The Austro-Hungarian Empire
A few weekends back I traveled to three new countries in the continuing quest to see 100 countries and all 7 continents. My stops were Bratislava in Slovakia, Budapest in Hungary, and Vienna in Austria. People see the itinerary and ask “Why would you go to Bratislava?” Because it’s cheap to fly into, that’s why.
But let’s start there. Bratislava. Say it a few times. Let it pounce off your tongue like it’s going to attack someone. If I heard someone say “I am Ivan, am from country Slovakia, from city called Bratislava” in an obviously heavy and fake accent, I’d turn and run the other way. It’s a scary place, this former Soviet bloc country. Very dark and foreboding…everything is leftover from the Soviet occupation. I mean, when I left the airport I even drove past….
…an IKEA.
And a Nike store, and McDonalds, Marks & Spencer, and a host of other Western stores anyone would immediately recognize. My hostel didn’t have room numbers. It had cute pictures of animals. Mine was a ladybug. (Not an animal as we’d recognize it but still an insect and most people find them cute.) I’ve felt more scared walking to the Dunkin Donuts near my house at Clark and Division to buy coffee on a Sunday morning.
Now it should be noted that the movie “Hostel” does actually take place in Bratislava. Seeing as how I was staying there on my own, my exchange friends were worried I was going to get raped, murdered, or worse. I think it’s a pretty universal truth that there’s no raping or murdering going on when there are ladybugs adoring the walls. So I was safe.
The town itself was very pretty, if a bit cold. It was winter, after all. I wandered around through streets I didn’t know, saw buildings I didn’t recognize, past churches I didn’t go into, up to a castle I know nothing about. This is what happens when you are slightly unprepared for your trip. My pre-dinner walk ended in a cafe with some locals singing opera at the top of their lungs.
Dinner was good…kebab of meats and veggies…most of which were wrapped in bacon, which is the proper way to do anything. Washed it all down with some local beer, and headed to an early bed. A few pictures below…
Next up was Budapest. Budapest is in Hungary, famous for paprika, having the highest concentration of geniuses per capita, an inordinate number of Nobel Prize winners, and consistently losing wars to the Romans, Ottomans, Habsburgs….etc. It’s actually two separate towns that merged a while back. Buda, which means “where the castle is” and Pest, which means “where the rest of the city is.” I also think there’s some stuff about killing vampires in its history somewhere…but I’m currently too lazy to back that up. Overall it’s a very interesting mix of Austrian/German/Turkish/Soviet influence, blending both east and west cultures in a very different way than Istanbul.
One thing is exactly the same. That scam that happened to me in Istanbul? Apparently it’s very very common in Budapest. Didn’t let myself get suckered into paying 200 Euro for one drink this time, however.
The first day was spent wandering around the Pest side, starting with the street Vaci Utca and the market at the end of said street.
After the market I visited St. Stephen’s basilica, the Hungarian Parliament building, and wandered around the city center some more. I was starting to get a bit cold so I popped in to a little cafe to have some mulled wine, a specialty you can find just about everywhere in Budapest. Definitely one of my favorite parts. The best meal of my trip was this night, at a restaurant serving pretty traditional Hungarian foods called the Bagolyvár. It was the sister restaurant (and less expensive at that) to Gundel, which everyone was recommending. The meal started off with a plate of traditional cheese lightly grilled, served over a walnut and fruit ragout. I moved on to a traditional Hungarian soup, which, while pretty standard from a beef soup point of view in terms of ingredients, had an amazing paprika and cinnamon flavor to the broth that made it really stand out. My main course was a beautifully reddish veal stew, again flavored with a heavy dose of paprika. I rounded it off with a chocolate cake, and slowly rolled myself home through downtown Budapest.
Cheeses with walnut and fruit ragout
Veal stew
Dessert….
The following day, my last day in Budapest, it sleeted basically the entire day. I was able to see the castle, the history museum, and a few other things, but mostly I was concerned with catching an earlier train to Vienna.
I wasn’t sure what to expect with Vienna, but this was my favorite of the trip. First of all, you have the Habsburgs building all sorts of empire-like things (palaces, etc) here so that’s pretty cool. Add to that some delicious encased meats, great beers, and you’ve got the makings of a world class city.
