What book? For me, Europe has been all about the food.

I love to eat. And when I’m travelling, I love it even more. I mean, what better way is there to get to know a country and it's culture than to eat and drink like a local?

If I think back to the years I have spent travelling and living overseas, often it's the food and the places I've eaten that have created some of my best memories. Like:

1. Ordering breakfast at the Cracker Barrel in Tennessee and being presented with two, yes two, dinner size plates of food.
2. Our hosts hunting an impala in Zimbabwe and then serving it up to us for dinner (actually what I remember most about this is someone stealing the poor impala's foot and hiding it in people's sleeping bags. We were only 17 after all.).
3. $5 steaks in Argentina that were the size of my head.
4. My South African host mum Helga feeding me the same portion sizes as her tall, fit teenage boys. I remember being presented with, and eating, two hamburgers one night. And I wondered where the 13kg weight gain came from.
5. Eating poutine after a big night out in Vancouver. Because you would never eat that stuff sober, would you?

Now that my four months in Europe is coming to an end, I thought I would put together a short highlights reel of my culinary journey through London, Portugal and Spain.

I realise this looks like the recreation of a cow's intestine, but it is actually Jane making homemade sausage rolls in London.

Seriously good.

It is really hard to find good coffee in London. I'm sorry Londoners, but it's true. I made it a personal mission over the six weeks I was first there to try and track down the best coffee possible. In the end it was a toss up between the coffee at Look Mum no Hands! and the Department of Coffee and Social Affairs.

Both with cool names to boot.

It is not hard, however, to find a great pub in London that serves a Bloody Mary on a Sunday afternoon. Here's Lizzie at the Owl & Pussycat in Shoreditch, waiting for our Sunday roast.

And just to prove that I did need to travel to London for important book research, the Owl & Pussycat now features in my book (the Bloody Mary, however does not).

I have blogged a lot about the joys of the Portuguese tart. Here is just one of the many I have consumed during my time in Portugal.

Also featured in this photo is a galau, or milk coffee, made on, you guessed it, UHT milk. Check out the nice frothy bubbles on the top. Even the coffee in London is better than this stuff.

But those tarts are to die for, so I forgive the Portuguese for their bad coffee.

  

Meet my friend the Gin Garden. We were first introduced by Simon the Italian barman at Dromedario Bar in Sagres, Portugal.

I ask you, how can anyone call gin a depressant when it looks like this?

                                   

I like tapas.....but at the same time I don't really get it. If I ever saw a dish on a menu that consisted of tomato bread, grilled octopus and an omlette, I would never order it. So why do we think it's okay to eat all of these things together just because they're served on different plates?

I think the Spanish had been drinking too much sangria when they came up with that one.

Speaking of which, I did some pretty extensive sangria research, and this one in Vejer de la Frontera was the winner.

Drink and dinner in one. What more could you want?

Vegemite toast from Federal in Barcelona. I know it's wrong to put this on my highlights of Europe food reel, but I was bloody excited to eat it, okay? And this is my blog. I can do what I want.

Churros with thick hot chocolate.

Best eaten at 4am after a few hours on a Spanish dance floor. These suckers even give the portuguese tart a run for it's money.

 An authentic seafood paella. I shared it, but I could have eaten the whole thing on my own, even though I could see the chef making it in the kitchen and I saw him lick the spoon.

Heat kills all germs, right?

I asked for a Corona. The barman recommended this instead.

I am still trying to work out if I should be offended or not.

Looking back on all this food and drink, it's a wonder I've managed to get any writing at all done really.