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Cooking as an Ultimate Expression of Love, or Early Valentine’s Day Experiences
I’m always happy to admit that Valentine’s Day is one of my favorite holidays. Of course this is a personal statement, and of course, I perfectly understand that I’m lucky to be able to say it wholeheartedly, as this is not a universal truth.
Outside of presents (which is fun), overpriced flowers and cheesy cards (nevermind all the heart-shaped chocolates, I don’t even want to mention those), Valentine’s Day is all about food and wine. Many years ago, we ditched the tradition of oversubscribed and underdelivering restaurants, offering strictly timed moments of celebration in favor of homemade dinners, which also include the whole family.
Valentine’s Day dinners at home offer a lot of pleasure in itself – you get to contemplate and select the menu, and you have an opportunity to touch lots and lots of bottles until you grab the one which somehow, magically, will become “it”. And then you get to cook that dinner, and most importantly, if everything works as you are hoping it will, you get an extra dose of happiness looking at the happy faces around the dinner table. By the way, if you need any wine recommendations for the Valentine’s Day, I wrote a few of them in the recent years – here and here are two of my favorite ones.
This year, Valentine’s Day dinner came in early – we will be leaving for vacation exactly on the February 14th, thus in order to maintain the tradition of family celebration, the dinner had to take place earlier – on Sunday before the Valentine’s Day. And so the next idea was – why don’t we start early on Sunday, let’s say with a nice breakfast?
What is your favorite celebratory breakfast meal? Eggs Benedict is definitely one of my favorites, so that was an easy decision. Smoked salmon is one of my favorite choices for the eggs benedict, so the prep for the breakfast started two days prior, first by making smoked salmon (you can find the recipe here).
This is Valentine’s Day dinner, so we need to up the game, right? What can elevate breakfast better than some crispy bacon? Yep, bacon it is!
Traditional Eggs Benedict are served on top of the English muffin. Truth be told, I don’t like English muffin – not with eggs benedict, not by itself. So my choice of bread? A fresh biscuit. I have friends who can easily whip a batch of biscuits on a moment’s notice, but I have my limits – thus buttermilk biscuits by Pillsbury work just perfectly for me.
Next, we need to make the Hollandaise sauce. It is somewhat of a tedious process, involving a double-boiler and some serious skills – unless you have a recipe from Suzanne, which is very simple and guarantees a perfect result – as long as you follow it precisely. The Hollandaise came out perfect, both taste and texture, so last prep step was to poach some eggs. All you need to do is to get hot water with vinegar to borderline boil (it shouldn’t be actively boiling, so take your time to adjust the heat) in a deep skillet, then carefully crack the eggs, set the timer and voilà. To my shame, I have to admit this is where I failed – I set the timer for 10 minutes (this is what I read in one of the recipes online), and this was a mistake – I completely overcooked the eggs. I believe the right time would be 5 minutes at the most.
Another important step – let the eggs cool off after cooking (ice bath recommended) – I didn’t do it, and as the result, Hollandaise was not covering the eggs properly – oh well, it was still really tasty. So the last step was to assemble the Eggs Benedict – the biscuit on the bottom, then smoked salmon, bacon, egg, and Hollandaise.
Now it is time to make dinner. More often than not, simplicity is your friend when it comes to food. Going the simple route, our Valentine’s Day dinner plan was simple – steak and potatoes.
For the potatoes, we have a recipe where potatoes are thinly sliced on the mandoline, then slices are stacked at the little angle and fried – it is a great recipe except that my fingers and mandoline are not great together, but love requires sacrifices, right?
And for the steak – you can’t beat the simplicity of the pan-fried filet mignon:
Where there is steak, there is also wine. As I mentioned, after spending good 20 minutes going through the different shelves of the wine coolers, I pulled out the bottle which happened to deliver an insane amount of pleasure – 2005 Neyers AME Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley.
I like to know critics scores for the wines, but only out of curiosity – my buying decisions are not based on those scores at all. Besides, my own take on the wine rarely correlates with the critic’s opinion. Except for this wine – when I read Robert Parker’s description, to my surprise and delight, it was well aligned with the way I perceived it – so here is Robert Parker’s take on this 2005 Neyers AME:
” 93 points Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate
Here you are, my friends – our early Valentine’s Day dinner experience. Happy Valentine’s Day! Cheers!Gardens of Singapore
I don’t really have a “bucket list” (thinking about the etymology of the expression, it doesn’t even sound all that appealing). Instead, I have a “dream list” – places I truly want to visit and things I want to experience.
