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Don't they like their food in Bologna...
2008-02-10 12:59:00
Bologna is arguably the Italian capital of handmade filled pasta (OK, from now on we'll need to overcome the groans of discontent of readers from other Italian regions...). Here you can find whole troops (even though thinning out) of "nonne" working their rolling pins to produce acres and acres of perfectly thin pasta for tortellini, ravioli, tagliatelle... you name them, they do them. And for starred restaurants, too! Here we show you a selection from the windows of Atti, a real institution of a shop in the heart of historical Bologna:and here a closeup of passatelli (remember? We had them at "Il Sole")But of course here you find tortellini by the wagon load everywhere: don't you feel like diving in?And Bologna wouldn't be Bologna without its fair share of cheeses and hams...You find this plenty at every corner:as well as their proud owners! Back to Atti, there you can also find all manner of goodies to soothe your sweet tooth. Various "paste":as well as other cakes:including th...
More About: Food , Bologna

TerraNostra
2008-02-03 15:16:00
The day: 17th January 2008, Dinner.The place: 27 Old Bailey, London EC4M 7HS (020 3201 0077)The venue: TerraNostra RestaurantThe food: SardinianThe drinks: Short list, mostly Sardinian but many other Italian regions. We take holidays in Sardinia quite often. That we fell for the second time, after the disaster of Sardo, into the trap of trying a Sardinian restaurant in London lays bare a masochistic streak in us...The restaurant in question opened just last September in an interesting area which should be great for business, near to poles of attraction as diverse as the large Bart's hospital (as St. Bartholomew's Hospital is known to us regulars), St. Paul’s Cathedral, and about a zillion of City offices. The interior is rustic and welcoming, with a room enlivened by a curvy partition and a bar area, decorations which are easy on the eye, and plain tables: On the menu, the few usual suspects of simple Sardinian fare: some mainly fish starters, such as tuna tart...

Le Grappe d'or (Lausanne)
2008-01-27 16:13:00
The day: 9th January 2008, Dinner.The place: Rue Cheneau-de-Bourg, 3, Lausanne, (Switzerland), tel: +41 (0) 21 323 0760The venue: La Grappe d’OrThe food: (Very) Traditional Italian Airport: Geneva (BA)The drinks: Short list, mostly Italian, a couple of Swiss wines We are condemned to Italian cusine. In Lausanne for a couple of days, we had been tipped off by Chef Edorovio to go to Le Pomme de Pin, but alas on a Wednesday night it was fully booked. So, egged on by various raving reviews, off we go to Le Grappe d’or: we expect to find a temple of French cuisine, (eg. Frommer hails it as ‘the most sought-after citadel of food and drink’) but uhm, a bit weird, an inspection of the menu reveals vongole and tomato pasta, risotto… oh well, no time to lose by now, this is our third attempt to get some food tonight (yes, we had also tried and book ‘Le petit grappe’: according to the always knowledgeable internet guides, the name is due to it being run by the son of the more...

