Psychophant's Rants
8.9.09
Eurofood
I like making lists. They give me a sense of purpose, when they are in the future, or a sense of achievement when they deal with the past. They also give an illusion of order, more important than order itself. So here is a list of holiday food and some extras.
18th August. We arrive late in the evening in Milan, so we have dinner close to the Central Station. We skip the tourist traps and find a pizzeria full of Italians, Fashion II. We stick to classics, tomato-mozzarella salad, 4 cheese pizza and tiramisu.
19th August. Breakfast at the Andreola Grand Hotel. Reasonable cold buffet and nice sweets. We take ham-cheese sandwiches for later. We will miss the coffee when we move north.
Walking around Milan, we can recommend the excellent Grom ice cream chain. Old style creamy delights. Between sandwiches and ice cream, suddenly it is too late for a good lunch, even if it is a reasonable Spanish lunchtime (15:15) so we end up in McDonalds having a bite and drinks. Another Grom visit and we decide on a nice dinner at Nabucco. We picked it among the others because they had stuffed zucchini flowers, so those are our starters. Then I go classical (to improve my own recipe) and have ossobuco with risotto alla milanese. We also share a wine bottle, an excellent vino nobile de Montepulciano. With the wine this is also the most expensive meal.
20th August. Lots of coffee for an early start and more sandwiches and pastries at Andreola. Then we move, buying sandwiches and fruit in Basel, in what will be the hottest day of the year in Germany. We were planning on dining in an open air weinfest in Bonn, but a storm forces us to take refuge in a Mexican restaurant, where we find that the local kölsch beer goes very well with burritos, quesadillas and enchiladas.
21st August. Breakfast buffet at the Bonn Hilton, one that we will fondly remember the following days. Now we can take away not only some sandwiches but even the capuccinos. The sandwiches and an ice cream kept us going in the riverboat Skt. Peter, so we could return by train to Cologne, though we needed to have that German fast food invention, the currywurst, in the station. It was too cold for open air dining, but my wife really wanted an Alsatian Flammenkuchen with Riesling from the Weinfest, so we checked most of the restaurants till we found one that offered it, at the Rathaus. I had the season mushrooms, pfifferling, that we had been offered as special the whole day, delicious with onions and speck.
22nd August. Farewell to the Hilton, well stocked for the train trip to Berlin. Mövenpick icecream at Postdamer Platz, a place we would return a few times the following days. Asian noodles close to the Zoo, chosen because it was were the peep-show dancers were dining. Quite good.
23rd August. Breakfast at the Excelsior Hotel, busy and limited choices, maybe we are spoiled after Bonn. Lunch at the cafeteria in the Pergamon Museum, recovering from the impression of the Ishtar Gate, quite a nice, big salad. Kebab dinner at the Central Station after failing to get to visit the Reichstag dome to see Berlin's lights.
24th August. Breakfast again at the Excelsior, this time filling out the pockets with food, so an ice cream is enough as lunch. Dinner again at the Central Station, waiting for our night train to Malmö, this time Thai, followed by McSundae (what can I say, it was only 1€).
25th August. Breakfast at a friend's house, very welcome after the cramped cabin. Fresh coffee, fresh croissants and bread and cheese. Lunch was pizza, prepared while we dozed and eaten before a nap at Rosenborg. Dinner was a homemade Danish specialty, fresh cod in mustard sauce, acompanied with food-for-thought conversation and a good (Chilean, maybe) white wine.
26th August. Quick breakfast, because we were up late and we had a train to catch. Lunch in the Louisiana museum, sunning ourselves. I had a so called Caesar salad, very good, with parmesan, bacon, big pieces of garlic bread and a wide variety of lettuce types. The view of the Øresund and Sweden was also quite filling. We had dinner with her daughters, so it was pizza and ice cream. Homely!
27th August. Tea and toast, before running for the bus to the station. We had time to get some sandwiches and water at the station, before we started island jumping. The penultimate jump was a ferry, not a bridge, so we got euros out again and went duty free shopping, including sweets. We changed trains at Hamburg, where I got Chinese noodles in a box, a first for me, after seeing them all the time in movies, while my wife preferred the more traditional sandwiches. We had finally learned that plastic bottles are worth money in Northern Europe, so we recycled our water bottles. The switch at Hannover was a bit tight, but at Cologne we had enough time to visit the cathedral, again, and rewater. We arrived quite late and tired in Brussels, so rather than look around we just went into the home grown burger chain, Quick, and found out why they do not spread outside France and Belgium.