Believe it or not, but I can’t tell you how my “dream list” is formed. It is usually an article or pictures, which get stuck in the head, and then all of a sudden show up on that list. Such is the case with Singapore, and I can’t even tell you if it was any particular article or any pictures – all I know is that Singapore was definitely a dream destination for me for a long time. And then finally, the dream was realized – a business meeting brought me down to Singapore, with an open day for the sightseeing.
Singapore was definitely a place I wanted to visit – but I really didn’t know what to expect. So I’m not sure I can say that Singapore exceeded my expectations, but instead, I would have to say that I was blown away by what I saw. I felt that was living through the movie which was part beautiful science fiction, part thriller taking place in the Asian city (with all the little spots you really have to know about) – surreal is the word. No, I didn’t experience anything adverse, but the overall feeling was surreal.
Singapore is located 1 degree north of the equator – yes, that would definitely place it in the tropics. In turn, that also means that Singapore is really green – and it is happy to show it. On one side of the city-state, you can find Singapore Botanical Gardens, 159 years old tropical gardens, spanning 185 acres with many thousands of plants. It also hosts a National Orchid Garden with about a 1000 different orchard species. On another side of the town, you can find Gardens by the Bay, a $650 million project – 250 acres of land, hosting more than 250,000 different plants. Gardens by the Bay look nothing short of alien site landing, worthy of any science fiction movie – an absolutely stunning testament to human creativity.
This is the wine blog, yes – but I love photography, and flowers are some of my most favorite subjects. Hence let me inundate you with the beauty I was able to embrace last week. Hope you will enjoy it as much as I did. Cheers!
under the leaf…
And Winter Gracefully Arrived
The winter arrived in Connecticut, and arrived in a very graceful way – the snow was coming down on Saturday – not too hard, just right. We probably got about 6 inches, and that snowy Saturday followed by a beautiful, sunny Sunday, with the beauty of the first snow, crisp, fresh, white. No work commute was affected, no schools closed – the very graceful arrival of the winter.
What you see here are a few pictures, from my walk around the neighborhood, all captured with the trusted iPhone. Enjoy!
Travel Diaries: Few Days in Malmö, Sweden
About a month ago, I shared with you, mostly in pictures, my experience of a few hours in the Copenhagen. Copenhagen visit was a lucky detour, but the actual destination of that trip was the city in the Southern Sweden called Malmö.
Okay, I’m not going all of a sudden talk about the history of Malmö, the capital and largest city of the Swedish county of Scania – everything you want to know you can find in the Wikipedia or other sources. I was there for long and grueling week-long meetings and really didn’t have time to freely roam around – most of my sightseeing was done during the lunch breaks. Nevertheless, I have tons of pictures, thanks to a very capable camera which is now in the pockets of most of the people all the time (yes, that would be an iPhone for you, Apple-loving people) – and I have my impressions from walking the streets and interacting with people.
I can summarize my impressions of 5 days in Malmö in 3 simple words: “I loved it”. That’s all I need to say, really. The streets, the city views, the people, the hotel, the food – that is truly a full summary.
I know that everyone’s perception is different, and more often than not, we get lucky in our endeavors (unfortunately, we often take it for granted, but this is not the subject of this post). Yes, my impressions are based on spending time in the area adjacent to the Malmö Central train station, in the radius of 20–25 minutes walking from that train station. Is life very different in the areas which are located an hour away from the train station and city center of Malmö or elsewhere in Sweden? Quite possible, but I will let you find out.
Anyone wants to play while waiting for the train?
I loved the way the town is architected. The old and authentic looking houses and buildings are perfectly intermixed with the new houses and buildings. The style of the new construction is modern and clean (it is Scandinavia, after all), but the old and the new work very well together.
Bicycles are everywhere. Lots and lots of bicycles are parked along the streets, there are lots of people riding them, and an absolute majority of the sidewalks have designated “lane” for bicycles where pedestrians are not allowed.
HSB Turning Torso – a marvel of engineering
And then people. Anyone I talked to had perfect English. Young and old, at the restaurants or on the streets, at the train station or a supermarket – people had no issues switching to a perfect English in a heart bit. I wouldn’t claim any special traveling prowess but having been to a few countries outside of the USA, I have some basis for the comparison – this experience was definitely unique and ultimately comforting (you can truly relax knowing that you will be understood if need to ask a question).