When I arrived, I walked into what I thought was my hostel, but was actually a different branch of the Wombat hostel I was staying in. It looked very cool, there was music playing, I could hear the sounds of a bar somewhere in the vicinity, and it was all brightly colored. As I walked out to find the actual place I was staying, there was a giant sign on one of the doors that just said “SEX” in giant letters. Below that word it said “Please use other door.” Yeah…I’m gonna like Vienna.
I trudge through the snow a few more blocks and end up at my hostel. It’s almost 9:00 pm at this point and I’m pretty tired by this point. I head to my room where….everyone is already asleep. This was a common occurrence throughout this trip – people asleep at 9:00 at night and waking up at ungodly hours of the morning. I’m not talking 10:00 a.m. – I’m talking 5:00 a.m. Who does that? I guarantee you, no tourist sites are open at 5:00 a.m. This is Europe, after all.
Not being able to do anything in my room, I leave my bag in my locker and head down to the bar. At check-in, Wombat gives you a free beer. Not a bad deal. So I grab a meal and a couple of beers, ready to call it an early night. Two American girls sit down next to me, and we start talking. Turns out, they’re Univ of Michigan students, studying in Prague for the next few months. Of course they are. Wolverines are everywhere, because we’re awesome. (Or maybe because we have a large school and a huge alumni base, but I think it’s because we are awesome.) They’re rooming with some Scotts on vacation after graduating from law school, and before long the bartender starts handing out free shots. When I ask him what it is, he responds “It’s an Austrian herbal thing, don’t worry.” Right – that’s how you wake up in a prison in Bucharest, not wearing any shoes and smelling like you’ve been on a farm all day long.
Thankfully, we woke up in our hostel in Vienna, not in Romania on accident. The five of us headed out to see Vienna a bit, despite blistering cold. First up was the Schonbrunn Palace, the summer retreat of the Habsburg dynasty. Very cool, but photography is not allowed inside so…that’s why we have Google images.
Next up was the Naschmarkt, a local farmer’s market that has grown up to include restaurants, kebab stands, spice vendors, and a large number of now permanent buildings selling all sorts of edible wares.
On the urging of my dad, I stopped for a Turkish kebab – 3 Euro for a sandwich that will rival anything you find at Katz’s deli or Manny’s in Chicago. Huge, piping hot, stuffed with all sort of delicious condiment and vegetable…you have to sample if you’re here.
After a few more sites, a few stops for beers, wine, coffee, etc, I spotted something I’d been looking forward to finding in Vienna.
In Chicago, there is a cafe called Julius Meinl and it is the first of its kind in the US. JM is a Viennese coffee company selling some of the finest coffees you can obtain in commercial form. Obviously picking and roasting the beans yourself would be better, but if you’re doing that you probably have no time to read my blog, so please don’t start picking your own beans. The furniture inside is imported from Vienna and the cafe itself exudes a legitimate European atmosphere.
When I saw the giant letters spelling out Julius Meinl at the end of a square, I had to stop in. I figured I would end up paying roughly $18 for a cappuccino but I didn’t care. I needed to go to the source.
As the picture shows above, with your cappuccino you receive a trio of sugars, a small glass of water, and a small bit of silky dark chocolate. And it didn’t cost an arm and a leg. Much more than a cafe, however, the store itself is a complete gourmet food store. Much like Peck in Milan or EATaly in Torino, it had a high-end restaurant on the top floor, a large wine section, and more chocolate than even the most committed chocoholic can stand.
Satiated from kebabs, chocolates, coffee, spiced wine, we wandered back to our hostel in time for happy hour at the bar. Which, you know where this is going by now, lasted at least 4 or 5 hours.
The next day was mine to see Vienna for a few hours before heading back to Milan…and the beginning of Fashion Week. It’s a rough life over here…
It’s a small world…
Quick post – few updates on things happening over here in this magical “internet land.”
This blog is currently being read on four continents, which I’m pretty happy about. So – to my one reader in Australia – please keep it up! And pass along to friends! To my two readers in Asia – also please keep it up! I promise to come back sooner if you do.
To my Italian teacher who today in class announced she had read my blog – grazie! That was not in any way expected and totally caught me off guard. E veramente un piccolo mondo… So Loredana – please feel free to pass on to your friends!