28th August. We did not have breakfast in the hotel, so we had it at the Station Haagen Dazs. Quite cheaper than the hotel. We wanted to avoid the obvious tourist restaurants close to the Grand Place, so we ended up having a late lunch, moules-frites of course, at the Cafe de l'Opera. Great service, nice place and, as in all of Belgium, excellent beer, Karmelit this time. Dinner was also quite local, Stoemp (mashed potatoes with leek and some other things) with sausages, and the help of Duvel beer to wash it all down, at a cafe by the Place du Sablon.
29th August. Breakfast and some Liege waffles again at Haagen Dazs before facing the security controls for the Eurostar to London. My wife is a Cafe Nero fan so we visited often while in London. Lunch was at Le Pain Quotidien, a good discovery chain, with healthy salads and tartines, and delicious cakes (after a repeat visit only for cake, my favorite is still the Tarte Tatin). Late dinner at Mr. Kong, in Chinatown, one of our London traditions. Crispy Szechuan duck, scallops and excellent "mixed-meat" fried noodles to fill up the holes and Tsingtao beer to put down any fires.
30th August. English breakfast at the Seven Dials hotel. Mot much choice, but well made, filling fare. Skipped the beans. Lunch at an open air food market in Cambridge, an ostrich farm was offering ostrich burgers and could not resist those half a pound (weight, not price) burgers. Washed down with Marks and Spencer Limeade. Dinner was another tradition, good Indian unlike what we find at home. We picked the Punjab restaurant because it was close to the hotel and it had opened sixty years ago. A good choice, as both the chicken and lamb curries were delicious.
31st August. Another English breakfast, identical to the previous day. This time I also skip the tomatoes. Late lunch at Stansted Airport, as we arrived well in advance to avoid any difficulties, Pret-a-manger sandwiches and salad. Dinner at home, finally. ¶ 10:45 AM
I like making lists. They give me a sense of purpose, when they are in the future, or a sense of achievement when they deal with the past. They also give an illusion of order, more important than order itself. So here is a list of holiday food and some extras.
18th August. We arrive late in the evening in Milan, so we have dinner close to the Central Station. We skip the tourist traps and find a pizzeria full of Italians, Fashion II. We stick to classics, tomato-mozzarella salad, 4 cheese pizza and tiramisu.
19th August. Breakfast at the Andreola Grand Hotel. Reasonable cold buffet and nice sweets. We take ham-cheese sandwiches for later. We will miss the coffee when we move north.
Walking around Milan, we can recommend the excellent Grom ice cream chain. Old style creamy delights. Between sandwiches and ice cream, suddenly it is too late for a good lunch, even if it is a reasonable Spanish lunchtime (15:15) so we end up in McDonalds having a bite and drinks. Another Grom visit and we decide on a nice dinner at Nabucco. We picked it among the others because they had stuffed zucchini flowers, so those are our starters. Then I go classical (to improve my own recipe) and have ossobuco with risotto alla milanese. We also share a wine bottle, an excellent vino nobile de Montepulciano. With the wine this is also the most expensive meal.
20th August. Lots of coffee for an early start and more sandwiches and pastries at Andreola. Then we move, buying sandwiches and fruit in Basel, in what will be the hottest day of the year in Germany. We were planning on dining in an open air weinfest in Bonn, but a storm forces us to take refuge in a Mexican restaurant, where we find that the local kölsch beer goes very well with burritos, quesadillas and enchiladas.
21st August. Breakfast buffet at the Bonn Hilton, one that we will fondly remember the following days. Now we can take away not only some sandwiches but even the capuccinos. The sandwiches and an ice cream kept us going in the riverboat Skt. Peter, so we could return by train to Cologne, though we needed to have that German fast food invention, the currywurst, in the station. It was too cold for open air dining, but my wife really wanted an Alsatian Flammenkuchen with Riesling from the Weinfest, so we checked most of the restaurants till we found one that offered it, at the Rathaus. I had the season mushrooms, pfifferling, that we had been offered as special the whole day, delicious with onions and speck.