I stayed at Marriott Renaissance, and this was one of my absolutely favorite hotel experiences – very comfortable room, nicely appointed, with the temperature which can be easily adjusted – those who stay at the hotels, will understand my excitement, I’m sure; good size bathroom and everything in the working order. Nicely appointed interior throughout the hotel, and – all the service staff were a pleasure to talk to. Again, if you travel, you will understand my excitement. Excellent breakfast buffet, which appears small but has an outstanding variety of everything you need for a good breakfast (I suggest you will get it included in your room rate).
If I have a gripe with my trip, it would be food and, especially, the wine. Not the quality or quantity, no, not at all – but the price. You can’t find a bottle of wine at a restaurant which will be cheaper than $50 (most of the prices start from $60). Most of the beers will be $8+ per glass, and cheapest glass of wine (hard to find) will be around $12. When you look at the prices of the hard liquors, they look perfectly reasonable, until you understand that the prices are given for the 10 centiliters – there are about 3 centiliters in an ounce, and standard pour in the USA is 2 ounces, so what looked super-cheap at $4 or even $6, doesn’t look that attractive at $18 for the half of your typical pour. Food is also not cheap, so keeping your dinner at least around $60 with one glass of wine is not simple at all. But – pretty much everything we ate was very tasty, so I really don’t have a good reason to complain. And I have to say that if you chose to skip the full-service restaurants, there are plenty of inexpensive dining options – for instance, lots of small restaurants inside the train station, serving tasty food (this is where we had most of our lunches).
Here are the restaurants I’m happy to recommend if your travel will take you to Malmö:
Espresso House
Espresso House is a chain, similar to the US Starbucks – there are no Starbucks in Sweden. It is similar to Starbucks in the selection of the drinks, but beyond just that, also has very similar issues. Let me explain. I visited the Espresso House located on the plaza next to the Renaissance hotel. First, the barista made me wait for at least 5 minutes, just keep doing and doing something without paying any attention to my presence in front of the counter (the place is small, so yes, she saw me). Then, there was a list of various coffees available to order – from 4 or 5 different countries of origin – when I asked to explain me the differences, was quickly told to ignore the list as Brazilian coffee was the only one available anyway.
But – the ambiance of the sitting area on the second floor was very nice, and the whole place had a charm, so the service part was quickly forgotten as I was enjoying my cup of coffee and a pastry.
Hamnmästaren
Bagers plats 1
211 18 Malmö, Sweden
Ph: +46 72-865 96 68
Who would’ve thought that Malmö is a place for an American barbecue? And so it actually is! We stumbled across this little place, located close to the train station, in the old house on the Port Supervisor. The restaurant offers a good selection of beer and all the bbq “usual suspects” – pork, brisket, chicken. I ordered chili to start with and pulled chicken sandwich. Big mistake. The chili was huge in size and was mostly pulled pork with beans, generous and delicious. And when it came to the pulled chicken sandwich, I never saw more overstuffed sandwich in my life (keep trying to understand my logic of not taking any pictures; sigh) – and this was probably the very best smoked chicken I ever had too. Beware of the portion sizes – and this place is definitely worth a visit.
La Brasserie
Skomakaregatan 10
211 34 Malmö, Sweden
+46 40 12 21 00
A French style restaurant, as you can tell by the name. The reasonable selection at around $50 per bottle – my gripe is that those wines are mostly around $7 – $8 in retail (outside of Sweden, of course), but nevertheless. We had a bottle of Cotes du Rhome and a Corbieres, both from 2014 vintage and both nicely drinkable.
I asked for waitress’ recommendation for my main dish, deciding between steak tartar and a seafood soup, technically a bouillabaisse. She confidently replied: “seafood soup” (I wonder what was her criteria to suggest it).
The soup had a total of 3 mussels in it, and random pieces of fish, in somewhat heavy broth. Again, I’m not sure what was the basis for the recommendation for this dish, but I definitely found it underwhelming. Nevertheless, you might give it a try, may be seafood is not their specialty.
Bastard
Mäster Johansgatan 11
211 21 Malmö, Sweden
Ph: +46 40-12 13 18
French flair restaurant. Reservations are definitely recommended – it was almost a miracle that we got in on Wednesday, there were lots of people sent away.
Good list of beer and wine. I had nice French cider first, then a glass of house Rosé, very tasty.
