Peter also described himself as “fearless when it comes to meeting new people or trying new foods.” After reading his first New York taxi adventure, I think you’ll agree: he ended up at a 24-hour Bangladeshi deli where they don’t have any idea who Lindsay Lohan is.

Stay tuned for more of Peter’s dispatches – and if you’re interested in trying your own taxi adventure, email me at layne@taxigourmet.com.

Photo by Peter J. Kim

“What is it with you Koreans?” says Mohammed, a 30 year-old Bangladeshi, after I explain my ethnic background to him. “My best friend at school is Korean too.”

I shrug and reply, “What is it with you South Asians? Half of my friends are South Asian.” We both chuckle.

Mohammed zips around traffic on the FDR, somehow managing to simultaneously maintain eye contact with me in the rear-view mirror.

“New York is like Darwinism,” he says. “Survival of the fittest. Humans can evolve and survive anywhere, even on the moon, why not here?”

For Mohammed, cab driving is part of his own Darwinian struggle. He does it to support his studies at Queens College, where he’s pursuing a degree in physics.

I ask him about his favorite food. An ethnic Bengali, Mohammed speaks enthusiastically about the bounty of food that Bengalis eat for special occasions: chicken pulao, roasted spicy chicken, pitha (sweet and savory cakes) in countless varieties. “And,” Mohammed adds, as he deftly circumvents a slow-mover ahead of us, “I like Korean sweet rice cakes.”

Photo by Peter J. Kim

But what does he miss the most? “Deshi chicken. We grow them in the house, not on a big farm. They’re not like the cloned chickens here—here, in a couple of days you can make a big chicken. These Deshi chickens, they grow up at home, they eat a lot of good food, they live well.” He pauses. “Those chickens taste really good.”

By now, I’m licking my lips and imagining what a DFC—you know, a Deshi Fried Chicken—might look like. I ask Mohammed to take me to his favorite restaurant, fully prepared for a long haul into the outer boroughs. But instead, he takes me straight into Little Chinitaly, and we arrive at Mott Corner, on the corner of Mott and Kenmare. He parks the cab and we go in together.

Photo by Peter J. Kim

On the surface, Mott Corner isn’t the most obvious destination for Bengali food. Its purple awning bears the image of a man with a one-sided Dali mustache wearing a sort of off-kilter flattened beret with “coffee” written on it. Glass cases filled with beer hum next to stacks of potato chip bags. Behind the register lies the usual deli bric-à-brac—cigarettes, razors, condoms, and the like. And the menu is a familiar heartland lineup: turkey with gravy, root beer float, BLT, egg salad.

But look a little more closely at the menu. Tucked in between the bacon cheeseburger and the tuna melt, you’ll see “Bengal Noodles (Spicy).” “Lamb / Goat Curry” next to a ham, egg, and cheese sandwich. In the back of the restaurant, past the burgers and the chicken noodle soup, there are bubbling pots of Bengali curry and a spice rack filled with the unmistakable colors of turmeric, chili, and cumin.

Tilapia curry with arrowroot. Photo by Peter J. Kim

Mohammed explains to me that Mott Corner is a 24-hour hub for Bangladeshi cab drivers who come to socialize, read Bengali newspapers, and most importantly, feast on the restaurant’s daily changing curries, which today are two varieties of fish curry. Mohammed and I order both curries and the spicy ginger chicken salad.

The first curry features cross-sections of tilapia with wedges of arrowroot. The second is made with buffalo fish and slivers of Chinese eggplant. Both are served in a hearty red curry soup seasoned with cumin, garlic, onion, turmeric, and chili. Bangladeshi curry uses water where Indian curry would use paste, Mohammed notes. “More water, less oil—it’s better.”

Mohammed suggests that I eat the curry with my hands, as Bengali tradition dictates. A grizzled veteran of hand-as-utensil eating, I enthusiastically comply.

In both curries, the fish remains delicate, seasoning is appropriate, and spices complement, but do not overpower, the flavors of the dish. Both the arrowroot and the eggplant reduce to a satisfyingly creamy consistency in my mouth. It’s clear that a knowledgeable hand has prepared these curries.

I ask Mohammed why there’s a separate, blocked-off seating area in the restaurant. He explains that sometimes the drivers eat with their hands back there. “Some Americans just can’t deal with it,” he says as I scoop up another fistful of fish curry.