Down with Starbucks (but please don't sue us)
2008-01-22 12:49:00
A cold late December morning outside a non-descript bar, near a non-descript hospital, in a non- descript residential suburb of Bologna (if Bolognese readers want to take a guess...go ahead!). Outside you get this on the right:and this on the leftYou cannot get much more anonymous than this, can you? But now, get inside.... a whole new world of plenty: would you care for chocolates?Or perhaps you fancy the more traditional "paste"Well, they also have a lab (a lab in a bar, can you imagine?!), and people working in it:We could not take a picture of the coffee counter, so crowded it was.Moral: How can anyone in his right mind ever be tempted, we wonder, into the aseptic (at best) Starbuck world? Long live the independent bar! Home
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The Leoni brothers at Ristorante Il Sole (Bologna, IT)
2008-01-15 19:15:00
The day: 28th December 2007, Lunchtime.The place: Via Lame, 67, Trebbo di Reno (BO), Italy (tel +39 051 700102)The venue: Ristorante Il Sole (aka Antica Locanda il Sole)Closest airport: Bologna (BA from London Gatwick)The food: Fine Italian Dining, with strong regional influenceThe drinks: Good list, many regional but also other choices, all prices but very reasonable markups We had been in this Michelin starred establishment, just 8 kilometres in the fertile plain around Bologna, before several times, this being an old time favourite with Megaman and Megawoman, but never with a camera handy. So here we go to pay a solo (well, in the sense of duo, of course) visit with all the necessary equipment. The restaurant is run by two brother chef patrons Marcello and Gianluca Leoni , justifying the nice menu cover, as Leoni is the Italian for “lions” The interior, divided in several relatively small rooms (almost empty during our visit), with huge, well-separated ...
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Amazing langoustines at Au Tilleul
2008-01-10 13:02:00
On our way to Italy for a non-vacation in December, we need some relaxation ahead of a very diffcult period (we spare you the details). And where best to find it than during the natural stop in Alsace, at our discovery of last Summer, Jacques Lorentz's Au Tilleul? As you'll recall it is in the village with the typically French sounding name of Mittelhausbergen, off Strasbourg, here:We had another wonderful and stunningly inexpensive dinner at Au Tilleul. Among the many superb items, the Langoustines were particularly superb. The dish arrives to your table like this:with the langoustine resting on a bed of cereals and grains. Then, the waitress pours on it a clear consomme', et voila':This dish is light, this dish is beautiful, this dish is elegant, this dish is tasty: in a nutshell, this dish is great. The delicate, sweet, succulent meat of the Langoustine is just caressed by the equally delicate consomme'. The cereals and grains then add some texture and crunch. Perfect.And,...
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Kikuchi
2008-01-03 17:55:00
The day: 9th Decmber 2007, Dinner.The place: 14 Hanway Street, London W1T 1UD (020-7637 7720)The venue: Kikuchi RestaurantThe food: JapaneseThe drinks: Japanese beers and sake. In the year when the Michelin critics regaled Tokyo with an amazing array of stars, including three for a sushi bar in a station, it seems appropriate to pay a visit to Kikuchi, our favourite Japanese joint in London town. It’s tucked away in a seedy street off Tottenham Court road; if you notice several Mercedes parked there, be aware that they are not for Kikuchi customers but rather for the nearby much posher venue of Hakkasan. The interior is Spartan with wooden tables but very pleasant, tastefully decorated, warm, inviting, with embellishments, hygiene certificates and knives hung here and there And of course the sushi counter (of which we could not take a detailed photograph not to disturb the other guests seating there) with Mr. Kikuchi himself, in traditional attire, con...

George (Helsinki)
2007-12-27 20:04:00
The day: 15th December 2007, Dinner.The place: Kalevankatu 17, Helsinki , Finland (tel 010 270 17 02)The venue: Restaurant George by HenriXClosest airports: Helsinki (British Airways, Finnair)The food: Modern FinnishThe drinks: too expensive as everywhere in Helsinki Our last cold night in Helsinki: we try a restaurant that until a couple of years ago vaunted a Michelin star and is now under new management and chef. Thus, a restaurant that has to prove itself and is desirous to both confirm its past glory and emerge afresh: will it succeed? That’s what we are here for: here we come, here we come… The exterior is cool in an elegant neoclassical building typical of Helsinki: The interior is ‘woody’, with wood floors and ceilings, and even the upholstered walls ardent to mimic panelled wood. With the tables spacious and well spaced, the impression is one of modern comfort. The a la carte menu is short, with seven starters and five mains. Prices for the former are...