22nd August. Farewell to the Hilton, well stocked for the train trip to Berlin. Mövenpick icecream at Postdamer Platz, a place we would return a few times the following days. Asian noodles close to the Zoo, chosen because it was were the peep-show dancers were dining. Quite good.
23rd August. Breakfast at the Excelsior Hotel, busy and limited choices, maybe we are spoiled after Bonn. Lunch at the cafeteria in the Pergamon Museum, recovering from the impression of the Ishtar Gate, quite a nice, big salad. Kebab dinner at the Central Station after failing to get to visit the Reichstag dome to see Berlin's lights.
24th August. Breakfast again at the Excelsior, this time filling out the pockets with food, so an ice cream is enough as lunch. Dinner again at the Central Station, waiting for our night train to Malmö, this time Thai, followed by McSundae (what can I say, it was only 1€).
25th August. Breakfast at a friend's house, very welcome after the cramped cabin. Fresh coffee, fresh croissants and bread and cheese. Lunch was pizza, prepared while we dozed and eaten before a nap at Rosenborg. Dinner was a homemade Danish specialty, fresh cod in mustard sauce, acompanied with food-for-thought conversation and a good (Chilean, maybe) white wine.
26th August. Quick breakfast, because we were up late and we had a train to catch. Lunch in the Louisiana museum, sunning ourselves. I had a so called Caesar salad, very good, with parmesan, bacon, big pieces of garlic bread and a wide variety of lettuce types. The view of the Øresund and Sweden was also quite filling. We had dinner with her daughters, so it was pizza and ice cream. Homely!
27th August. Tea and toast, before running for the bus to the station. We had time to get some sandwiches and water at the station, before we started island jumping. The penultimate jump was a ferry, not a bridge, so we got euros out again and went duty free shopping, including sweets. We changed trains at Hamburg, where I got Chinese noodles in a box, a first for me, after seeing them all the time in movies, while my wife preferred the more traditional sandwiches. We had finally learned that plastic bottles are worth money in Northern Europe, so we recycled our water bottles. The switch at Hannover was a bit tight, but at Cologne we had enough time to visit the cathedral, again, and rewater. We arrived quite late and tired in Brussels, so rather than look around we just went into the home grown burger chain, Quick, and found out why they do not spread outside France and Belgium.
28th August. We did not have breakfast in the hotel, so we had it at the Station Haagen Dazs. Quite cheaper than the hotel. We wanted to avoid the obvious tourist restaurants close to the Grand Place, so we ended up having a late lunch, moules-frites of course, at the Cafe de l'Opera. Great service, nice place and, as in all of Belgium, excellent beer, Karmelit this time. Dinner was also quite local, Stoemp (mashed potatoes with leek and some other things) with sausages, and the help of Duvel beer to wash it all down, at a cafe by the Place du Sablon.
29th August. Breakfast and some Liege waffles again at Haagen Dazs before facing the security controls for the Eurostar to London. My wife is a Cafe Nero fan so we visited often while in London. Lunch was at Le Pain Quotidien, a good discovery chain, with healthy salads and tartines, and delicious cakes (after a repeat visit only for cake, my favorite is still the Tarte Tatin). Late dinner at Mr. Kong, in Chinatown, one of our London traditions. Crispy Szechuan duck, scallops and excellent "mixed-meat" fried noodles to fill up the holes and Tsingtao beer to put down any fires.
30th August. English breakfast at the Seven Dials hotel. Mot much choice, but well made, filling fare. Skipped the beans. Lunch at an open air food market in Cambridge, an ostrich farm was offering ostrich burgers and could not resist those half a pound (weight, not price) burgers. Washed down with Marks and Spencer Limeade. Dinner was another tradition, good Indian unlike what we find at home. We picked the Punjab restaurant because it was close to the hotel and it had opened sixty years ago. A good choice, as both the chicken and lamb curries were delicious.
31st August. Another English breakfast, identical to the previous day. This time I also skip the tomatoes. Late lunch at Stansted Airport, as we arrived well in advance to avoid any difficulties, Pret-a-manger sandwiches and salad. Dinner at home, finally. ¶ 10:45 AM
