with one major domestic carrier.  In the last year, thanks to applying for a few airline credit cards (both for personal and business) and focusing our credit card spending on those cards to hit bonus mile rewards we’ve amassed so many points that we’ve been awarded a voucher that lets us fly buy one get one free anywhere in the country.  Thanks to those frequent flier miles and the voucher we surpassed 13 domestic flights last year alone, at a cost of less than $5 per ticket.  True story.

We’ve heard so many people complain about being unable to use frequent flyer miles or flight vouchers but we find that it’s not true.  If you are strategic about who you fly with, how you fly and flexible enough to take advantage of bonus programs and flight voucher than you can maximize the rewards and benefits programs and really make them work for you.

We’ll be posting more about our frequent flyer and voucher strategy in the upcoming weeks to share our tips and tricks to help you maximize these programs to help you explore the world!