So that makes N. America, Europe, Asia & Australia. I have a few S American friends who are currently in Milan. Just FYI you’re on the hook when you return. I would appreciate that fifth continent.
A site in Aspen wants me to do some restaurant reviews for their database. A small step but a step none-the-less.
So – I will keep trying to entertain, and you keep posting on Facebook, emailing to your friends, and spreading the word. A big thanks to everyone who’s read so far, it means a lot.
After a quick ski day tomorrow I will be back with a post about Vienna, Budapest and Bratislava. Okay mostly Vienna and Budapest…
Spaghetti Carbonara, or how to host a proper lunch.
Taking a cue from my sister’s blog here, with a personal note:
Spaghetti Carbonara is my favorite pasta dish and most likely holds the #2 spot in my all-time list of favorite dishes. Like, ever. At first I thought I liked it because of it’s inherent simplicity, humble beginnings, and surprising harmony. In general, I like things to be simple, and rely on the freshness and quality of their ingredients. And the surprising bit – I like it when dishes and flavors surprise, or the combination turns out much better than you’d expect. Perhaps the best example of this is the Wasabi Caesar salad at Elevation in Aspen, CO. When you say it, you’d think that wasabi and Caesar would be a no go. But then you take note of the fact that a proper Caeser is supposed to have a healthy dose of pepper and be slightly spicy. And if a subtle amount of wasabi helps in that endeavor then it just might work.
As for humble beginnings – spaghetti carbonara was, according to the most popular legend, created for charcoal workers in the area around Rome. It is a Roman dish, even though a restaurant in Rimini has claimed it. It doesn’t show up until post-WWII. Another popular iteration states that the charcoal workers created it themselves, and the original recipe doesn’t have pepper. Instead flecks of charcoal actually made its way into the pasta, and when the recipe was introduced elsewhere they added pepper to maintain the same look. And then, for you secret society freaks out there (myself included), there did exist a mostly harmless Italian society called the Carbonari…
Come to think of it, I’m going to start calling anyone who likes Carbonara the new Carbonari.
But then it hit me – why I like this recipe so much. It’s basically bacon and eggs tossed over spaghetti. It’s a no brainer.
Ingredients:- Pancetta – not bacon unless you really have to. Guanciale is the original I think but pancetta is more accessible to most people.
- Eggs
- Spaghetti
- Parmigiano-reggiano – both finely grated and cut into thin strips
- Fresh cracked black pepper
Preparation:
Saute up the pancetta until it’s nice and crispy, set the pan aside.
In a small bowl, crack a couple of eggs and finely grate some p-r cheese.
Cook the spaghetti, enough for four people.
Mix it up. All of it. It’s good. Top with fresh cracked pepper, salt, and thin shavings of p-r cheese.
Most recipes will be more precise than this one, but you need to adjust the amount of eggs, bacon, etc to suit your own personal tastes here.
You should probably drink this with a bottle of red wine. I know it doesn’t totally seem like red’s the obvious choice, but it’s a serious meal, and serious meals deserve to be had with red wine. Osso bucco? Red wine. Chicken cutlets? White wine. Need I go on. Again, serious wines for serious meals.
And please, no onions, peas (seriously America, peas?), broccoli, or anything else ridiculous like that. Keep it simple here people. If you’re doing it well, it should look like this:
That’s if you’re doing it well. If you want to do it right, you’ll go to Mantova. You may remember this little town as the place Romeo was banished to. It was also the seat of the Gonzaga family, who ruled large chunks of northern Italy for many years. And last but not least, it is the home of Andrea Pattarini, a friend of mine who studied at Bocconi last year and did his exchange in Chicago. He tempted me by telling me his mom made the best Carbonara. Well….this I had to see.
At the end of the Foodyssey Jenni and I traveled to Mantova to visit Andrea and his welcoming parents. Carbonara was to be lunch on Sunday so we had some time to kill Saturday night. Andrea took us around and showed us the town, and we actually went out to a sushi place that had recently opened in town.
Sunday morning started with an aperitivo of prosecco and Crodino and some delicious little snacks at the local bar. The closest thing to our bloody Mary brunches they’ve got over here. When we walked into the kitchen at home, this is what awaited us:
Yes, that is a bottle of Brunello di Montalcino on a table covered with fine China and a white tablecloth. They were not messing around here. This was going to be the real deal. You’ve been given instructions above for how to cook – now sit back and watch the magic unfold.