The spicy ginger chicken salad is not as endearing. Here, Mott Corner’s all-American pretenses creep too far. The base of chopped spicy fried chicken, pickles, ginger, chili, iceberg lettuce, and tomatoes is appetizing enough, but a thick coat of mayonnaise takes this dish closer to Cleveland than to Kolkata.

Photo by Peter J. Kim

After polishing these plates off, I sit back contentedly with turmeric-stained fingertips, but still feel peckish. At Mohammed’s recommendation, I order the Bengali noodles and slip behind the counter to watch the cook prepare the dish. Thin ramen noodles, spicy chicken, and vegetables hiss and sizzle on the flat-top as I look on. The dish, more of a late-night comfort item than a delicacy, is a good value but falls far short of the curries.

I thank Mohammed for guiding me here and we part ways—he has a long night of work ahead. Outside, I notice one of the Bengali diners in Mott Corner come outside, get into his cab, and flip on the car’s top light. I can’t resist, and hop in. He tells me he’s been going there for about nine years. I tell him that the Bengali noodles left me positively stuffed.

“Ah, the Bengali noodles are the best there. I ordered some to bring home to my wife, she thinks they are very nice,” he says.

I reply, “Do you really think that those noodles will make it all the way home?”

“Maybe.”

Mott Corner – Map it
58 Kenmare St. (corner of Mott and Kenmare) – Little Italy
(212) 431-1192
Recommended dish: Curry, $7 (changes daily)
Open: 24/7

Meanwhile, if you’re interested in doing some fearless foraging of your own and writing about your taxi adventure, I’d love to share your story with other Taxi Gourmet readers. Email layne@taxigourmet.com for details.

Charles was parked in the corner of the gas station across the street from Lionel Groulx metro station. A bearded man with a nice smile, he greeted me when I got into his cab.

When I asked him right off the bat where his favourite restaurant was, he said he’d heard of a good steak house not too far away. He hadn’t been there. After some more questions from me and some thinking from him, he remembered that there was a branch of a Haitian restaurant he’d been to before. He wasn’t sure of the address though – or if it was open. He called a friend to ask. Five minutes and two phone calls later, we were on our way to Kalalu on Saint Denis St. in downtown Montreal.

As we passed through the Ville Marie tunnel and merged onto the 720, the cabbie told us he’d first opened a barber shop when he came to Montreal from Haiti 22 years ago.

When his kids were in high school, he decided to shift gears and go to school in computer science. For 7 years now he’s put his studies on pause to work as a taxi driver so he can put his kids through private school. He’ll go back once they graduate.

I told him that I’d dropped out of college myself for lack of motivation and self-discipline and he laughed and said just the day before he had been telling his son: “You need a lot of self-discipline! Without that you won’t make it.” He added, “You guys are young, what, 25, 27 years old? You have your life in front of you.”

He said he didn’t eat out often, putting three kids through private school didn’t leave much room for extra expenses, and there weren’t that many good Haitian restaurants in Montreal. His wife’s cooking was better than any restaurant food anyway.

When Charles braked in front of Kalalu, we sort of wished we were going to his house for dinner. We thanked him for the ride and climbed the stairs to the restaurant, where there was a big balcony with a few occupied tables – and an empty dining room inside with a skylight – and what I assumed was Haitian music playing.

My co-adventurer and I sat outside in the fading light and pored over a short but delicious-looking menu. The main courses ranged from $13 to $20 with a table d’hote (set menu) in the $25-$30 range.

There was a section for “The Authentic” that I chose to order from. I’d never tried Haitian food before.

We ordered Chiquetaille as an appetizer: a spicy mixture of salt cod and with garlic, onion, thyme and chili spread on what seemed like freshly baked bread.

We chose Calypso and Tasso for our main courses. Calypso was a medium-juicy chicken breast under a blanket of mango salsa, with a mixture of mashed sweet and regular potato. The potatoes were slightly spicy and had a smoky, meaty undertone that made me steal bite after bite off my friend’s plate.

Tasso: fried goat and beef in a rich brown gravy with a hint of tomatoes.

I was eager to try tasso – fried goat and beef in a rich brown gravy with a hint of tomatoes that reminded me of poutine sauce – as I’d never had goat before. It had a nice gamey flavor that I liked, and it was a nice contrast to the chicken.