The restaurant offers a tasting menu, which has to be shared by the table, which was what we took. The tasting menu is not predefined, it is basically “whatever chef feels like today”.
The charcuterie was very tasty and steak tartar was outstanding. The followed by the two salads, both were simply a standout – Panzanella salad with boquerones, and then tomato and feta salad – the tomatoes were so succulent – I don’t know when was the last time I tasted tomatoes like that. Squash pizza was unusual and tasty and our last dish, individual servings of ham with mashed potatoes and fresh peas – was delicious to the last morsel. A very tasty experience.
Drumbar Scottish Pub & Tavern
Lilla Torg 9,
Hedmanska gården
211 34 Malmö, Sweden
+46 40 799 90
An English pub with outstanding selection of beer and scotch. I wish I realized that the word “drum” in the Drumbar relates to the actual “drum”, the whisky. The selection of drums was just spectacular – which I saw only as we were leaving. Yeah…
Had Innis & Gunn an IPA style beer on draft, but with more citrusy notes and not as biting as traditional IPA, and fish and chips for dinner (we are in the pub, right?) – may be the best I ever had – huge piece of cod, lightly fried, delicious sauce – outstanding. My colleague had pork shank which was absolutely perfect – rich, flavorful, fall-off-the-bone with crispy skin – another standout. An excellent place well worthy of anyone’s attention.
That’s all I wanted to share, with you, my friends. If your travel will take you to Malmö, I hope you will find these notes useful. If you’ve been to Malmö recently, I would be glad to compare the notes. Cheers!
Travel Diaries: Copenhagen in the Rain
My business trip was taking me to Malmo in Sweden. At first, I was trying to book the flight to arrive at the Malmo airport, but tickets were coming out extremely pricey, and what is even worse, required at least two stops to come back to the USA – there were no other options available.
Obviously, when one gets stuck in today’s world, then one asks for help of … no, not audience, but the almighty Google. Within a few minutes I was able to figure out that it is much easier to fly to Copenhagen and then take a train from the Copenhagen airport to the Malmo central station, which is very easy and takes less than 30 minutes. After figuring that out with Google, I looked into the invitation letter for the meeting, and that is exactly what was recommended there (yep, a classic RTFM case). Anyway, to make the long story short, I got the tickets for the flight which was arriving into Copenhagen very early Sunday morning.
I connected at Copenhagen airport a few times before, but this was the first time I had an opportunity to actually visit the city. And a few weeks before the trip it dawned on me that I will be visiting the city I was so fascinated with while growing up as a child. You see, fairy tales were one of my most favorite books, and when it comes to the fairy tales, Hans Christian Andersen is easily the classic of the classics, comparable may be only to the Grimms brothers.
Hans Andersen was living in Copenhagen for the most of his life, and so the illustrator for his books (translated, of course) which I had an opportunity to read, had chosen different Copenhagen city landmarks to be on the cover and throughout the books. The opportunity to see all the castles, spires and flags was truly exciting and brought back lots of childhood memories…
On the morning of arrival, the weather was grey, and by the time I was able to go drop my luggage at the hotel in Malmo and come back to Copenhagen, the rain started. I couldn’t give up the opportunity to connect with the childhood, so rain or not, this was my only day to walk around Copenhagen, and nothing was going to stop me. Thus what you see below is mostly bleak, but it is still looks beautiful to me…
I clearly remember the building below (which turns out to be the old Stock Exchange building) to be depicted on the cover of the books, so I really made a few attempts to find a good way to capture the view (not easy with an iPhone camera):
More of the “wet” views:
You know, you get tired walking for a day, with or without the rain. By accident, we found the ILLUM Rooftop, which is a large rooftop space on top of the shopping mall, hosting lots of different restaurants. We wandered into the Bar Jacobsen, which provided delicious locally brewed Jacobsen beer and some beautiful views:
And the last picture for today, processed with my favorite iPhone photo editor, SnapSeed:
Wet but very, very happy – that was my state upon coming back to Malmo.
To be continued…
Restaurant Files: Room 112 in Norwalk, CT – Experiencing The Art Of The Cocktail
I’m very comfortable around alcohol. In the times of utmost political correctness this statement might be taken wrong in so many ways, but yes, I would still say it. Wine, beer, whiskey, tequila and everything in between – I’m not an expert, but I know my way around different types of alcohol in all of its forms. With one exception – cocktails. I have to openly and honestly admit that I’m intimidated by the cocktails.