Hakaniemi market hall (Helsinki)
2007-12-20 14:50:00
A people is a civilization if they like their food - at least, this is our firm conviction. So, we skip the definitely more touristic Old market hall in market square (all tourists want to skip the tourist bits, after all), and head decidedly towards Hakaniemi market, in the north of the city where our hosts tell us locals go.On the square outside the market proper, there are some stalls, like this one selling berries by the mountain(We believe the ones above are lingonberries). Inside the brick building, though, what a wonderful space opens up. We skip the boring top floor, which sells clothes, brick a brack, etcetera (but it has some cafes). We go instead for the jugular, and the first stall we bump into is serving cold cuts of meat and herring, porridge, sausages, and there is a scramble to have breakfast with what looks really delicious stuff: but it is so busy, no chance of even taking a picture, unfortunately.Next up, a well-stocked cheese stall, the stall holder is lovely and...
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Havis (Helsinki, Finland)
2007-12-16 14:09:00
The day: 14th Deember, Dinner.The place: Eteläranta, 16, Helsinki (FI) (tel +358 9 68695660)The venue: Havis Closest Airport: Helsinki (British Airways and Finnair form Heathrow)The food: FishThe drinks: do not know (but markups are so high in Finland , you really do not want to know) We are in Helsinki for a few days. We were really not counting to review this place (nice friends on account brought us here), but it was too good to miss. And it was on our shortlist (reputedly the best fish restaurant in Helsinki), so why should we not tell you about it? Only, as we had no control on either the final bill nor the wine list, we’ll have to be sketchier than usual on some details. Moreover, as we were engaged in very pleasant conversation with our host, we failed to profit to break ice with the chef who brought one of the orders to our table, and might have been distracted in places (especially Man who, let’s face it, can cope less well with alcohol than Woman can...). We also...

There are figs and there are figs
2007-12-10 11:14:00
Look, here are some Sardinian figs (memories of Summer...) taken, just a few minutes before, off the fig tree branch:and here are some other figs taken in London (still in late Summer) from a posh supermarket shelf:You might notice they look rather “tighter”.Let us check inside. Here you see the Sardinian ones:And here are the London supermarket ones:Can you see the difference? The fresh-from-the-tree ones are all over the place: they are so ripe they cannot hold their shape. Flavour, we can tell you, goes hand in hand with this type of disarray. Now imagine shipping those figs: if insect don’t have them before arrival, handling will finish them off. The figs will need to be plucked muuuuch too early.Now for 'lecture' number two, a more seasonal one: observe these sharon fruits bought in a posh London supermarket:and these from a supermarket in Italy:above you see the "before" and "after" condition of the fruits :)Now let us study them inside, first the London onein case you...

Costa Salici
2007-12-03 14:37:00
The day: 9th November 2007, Dinner.The place: Via Costa dei Salici, Cavalese, Trento (IT)The venue: Ristorante Costa SaliciThe food: Modern take on regional cuisineAirport: Verona, Brescia (BA, Ryanair)The drinks: Mostly from Trentino-Alto Adige, some other Italians, some token French. Good list of distilled spirits and dessert wines Living in London trains you for fairly long trips to do anything: shopping, visiting your friends, trying a restaurant. One does not think much of spending 50 minutes to reach a destination. By applying the same principle when in small centres (winning over the psychological resistance of ‘travelling far out’), one can expand considerably the range of culinary experiences. So one cold November night, the very last of our short Autumn trip to Italy, we drive out and up to Cavalese, in the beautiful Val di Cembra in the Trento province. Our target is a family restaurant which is making its name among lovers of good food. The Tait family have run t...