The tasso also came with fried green plantains, salad, rice and beans. The salad had just a splash of mango juice as dressing and was refreshing, sweet and simple but the plantains were slightly acidic. I left a few on my plate – the texture was okay but they lacked something to balance out their acidity. I tried dipping them in the brown sauce from the tasso but that didn’t make them much more interesting.

After our meal, the waitress said she had something for us to try since it was our first time there. She made us some mango and vodka granita in small shot glasses that normally came with the table d’hote menu; it was yummy and refreshing after our spicy meal.

When I told her I’d found the restaurant on the recommendation of a Haitian cab driver, she said that a lot of cab drivers came to Kalalu actually. I’ll definitely be going back to try more Haitian food. Tasso was just the beginning.

Kalalu
4331 Rue Saint-Denis
Montreal, Quebec H2J 2K8‎
Tel. (514) 849-7787‎
Map it

Meanwhile, if you’re willing to get into a random cab, ask the driver to deliver you to his/her favorite place to eat and write about the adventure, I’d love to share your story with other Taxi Gourmet readers. Email layne@taxigourmet.com for details.

I got into the taxi with my friend not knowing what to expect, somewhat nervous, but I put on an enthusiastic smile and said to the driver: “Okay, I have a strange question to ask, but do you know any good places to eat? Like a not too expensive place?”

“Well there’s plenty right on this corner…” he replied, which there were.

“No, I was more wondering where you like to eat when you’re working?” I said.

He replied, “McDonalds” and pointed over his shoulder.

I said, “No, I’m looking for something that’s not a chain restaurant… where else do you eat when you work?” He looked at us quizzically for a moment, and I broke down and explained that I was writing for Taxi Gourmet.

He laughed and said, “Really, so I’ll be on a website?”

“Yeah!” I told him, giving him the address.

“Well what’s your price range?”

We told him we were looking for something in the $15-$30 range. He thought for a moment, then said, “Yeah, there’s a Greek place I used to go to on Cote St-Luc road. They had great pita and salads there, only $5!”

On our way to the restaurant, he told us he’s been driving a taxi for three years, but when I asked him how he got into it he simply replied, “Circumstances…” and I left it at that.

When he isn’t driving he said he liked taking walks, reading…but he didn’t seem to want to elaborate, or maybe he was just unaccustomed to random questioning. He had a wife and kids as well – I was too nervous and didn’t think to ask him more about his family, though.

He told us about some of his more memorable passengers: a gay couple wrapped up in each other, quite literally, some drunken teenagers that got sick, a couple that he had to break up verbally after they went overboard in their affections, and an incredibly lost German passenger who directed him all over the city, racking up a huge bill as they drove around for an hour and a half.

We finally got to the restaurant, thanking the cabbie profusely and giving him a good tip in return for being victim to my first foray into the world of taxi-themed food blogging. I remembered just before getting out to ask his name, which he said was Alex. I introduced myself and my friend and he shook my hand with a smile and a laugh, saying to come back again.

So I got out, still a bit shaky from first-time nervousness, glad that I had succeeded at the first part of my mission. Now for the eating part!

We studied the outside of the restaurant: instead of the Greek place Alex had told us about, it was now called Carmine’s Tuscany Grill. They had a banner announcing a summer pasta festival for $11.95. We decided to go in even though it didn’t seem like the cabbie had been there since they changed owners.

There was a five minute wait to be seated, but the place was full on a Monday night, which was a good sign to me. Our young waiter was courteous and fast, leaving us just the right amount of time to look over the menus and decide what to order.

The menu had a medium-sized selection, all Italian, and it seemed like the classic stuff: pasta, chicken, seafood, pizza, and some veal and beef. Some of the more expensive chicken and fish dishes ranged from $12 straight up to $25.

I had the house salad. At first I thought they had forgotten to put vinaigrette on it, but when I tasted it I realized they had just perfected the balance of vinaigrette to salad – there was a barely noticeable sheen of dressing on the lettuce, adding just enough flavor. My friend’s leek and potato soup was light even though it had a cream base and “well worth $2.95.”

We’d both decided to take advantage of the summer pasta festival. I had the veal canneloni with rose (tomato and cream) sauce and mozzarella, and he chose Gigi’s pasta plate: mixture of pancetta, prosciutto, mushrooms, and shallots sautéed in a rose sauce.