Cooking the pasta…
How about a little more bacon?
Mix it up. It’s good.
When I die, I won’t see a white light. I will see this.
I’ve made Carbonara a bunch myself, and it’s different every time. I think that’s how it is when it’s your favorite dish and you have exacting standards for yourself. It never quite comes out right. But her Carbonara was perfect. Perfectly al dente, just the right amount of saltiness from the pork, slightly creamy consistency from the eggs. I’m pretty sure I ate close to 8 pounds of pasta that day. It was the quintessential comfort food experience. And then it got even better.
Apparently everything you’ve heard about Italian hospitality isn’t quite accurate. It goes beyond. After our bottle of Brunello we opened a 2005 Amarone di Valpolicella. Mrs Pattarini doesn’t enjoy red wine so much so she opens a bottle of champagne. After the wine is done, Mr Pattarini decides it’s time for Armagnac. A 1970, unopened bottle of Armagnac to be precise.
And then an unopened bottle of Ron Zacapa XO.
And then a Moscato grappa.
I’m pretty sure those are all my glasses.
This is what we drank for lunch that day – Ron Zacapa, Armagnac, Grappa, Valpolicella, Brunello, and Champagne.
Thankfully, we were taking the train back. These all went down straight, in gigantic bourbon glasses.
As the warmth engulfed my entire body, I couldn’t tell if it was from the Carbonara, the hospitality, the wine, grappa, armagnac, or rum.
I did know, however, that when people speak of La Dolce Vita, and they speak of good food and great peoplw….
This is exactly what they have in mind.
The Foodyssey.
It is almost impossible to begin this post because the events that transpired cannot adequately be put into words. No amount of language, hyperbole, or linguistic trick can describe how you feel as you sample delicacies prepared in restaurants older than your country. To taste gourmets foods in the lands of their origin. And so I will attempt, with the help of my muse, to describe the bounty one encounters on a trip through Emilia-Romagna.
Our travelers start the journey in Parma, home to parmigiano-reggiano and prosciutto. Almost immediately upon exiting the train station you can smell a salumeria. You have to love a city that smells of cured meats. On your way into the city center, you will encounter two gastronomias that resemble dueling vendors trying to outdo one another with the beauty and deliciousness of their wares.
Here is Gastronomia Garibaldi. Note the legs of prosciutto hung lovingly on the walls, better alone than any Christmas stocking could ever hope to be. This is what pigs in the USA long to be.
Across the street we have Salumi & Formaggi (meat and cheese). What a great name. Those are in fact gigantic wheels of parmigiano-reggiano. You know in Duck Tales how Scrooge McDuck dives into piles of money? If I could I would dive into piles of cheese and cured meats.
After finding our hotel, we ventured out in search of the perfect dinner. We got sidetracked, as you do here, by the cutest wine and cheese bar I’ve ever seen. It was about a foot wider than the bar itself, so we shuffled past and upstairs, where they kept books about wine making and terroir and how to properly butcher pigs and meats and…you get the idea.
Do you see that cheese on the plate? Take a good look because you can’t get it anywhere else. They make it somewhere (I suspect it’s a secret, magic cave of deliciosity) nearby and it tastes almost like a brie. With honey. Don’t let me forget that. See, I adore honey and so now I’ve got cheese and meat and honey and red wine and my tastebuds feel like Odysseys strapped to the ship’s mast as he passes the Sirens…wanting just a little more of the temptation…just a little bit more.
So do we indulge in this temptation? In Italy, the correct answer is and always has been yes.
Trattoria del Tribunale.
Why not start with cheese? Because if you call this just cheese you deserved to be shackled to a donkey and mocked. This is somewhere between cheese and ambrosia. By itself it is a meal, and the perfect blend of saltiness and nuttiness in the cheeses in Parma is unrivaled. It’s change your life, walk out in traffic because it can’t get any better than this good.
And we hadn’t even had dinner yet! So I’m skipping on the picture of risotto because I can’t figure out how to take a picture that doesn’t look like oatmeal. You know, just porcini mushroom risotto with fresh grated…what do you think we grated on it? Right then. As you do.
This beautiful creation was a braised beef stew that fell apart before you ever touched it with your fork. I think there was polenta but frankly I’m not sure.