Michelin guide Italy 2008
2007-11-28 12:03:00
The new Michelin guide for Italy has announced its new stars. After the recent lavisheness of stars for German and Japanese restaurants (including three stars for a sushi bar in Tokyo) there is a surprising paucity of stars for a country where - we can assure you, and with all due respect for other types of cuisine - you can eat divinely well...No matter, who cares about guides, you can always read our blog for more objective judgements...But we want to congratulate two chefs who have been justly rewarded and whom we praised here: Walter Miori of Locanda Margon where we had a fantastic dinner just a few weeks ago,and Piercarlo Zanotti of L'Ortica, for whom we forecast a bright future just a few months ago. Well done guys, keep up the good work!
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Number Twelve
2007-11-25 12:09:00
The day: 20th November 2007, DinnerThe place: 12 upper Woburn Place, London WC1H 0HX (020 7693 5425)The venue: Number Twelve bar and restaurant (at the Ambassador’s Hotel)The food: Modern British with an Italian twist (or modern Italian with a British twist)The drinks: International, shortish but non obvious, good range of prices and types, starting below £20, also by the glass and 375 carafe. We told you already there is one guy in the trade we really trust, and now you know we mean it since, in spite of our previous disastrous experience elsewhere, we once again followed his tip off and came to Number Twelve, recently opened as the bar and restaurant of the Ambassador’s Hotel in Bloomsbury. The weather on the night was too lousy for us to stop and take a picture of the outside, which is discrete and minimalist. The interior, softly lit, is slightly reminiscent of Addendum (another hotel restaurant), though the dining room here is probably smaller. Four chefs...

A little wine discovery: Negrara
2007-11-18 12:07:00
Whatever one thinks of Italian wines, one attraction of Italy for the oenophile is the incredible variety of half-forgotten local grapes. We have recently discovered a new one, courtesy of Cristina Menestrina of Osteria Fior di Roccia. It's called Negrara:Produced in Trentino, deep dark red in colour, perfumed, vivacious with nice acidity and some tannic grip but overall quite soft and round on the palate, this grape is 'piede franco', i.e. not grafted on American root stock like the vast majority of European grapes to protect them from phylloxera.Certainly not your standardised international wine, this specimen was produced by reputable producer Pravis and came at 16 Euros at the Osteria, which we found very resonable indeed for the quality and the sheer interest.It accompanied, among other things, some simple and rustic but spectacularly good 'chestnut gnocchi with pine nuts and raisins' made by Chef Michele Menestrina:Incidentally, the Menestrina siblings continue to make i...
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Latium's 4 fish ravioli = Best UK pasta dish 2007
2007-11-16 12:13:00
See here for the background. At the end of yet another enthusing dinner at Latium last night, we learned that the Craft Guild of Chefs and Restaurant magazine jury has picked Maurizio Morelli's dish as the winner among the three finalists: congratulations!That is indeed a great dish, but Morelli makes many others, including some brewing novelties on ravioli as desserts - stay tuned...Home
More About: Fish , Ravioli , Pasta , Dish

Locanda Margon (Trento, IT)
2007-11-11 16:26:00
The day: 3rd November, Dinner.The place: Via Margone, Ravina, Trento, Italy (tel +39 0461 349401)The venue: Locanda MargonClosest airports: Brescia (Ryanair), Verona (British Airways)The food: Modern interpretation of regional Trentino cuisineThe drinks: mainly from Trentino Alto Adige and Italy with some foreign choices (especially French), at all prices and with very honest markups In Italy for a week, we are deep in ‘Lunelli-land’, among the vineyards that produce Ferrari, one of the best Italian ‘metodo classico’ fizzies (i.e. champagne, but the French prevent us to call it that). The Lunelli family bought the vineyards three years ago from the previous owners, and they are also behind the “Surgiva” water found more and more often in Italian restaurants both in Italy and in London. Spumante, water and now… fine food. In place of the old ‘Marlene’ restaurant, a new sparkling building surrounded by vines and more vines. It is not all that easy...