Both were delicious: the veal in the canneloni wasn’t at all the texture of ground meat I was expecting, and I scraped up every last drop of my sauce, while my friend was sold after his first few bites of pancetta and prosciutto-flavored pasta. The parmesan and freshly cracked black pepper went really well with it, too. We didn’t have wine or dessert, preferring water and being too full for anything sweet.

As I headed home to wallow in a food coma I thought about the evening. I was quite pleased at the success of my first mission and was already looking forward to the next one.

Carmine’s Tuscany Grill
5525 Côte St. Luc Rd.
Montreal, Quebec H3X 2C6
Tel. (514) 484-7525

Photo by Ryan Bird

Our Jordanian gourmet adventure started just as we were about to catch the taxi – a crowd had stopped traffic, surrounding a group of four men dressed in charcoal-black undertakers’ clothes.

The coffin they carried acted as their prop as they carried it down one of the main streets of Amman, stopping every 20 metres or so to put on a mini-show and make the growing audience laugh with their slapstick antics, almost silent, uttering bits and pieces of languages, but almost no English. It was to be a funny forerunner for the rest of the evening.

After 20 minutes or so of trying to find a cab, we climbed in a taxi and asked the driver if he spoke English – there’s plenty of English in Jordan, but taxi drivers are definitely hit and miss and our Arabic mainly consisted of the foods we’d been eating.

He answered, “Sure. Yes,” using a full third of the words we later found out he knew. Our explanation of wanting to eat where he ate came up against a brick wall, so he called a friendly stranger over from the sidewalk to help. Disaster averted, the meter clicked on, and we were off.

As we wound north around and over the hills that make up Amman, simple sign language and easy words got us his name (Hamid), how long he’d been driving (12 years), and whether he was married (yes) and had kids (either one or two, he gave both answers at different times).

Eventually, we pulled up to fancy-looking place under an imposing black-and-orange sign that said SEREEN PARADISE amongst lines of Arabic. He gave us a thumbs up as we paid and thanked him, using another sixth of his English – “Good, good!” – and drove off.

The restaurant seemed the kind of place for a special occasion from a generation ago – mirrors on the walls, cast-iron chairs with pillows on them, a TV in the corner with the news.

It was a quiet night, but that may very well have been a combination of the later hour and the fact that it was Friday, the Muslim sabbath.

With no English menu, we had to point to dishes we thought we’d like.

Photo by Ryan Bird

I ordered a meat dish with shish kebab, shish tawook (the kebab’s chicken cousin), and kofte, an Arabic meatball/meatloaf with lots of spices and looking like a sausage this time around.

The kebab and tawook were decent, but the kofte stole the show. We’ve both had a few of these and this was one of the better ones. Delicate spices made each bite a pleasure and I was quite sad at how fast it disappeared. The grilled tomato helped raise my spirits a bit, but another stretch of kofte would’ve been better.

Chris ordered the signature Jordanian dish: mensaf. Most commonly made with lamb, as she had it here, it’s served at weddings and celebrations all over the country.

Photo by Ryan Bird

This was a pretty good specimen, with the lamb falling off the bone with a single nudge of the fork and the yogurt sauce, flavored with cooking fat from the lamb, in a nice tall bowl, ready for pouring. The sliced almonds on top are always nice, though we’ve also had it with peanuts.

A kind of curried soup accompanied the dish, and the standard mound of rice make this a hefty dinner for almost anyone – after both of us finished attacking it, there was still rice left over, though the yogurt sauce had vanished.

All in all, Sereen Paradise wasn’t a monumental find, as the dining downtown in Amman is just as good and much more accessible.

Since this was our dry run for an adventure in Istanbul, we learned a valuable lesson: language barriers can ground the best of adventures. It’s a good thing Jordan’s people are as wonderful as their food.

Sereen Paradise
Corner of Ibn Muqlah Road & Nasser bin Jameel Road
Amman, Jordan

Courtesy anefian.com

I mentioned last week that the Taxi Gourmet blog is going global. What exactly does this mean?

I’m still going to document my New York food finds every week, but I’m also going to recruit food pilgrims in other cities to add their taxi adventures to this site.

When I asked readers to weigh in on where they’d like Taxi Gourmet to go in addition to New York, Rome and San Francisco were the winners (but Mexico City wasn’t too far behind).

