... If the passenger visits better countries, he may learn to improve his own, and if fortune carries him to worse, he may learn to enjoy it.” -- Samuel Johnson, A Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland and The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides.

Stuck at home, we've discovered that restaurant-quality meals and foods that we imagined were only available to us from ethnic eateries and foreign travel are actually as simple as pie when you put your mind to it. Restaurants may be closed, but heaven help us, ethnic markets are open.

Nukazuke pickles at the Nishiki Market in Kyoto, Japan.Credit...iStock/Getty Images

Housebound because of the pandemic, an international correspondent finds a way to travel the globe in her kitchen: Conjuring Up the World Through the Sense of Taste by Hannah Beech (New York Times)