The Dutch love their cheese!
2007-11-06 15:16:00
With only a few hours at your disposal, how do you gauge the general gastronomic level of a city?Of course, by peeping into the markets and delicatessen shops.This is exactly what we did in Amsterdam, while strolling around from a canal to the next. Contrary to expectations, we were not much impressed by the breads (maybe we were just unlucky), but the cheeses...the cheeses were another story. Let's take a look in here, for example:Hi, we are two cholesterol conscious saddos and we are not going to buy anything, but could we please take pictures of your beautiful products?Thank you very much.Oh, yes:Plenty of varieties and a joyful display, with fantastic chromatic richness:Dutch cheeses but not only Dutch:Cheese s and more:And more, even with a 'mediterranean' slant:During our walk we encountered several other equally appealing delicatessen shops, equally well stocked with cheeses. The good Amsterdam people seem to have it quite better than in London, where the density of good ...
More About: Love , The Dutch

UK best dishes: you read it here first...
2007-11-02 16:41:00
We are very happy: our fave Latium restaurant is among the three finalists for the Restaurant Magazine UK Best dishes award, in the 'Best pasta dish' category.As you know, we've enjoyed Maurizio Morelli's Four fish ravioli many times... This is what we had to say on this blog:'The ravioli are sublime. They come in the following order: squid ink raviolo filled with monkfish with a hint of courgettees; spinach raviolo filled with brill and a hint of carrots; saffron raviolo filled with salmon and a hint of spring onions; and finally tomato raviolo filled with tuna and a hint of peppers. All dressed with butter (not as yellow as in the picture), diced tomatoes and seabass roe. The thin black dashes you see on the plate are also squid ink. This could seem a dish with too much going on: in fact, it is beautifully coherent, with a progression of intensity of flavours, and combinations of pasta, fish and herbs that match each other delightfully.'Well...the inspectors of Restaurant Ma...
More About: Read , Dishes

Beddington's (Amsterdam)
2007-10-30 18:08:00
The day: 27th October, DinnerThe place: Utrechtsedwarsstraat 141, 1017 W.E. Amsterdam , the Neterlands (+31 20 6207393)The venue: Beddington’s RestaurantThe food: French based, Far East influenced fusionClosest Airport: Amsterdam (BA, BMI, Easyjet...)The drinks: Relatively short, good range of prices and varieties, also by the glass and half bottle. In beautiful Amsterdam for a couple of days, we were keen to sample Jean Beddington’s cuisine in the restaurant that bears her name. It’s in a very quiet residential street stretching peacefully between the Amstel and the shopping and restaurant artery that is Utrechtsestraat. The interior is nicely stark, in “habitat style”, all straight lines, white and black/mahogany brown, subdivided into small areas. The tables are well spaced, in fact very well spaced, all reasonably sized, and the one we grab is just glorious: huge, and tucked at the L-shaped worktop separating the dining room from the kitchen, which is ...

fanatical about bread...
2007-10-25 11:58:00
Ok, you may wonder why we in our reviews we keep going on and on and on about bread baskets: well, as you imagine it is not the basket itself that we have a problem with, but with the quality, amount, and variety of their content. And to accommodate a decent selection, you need a good basket.As you see, at home indeed we have no decent basket, so we have to adapt a colander:but decent bread, we have. Up there you see a selection of plain and sesame rolls, either white or wholewheat, and olive grissini twist, either white or wholewheat. And if you are not a rolls type, then let us go for a loaf: a white oneor a rustic one with durum wheat:or a rye one:Now this is not a recipe blog, nor a “here-we-go-bragging-about-how-good-we- are-in-the-kitchen” blog. Our point is simply this: if this is what we, not particularly apt at the stove, can do at home, surely fine Italian dining establishments must be able to do something at least comparable with their professional ovens.Those who do n...
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Zafferano (London)
2007-10-21 12:11:00
The day: 13th October 2007, Lunch.The place: 15 Lowndes Street Street, London SW1X 9EY (020 7235 5800)The venue: Zafferano RestaurantThe food: Fine Italian DiningThe drinks: Mainly Italian, usual London mark-ups, nice range of prices and types, starting below £20 (Alloro and Giardinetto, please take note), also by the glass and the half bottle. Could we fail to visit, sooner or later, this Michelin starred Italian Knightsbridge stalwart, once home of the great Locatelli? No, we could not. So on a fine sunny October day we make our way past the countless embassies and elegant white buildings, and we get in sight of our treat providers for today – or so we hope. The kitchen is now in the hands of Chef Andy Needham (once Locatelli's sous-chef). The interior is an elegant space, with velvet upholstered chairs, quite vast, interestingly and variedly subdivided into areas, and definitely not stuffy. There is instead a certain air of Italian faux-rusticity. We are ...