Courtesy infohostels.com

Now the search begins for taxi adventurers in the Eternal City and the City by the Bay.

If you know any intrepid eaters in those spots – or if you fit that description – please send an email to layne@taxigourmet.com, and I’ll fill you in on the details.

And remember, even if your city didn’t get voted to the top this time, Taxi Gourmet could make it there in the future. Oh, the places we’ll go…

I’ll still write about my New York food finds every week, but I’d also like to feature dispatches from other spots where cabbies are plenty and restaurants merit a pilgrimage.

Would you like to see U.S.-based taxi adventures from cities like Chicago or D.C.? Or would you rather to take a virtual journey to Mumbai or Tokyo?

I need your help to figure out the two cities where these new culinary dispatches will originate. My goal is to feature a weekly post from each place.

Choose as many cities as you like from this list and/or write in your favorite. You have a week to vote (and spread the word to any of your food-obsessed friends).

Next week I’ll tally up the results and let you know which cities won. Then I’ll start searching for taxi adventurers from your favorite places. (Even if your city doesn’t make it to the top this time around, I’ll keep it in mind for the future. Every vote counts!)

On Monday, I joined him for two of his 93 meals: at Outpost Lounge in Brooklyn and Sal, Kris & Charlie’s Deli in Queens. A third of the way through his quest, Hagan has gained just four pounds – and his appetite is going strong.

If everything he’s eating is as tasty as Outpost’s lox bagel – and as deliciously cheap as The Bomb sandwich at Sal, Kris & Charlie’s – I can understand Hagan’s enthusiasm for his quest.

Photo by Hagan Blount

Stuffed with salami, ham, roast beef, provolone, American cheese, sweet and hot peppers, The Bomb is a $7 celebration of excess that reminded me of the legendary sandwiches my grandpa used to make at Eash Deli & Meats in Long Beach, CA.

The Bomb overflowed with the same paper-thin pile of onions, the same generous slather of mayo, and the kind of premium meats that grandpa always used.

The only thing that kept it from being a perfect sandwich was the bread: a little dry, a little airy, missing a sweetness that could play off the peppers and take The Bomb to another level.

In any case, I’d go back to Sal, Kris & Charlie’s for that sandwich – and I’ll be following Hagan’s culinary marathon at wanderingfoodie.com.

A journalism major at Northwestern University, Kira immediately dismissed the no-zone idea. Determined to hunt down the best flavors in her new city, she recruited a few friends and embarked on her own set of taxi adventures. “A good choripan,” she said, “Is worth the risk.”

Here’s Kira’s report on her Buenos Aires food quests.

Last week, my co-adventurers and I met at the obelisco in Buenos Aires’ tourist-filled city center. We hailed a taxi, brimming with anticipation at the idea of entering a ‘no-zone’ and ending the night somewhere far from downtown.

Our taxista, Dante, was surprisingly agreeable and told us right away, “I like to eat pizza at the best place in Buenos Aires.” We asked him to take us straight there.

On the way, we learned about Dante’s past as a graphic designer, his four children, and his childhood in the northern province of Salta. He came to Buenos Aires because “it’s beautiful and has everything. [It’s] the most important city in the world,.” He eventually turned to taxi driving for financial and personal reasons that he didn’t care to explain.

When he dropped us off at El Imperio in the distant neighborhood of Chacarita, he told us he always orders two slices of mozzarella to go.

“Every time I pass by, I have to get pizza,” he said, getting out of his cab and following us into the restaurant. Before going back to his shift, he stopped by our table, take-away bag in hand, to make sure we’d been taken care of.

We shared a large pizza, half mozzarella and half fugazetta. As Dante promised, the pizza came quickly, dripping with cheese. The crust was thick and spongy, as is the custom in Buenos Aires, but the pizza had more flavor than the typical porteño slice. My favorite was the fugazetta, an Argentine specialty layered with sliced onions and cheese.

We left the restaurant stuffed with pizza and sweets (strawberry pie, cookies, and chocolate pastries), thrilled at having ventured to unfamiliar ground. The excitement simmered, however, when the next day I learned that Layne had been to El Imperio on a previous taxi adventure.

