Yesterday I learned something: cooking food from around the world is one thing. Finding the ingredients is something else entirely.

I spent most of the afternoon driving around Boise looking for everything I needed to make my first meal from Afghanistan, and honestly, the shopping turned into its own adventure.

I started with spices.

I thought I already had a pretty good collection. Apparently not.

I stood in the spice aisle staring at green cardamom, black cardamom, and cardamom pods, wondering if I really needed all three. At almost $9 a bottle, I seriously considered buying just one and pretending it would work for all three. In the end, I spent the $27 and hoped it was worth it.

Next, I headed to an Afghan market I’d found online.

It was tucked between an adult video store and a cocktail lounge, which definitely wasn’t where I pictured starting this project. I even called my husband before I went inside just so someone knew where I was.

The store itself was great. For the first few minutes, though, I was convinced there wasn’t a cash register.

While they didn’t have the specific rice my recipe called for, they did have the green tea for my Sheer Chai and nigella seeds for the bread.

I still can’t pronounce “nigella.” When I got home, I looked at the package and realized they’re also called black caraway seeds. I’d at least heard of caraway before, so I felt like I’d learned something.

Since I couldn’t find the rice, I decided to try another Afghan market a couple of miles away, but I never actually made it inside.

The GPS had me driving in circles, the parking lot was tiny, the road was busy, and I was driving my pickup, which on downtown Boise streets felt about the size of a school bus.

After one embarrassing attempt to park in what may have been the world’s tiniest parking lot, I decided basmati rice was going to be just fine. The recipe even listed it as an acceptable substitute, so I stopped arguing.

My last stop was a regular grocery store to grab a few things I couldn’t find anywhere else. That’s when I looked at my shopping list and realized I’d forgotten the specialty flour.

The flour.

The whole reason I’d planned on visiting an international market in the first place.

By then I was tired, hungry, and absolutely not driving back across town. Whole wheat flour it was.

When I finally got home and unpacked everything, it hit me that this project is going to be a lot more than just following recipes.

It’s learning where to find ingredients I’ve never heard of. It’s walking into stores I probably never would have visited otherwise. It’s figuring things out as I go. It’s spending a fortune on spices I may only use once.

Next up: the actual cooking.