Alloro (London)
2007-10-14 15:56:00
The day: 5th October 2007, Dinner.The place: 19-20, Dover Street, London W1S 4LU (020 7495 4768)The venue: Allo ro RestaurantThe food: Fine Italian DiningThe drinks: Rather short wine list, all Italian, pricey, ridiculous price range, almost all over £30 by the bottle. Alloro sits in that array of streets off Piccadilly peppered with art galleries, expensive shops, and the houses of the well-to-do. It offers a short grab-a-bite menu if you are happy to seat at the ‘baretto’, and a full list in its comfortable set of dining areas snaking their way past the discreet entrance. At the helm in the kitchen is an Italian chef from Turin, Daniele Camera. We were seated in a smart room at the back with a Tapiesque palette of brown tones. The set menus are at £28.50, £34 and £39 for two, three and four courses, respectively, although several of the items on the menu do come with a supplement – making our £100 rule is going to be quite a challenge... The energetic...

Patterson's (London)
2007-10-08 16:41:00
The day: 21st September 2007, Dinner.The place: 4 Mill Street, W1S 2AX, Mayfair, London The food: Modern English (= French)The drinks: Rather short wine list but quite diverse, with a French slant, also by the glass and half bottle A Scottish family restaurant in the outer reaches of Mayfair, this is an elegant place about whose cuisine we’d heard good things, even with Michelin stars being mentioned as deserved: we must pay a visit! We scoot past Via Condotti off Regent Street, and literally behind the corner is our target. The interior, as we said, is elegant and the reception relatively formal. Huge fish tanks create a slightly surreal atmosphere, but ideal, together with the ornamental plants, to soften and enliven the stark room with black leather chairs and benches.We sit in a nice, softly lit and relatively secluded end-of-room area, but our row of tables for couples is crammed, the tables themselves are quite small, with a largish table behind us produc...
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Sa Cardiga and Su Schironi (Cagliari, IT)
2007-10-01 11:58:00
The day: 14th September 2007, Dinner.The place: stradale Pula, Bivio Capoterra, Loc. “La Maddalena Spiaggia” (Cagliari , IT)The venue: Ristorante Sa Cardiga e Su SchironiClosest Airport: Cagliari (BA, Easyjet)The food: Traditional Italian/Sardinian Dining (mainly fish)The drinks: Regionally based with some interesting wines, reasonably priced. Here's the second review from our selection of the Sardinian holidays. It's about the kind of slightly upmarket family restaurant you can find in Italy: very comfortable environment, well appointed tables with regular tablecloths and napkins (and above all oceans of space between them), a diffuse simple elegance, with a relaxed, unstuffy and welcoming atmosphere that suits the tourist, the local and the businessperson alike (all three categories were represented on the night of our visit). Well, this is what we mean: The restaurant, as one would expect, it being practically on the beachfront, specialises in seafood: as y...

S'Apposentu (Cagliari) - Chef Roberto Petza
2007-09-25 11:08:00
The day: 5th September 2007, Dinner. The place: Teatro Lirico (Cagliari , IT) The venue: Ristorante S’ApposentuClosest Airport: Cagliari (BA, Easyjet)The food: Fine Italian/Sardinian Dining The drinks: Extensive and careful list, Italian based, very strong on Sardinian wines, wide range of prices, also by the glass. This was the Michelin starred culinary destination during our beach-bumming holidays on the splendid Southwestern coast of Sardinia. Alas, all good things must come to an end; and this unfortunately applies to our holidays as well as to this restaurant: S’Apposentu will close in December because of financial disagreements between Chef patron Robe rto Petza and his ‘hosts’ at the Teatro Lirico (a very colourful, very Italian story at once sad and farcical, too long to tell here, though…). Nevertheless Chef Petza is not going to disappear, so we think this report will be of interest to those who wish to assay his cuisine in whatever new enterprise he launches....