Eager to stake out new territory, my co-adventurers and I meet again. Our first taxi driver takes us straight to a pasta restaurant next to the obelisco that offers tourist discounts and English menus. Unimpressed, we hail another cab, still hoping to blaze new trails.

Horacio understands. Our second cabbie tells us about a steak house he goes to with a group of four taxista and auto-mechanic friends every Sunday at 2am to talk about life, cars, interesting passengers, and things they see in the street.

“It’s far,” he warns us.

“Perfect,” I reply, ready to escape the city center.

Horacio chats openly with us, sharing his wisdom about the city and professing his love for the River Plate soccer team (one of the most popular clubs in Buenos Aires). In 18 years of driving a cab, he’s never been in an accident, although he sees them on the “dangerous streets” all the time. Horacio likes to drive at night when the city is calmer, leaving daylight hours for sleeping “like Dracula.”

We arrive at the restaurant, 2901, which is within walking distance of the taxi storage depot in the Belgrano neighborhood, making it the perfect place for cabbies to grab a steak and beer after a long shift.

But on this night, the place is crowded with groups of friends sharing liters of beer and local families watching soccer games and reality shows. I ask for a table for six (for better or worse, American students travel in packs), and the friendly waiter stays to explain each dish on the menu.

We end up sharing a steak, a milanesa, chorizo sausage, French fries, and a platter of roasted vegetables. The steak is tender and perfectly cooked, the chorizo delicious, but the milanesa does not impress.

As a thunderstorm engulfs the city, we sit and chat in 2901 for hours, soaking up our surroundings and enjoying our feast. We may not have crossed into a no-zone, but we were somewhere completely new – wallets and cell phones in hand.

El Imperio
Corrientes 6891 (esq. Federico Lacroze)
Tel: 4553-0875 / 4553-1464
elimperiodelapizza@fibertel.com.ar

2901
Congreso 2901 (esq. Cramer)
Tel: 4544-8686
Open 24 hours and delivery

According to the Baron, who showcases his passion for the food of his beloved borough on a fantastic show called Bronx Flavor, the Bronx is New York’s most sensuous precinct.

“Around every soulful corner,” he writes, “Untainted frontiers of opportunity await the adventurous epicure who doesn’t require a manual to dictate where they should dine.”

Sounds like a great place to kick off a taxi adventure. This Sunday, I’m going to start my food quest in the BoogieDown and see where I end up.

But first I’m going to scope out the goodies at the Ferragosto Festival in the Bronx’s Little Italy: zeppole, grilled sausage, suckling pig, Italian ice…I wonder if the Baron will grace us with his presence.

Stay tuned.

Photo by Michael Nagle/New York Times

I was taking a black cab from Park Slope to Greenpoint (both neighborhoods in Brooklyn but a pain in the a** to get to via subway, and I was in a hurry) with my friend Deborah.

The taxi driver was a middle aged, white guy, not the usual demo. We got on the BQU (a highway that connects Brooklyn to Queens) and as we approached Williamsburg (just below Greenpoint) he asked me how to go, as he had no idea.

“Uh, get off at Metropolitan,” I told him. I get confused getting off the highway in Greenpoint but I know it on backroads.

As he exited, I remarked that it would be so much easier if I were driving, as it’s hard to give people directions when you’re not rock-solid sure yourself.

“You wanna drive?” he asked.

“Seriously?” I answered.

He was serious. I got in his seat, Deborah got in the passenger seat, and he got in the back.

“You ladies mind if I smoke?” he asked.

“Not if you don’t mind if we do,” I told him (Smoking is illegal in taxis and hired cars. Strike two, should we be pulled over).

I got us up to Greenpoint – it turned out he’d only been driving a cab for two weeks (“Do you like it? “Nnnnnnope.”).

As we got out of the car he squinted up at the buildings – Greenpoint is a rapidly gentrifying Polish neighborhood – and murmured, “A lotta deadbeats made a pile of money in this neighborhood.” Nice!

The punchline: He charged me full fare, (twenty bucks!) and I, because I’m congenitally incapable of fighting unless sorely provoked and of withholding a tip, paid and tipped him.

And that’s how I became a taxi driver for 15 minutes.

Do you have a good story about a taxi adventure of your own? In the spirit of proving that cool things unfold in cabs around the world, Taxigourmet.com is now accepting submissions of 600-800 words or less. Send your stories to layne@taxigourmet.com and paste them directly in the message.