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I arrived in Bangkok in 1980: I was 23 years old, and it changed my life.

Going to Southeast Asia for the first time and tasting that spectrum of flavors - that certainly changed my whole palate, the kind of foods I crave. A lot of the dishes I used to love became boring to me.

I was always getting run-down from jet lag and being in strange towns where I didn't speak the language or know what the food was like.

The best meal I've had was in Tavarua, an island in Fiji. It was just before sunset. A bunch of guys had just caught all this yellow fin tuna; they literally brought this huge wooden table down to the sand, pulled the tuna from the boat, dropped it on top of the table, pulled the skin off and sliced the tuna up.

Food makes travel so exceptional, because you get to taste what it's actually supposed to taste like. To eat the real Pad Thai or finally have a proper curry is something pretty amazing.

I'm from Manchester, Mass., so it was lobster, lobster and more lobster! Also, lots of fish that we caught in the summers, clam chowder and roast beef sandwiches. But my mom was pretty healthy; we had a lot of chicken and broccoli and rice as well.

I usually eat in my friend Tom Corcoran's place - the Siam Thai in Monkstown. I go there for a very large plate of beef in red wine sauce.

That's always my downfall on tour: the food. I just want to eat everything.

I was eating in a Chinese restaurant downtown. There was a dish called Mother and Child Reunion. It's chicken and eggs. And I said, I gotta use that one.