Burrida culture shock - can you spot the difference?
2007-09-20 18:58:00
We spent our late Summer holidays in Sardinia. Before reporting on restaurants, a few thoughts on:BurridaA traditional fish dish in the Cagliari region (more on its preparation later).Here is what we had at when we ordered it at Trattoria Bachixeddu (in Pula, Cagliari):And this is what we found at Trattoria 'Zio Dino' (also in Pula):They look pretty similar, don't they? That's because this is what burrida is, how Burrida is prepared. The fish is 'Gattuccio di mare' (a type of small shark) boiled and then enlivened with a sauce made up of the fish liver and walnuts pulped together, and vinegar. Absolutely delicious (we think you can spot from the photos the better one, the one with the more satisfying sauce).But at Theo Randall in London when you ask for Burrida...now what is that? We wonder...we wonder...what did his parents tell him during his trips in Italy as a little child?Talking about culture shocks, let's also take a look at that great standard, Pasta con le vongo...
More About: Culture , Shock , Spot , Difference , Diff

Gerbeaud House, Budapest
2007-09-14 19:26:00
Gerbeaud Haz sits beautifully on a square at one end of the pedestrianised Vaci Utzca, in Vörösmarty tér. It started off in 1858 as a patisserie and confectioner; it is a real European institution. Inside it exhudes lavish imperial smartness:and this is definitely the place to stop for a slice of Dobos TorteThe Dobos Torte is the most famous creation of Joszef Dobos, sometimes described as the Escoffier of Hungary. Observe its characteristic thin layers topped by a caramel glazed crown:You see? There are five layers of vanilla sponge. This is exactly as it should be. Each is covered by chocolate buttercream icing. It takes a little bit of work to prepare it. You can see step by step pictures of how it can be made here (though notice there are more layers here, and the caramel top is in threads, rather than a compact slab: farther from the original, but more practical for cutting into it!)A nice feature of Gerbeaud cafe is that, beside good patisserie, they make the best coffee (o...
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Budapest's market
2007-09-08 18:53:00
Here we come to Buda pest's central market! Very high ceiling in this impressive building - pity we forgot to take a picture of the exterior, but the interior is rather grand, too:You will find many types of fruits and vegetables, but above all a very impressive, multicoloured array of all sorts of of peppers:of the fresh as well as the dried variety:Meat, however, rules here:A lot of innards (warning: from now on this post will be become ever more gruesome...), here is some tripe:as well as a great deal of cooked and cured meats: we skip the more usual salami, but have a look at these:Ah, and where did we see those chaps before?maybe you'll recognise them close up (turn away now if you are of a squeamish disposition)or after they have been cooked (can you spot the snout?):Sorry, no fish in Budapest central market.Home
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Fortuna
2007-09-03 15:42:00
The day: 26th August 2007, Dinner. The place: Hess Andras Ter 49, 1014 Budapest, Hungary (375 68 57 – both telephone and fax) The venue: Fortuna Closest airports: Budapest (British Airways) The food: Fine Hungarian Dining The drinks: Careful list of Hungarian wines, prices in line with the very elegant decorLet's have a change for tonight, let's dine in Budapest (we are that kind of people, you know...). Where best to start than in the tourist trap district of Buda Castle? You have to be careful when choosing in this area, but we had heard good things about Fortuna, so in we go.The interior is vast, impressive and lusciously elegant, a triumph of velvet, damasqued thick fabrics, and decorations from Medieval times onwards.There are in fact several interconnecting rooms with different themes, with the odd armour thrown in.And in case you wonder, no, it is not kitsch.The mise en place on the table is impeccable and very pleasant looking.The menu is rather on the expensive side by...