While I was growing up, even at the age when I could legally drink, a bar and a cocktail where only a theoretical concept for me, something I learned from the books, and from the books alone. It continued that way even after I came to the States. It is quite possible that my first cocktail drink was during my first vacation in Cancun, as it was very simple there – Mojito was one and only name you needed to know.
When I sit at the bar, I’m at loss. Too many ingredients I can’t relate to, the need to measure, numerous failed attempts to make something tasty at home, despite religiously following the recipe. In most cases, the service starts with “What can I get you”, for which I don’t have a ready answer, and usually the menu wouldn’t help. So I end up with the sheepish “something not too sweet, please?”
Of course, the situation is not as dramatic lately, as a majority of the restaurants now offer concise, easy to choose from and often unique selection of the cocktails, which I’m gladly taking advantage of. Still, sitting at the bar is not something I would readily go for.
And then, there is Room 112 in Norwalk, Connecticut, which is The Bar. I remember in many books coming across the word “saloon”, which now seems to be used interchangeably with the “bar”. In the original meaning, saloon seems to be a “large room with the bar”, so this is what the Room 112 is – a large, creatively appointed room with the bar. Actually, it is two rooms with two bars – as few steps down the stairs will lead you to the game room, with another bar. Maybe we should just call it The Lounge.
What you will see below is few of my notes and mostly a collection of the pictures; I hope they will convey the magic of Room 112 at least to a some degree:
I visited Room 112 with the group of bloggers, so I was happy to sit at the bar to get the best view in the house:
The cocktails at the Room 112 are not just made – they are crafted. Thoughtfully selected drinking vessels, the presentation, the meticulous measurement and execution – sitting there at the bar at the Room 112, you are looking at the work of not just a barmen, but an Artist.
Here is Moët Impérial Champagne to start the evening – just look at that glass:
Look at all the “tools of the trade”:
And here are the cocktails in the making – I should’ve recorded the video, only I didn’t:
Here is the final product – cocktail called Casa De Amor (casa amigo tequila, pavan liqueur, fresh lime juice, orange blossom bitters, dragon fruit, pink peppercorns, fresh rosemary sprig):
Here are few of the cocktails which I tried. The Pinacita (absolute elyx vodka, koval chrysanthemum & honey liqueur, st elder liqueur, fresh lime juice, serrano peppers, grilled pineapple, pink peppercorns and a campari foam) was not too sweet, nicely balanced (no, this is not an individual glass – it was served for the whole our group to try):
My absolute favorites were two cocktails. First, Magic Mule (magic moments lemongrass infused vodka, koval ginger liqueur, fresh lime juice, topped with club soda, ginger root, lime, and mint), which was truly magic. I don’t know what was so special about this cocktail, but it was super-delicious – soft and gentle, but with rich flavor profile, soft notes of fresh ginger with herbs – I simply couldn’t get enough of it, most delicious Mule I ever had, pure magic:
The second standout cocktail was El Nino (Mexican Hot Toddy – azeteca de oro liqueur, koval honey liqueur, fresh lime juice, hot water, dried cranberries and a lemon and orange twist garnish) – it was served warm, in the beautiful sniffer glass, and I would just smell it forever – so much flavor was exuding from this glass, lemon, orange, wow. This is an ultimate cocktail for the cold winter day – grab the glass with two hands, and feel like warmth spreads all over your body:
Room 112 offer food with the help of the farm to table catering company called Harbor Harvest. We didn’t have an opportunity to explore much of the range of the food offerings – only had some antipasti, but they were fresh and tasty:
Here is the peek at the room downstairs:
For the desert I had … yet another drink. I’m sure I mentioned in the prior posts how much I love good Mezcal (close relative of Tequila, but usually a lot smokier). Room 112 offers great selection of Mezcal (and tequila), so I was given an option to try one of my favorites – Del Maguey Mezcal and went with the Del Maguey Vida Mezcal – beautiful smoke over characteristic agave notes with herbal accents. Perfect desert in my book, for sure.
That’s all, my friends – here is your [mostly photo] report on my experience of the Art of the Cocktail. If you are local, or maybe visiting for the holidays – Room 112 should be on your short list.
What was your latest encounter with creative cocktails? Let me know. Cheers!
Room 112
112 Washington St
South Norwalk, CT, 06854
Ph: 203.939.1347
http://room112sono.com/
Last Bottle Sign Up ($10 credit)