The next day we did some…stuff? And then ate again. There’s a few churches and whatnot. But come on, we’re here to eat. So we did.
It’s a good thing Italy wasn’t on the way back from Troy, or Odysseys never would have made it home. Homemade torteloni stuffed with fresh herbs and ricotta cheese in a sage butter sauce. Jenni had to restrain me at this point.
I’ve been around the world eating delicious food. I’ve eaten at Alinea, twice. Il Mulino, twice. Been to restaurants owned by Batali, Emeril, Wolfgang (the good ones, not the crap ones), lived in Rome for six months, had duck at an incredible restaurant in Paris, eaten amazing pastas all over southern Italy and had breakfast so good I almost cried at Thomas Keller’s Bouchon. I know what good food is.
And then.
And then I went to Bologna.
Bologna, the capital of Emilia Romagna, therefore the food capital of Italy, and therefore you probably won’t find a city more responsible for such an incredible array of excellent food products in the world. Dinner was in the student district where a very surly hostess tried to sit us right next to two people in an EMPTY restaurant. She literally pulled the other half of their table away and wanted us to sit next to them. In an empty room. When we asked to move it was like we punched her cat or something. It was all okay when these dishes arrived:
Tagliatelle con ragu on top, and rigatoni al forno on the bottom. The tagliatelle was excellent, but just a warm up to the rigatoni. Mushrooms, sausage, and a slightly sweet, acidic cream sauce that blended so smoothly with the spice in the dish. Of course, fresh grated Parm cheese on top.
THAT dinner proved to be nothing but a teaser for tomorrow’s lunch.
Osteria dei Poeti. An old wine cellar beneath a palazzo serving pasta “fatto a mano” – made by hand. This tagliatelle con ragu…it’s not an exaggeration to say it changed my life. The meat has actually been braising since the late 1600′s. The pasta itself is delicate and at the same time perfectly hearty. But it’s the sauce that works its magic on you as soon as you smell it. On a cold day, when you’re freezing, it warms you all over with the power of a fire, warm blanket, hot chocolate, chicken noodle soup AND pasta all in one. Then it tucks you in, serves you warm milk and cookies, and reads you a bedtime story.
The picture doesn’t do it justice and neither do my words. I have found my last meal. That’s all there is too it.
For dinner we tried a more modern restaurant in Bologna. (In Italy modern is like 1700 and beyond but this was really modern) Expecting to be disappointed somewhat we were just wowed again. Jenni ordered stuffed pasta with pumpkin and bacon, smothered in a balsamic reduction that had hints of chocolate. I ordered papardelle “fatto a mano” with porcini mushrooms and bacon (of course).
Our traveler’s last stop was Modena, home to Ferrari and aceto-balsamico, commonly called balsamic vinegar in the US. Like Champagne, it can ONLY come from Modena or it’s not real aceto-balsamico. The goal: find real balsamic and bring back spoils for the uninitiated to try. The result: lunch like you’ve never eaten.
My friend Francesca Amadei recommended this restaurant to us which, for security purposes, shall remain nameless. She told me it was “familiar” and that Ada the owner/chef/waitress/everything would tell stories and poke fun at us and whatnot. What actually occurred was beyond all expectation.
It really is this woman’s house, and there are maybe 15 spots. If you’re late, get out. Vegetarian? Sorry, get out. Don’t eat pork? Um, you’re in Emilia Romagna. GET OUT! Lunch was 4 primi piatti, 1 secondo, 2 dolci, caffe, vino, and three or four sides, I can’t remember. All through lunch Ada herself was serving, clearing, cooking, and regaling us with stories of her lewd past. She is truly a one-woman show in and of herself, and is more than reason to go. If you can find it. I’m not telling where it is.
1.1 Orecchiette con pomodori – the roasted tomatoes bursted with a sweetness that could make Willy Wonka himself blush.
1.2 Sage and Rosemary Tortoloni stuffed with ricotta. The pasta was dark green and tasted of sage and rosemary. The best pasta itself I’ve ever had.
1.3 Lasagna Bolognese
1.4 Tortellini in brodo
2 Braised pork shank with roasted vegetables – do I really have to explain again that braising is the best way to cook anything, and pork is the best thing to cook, so when you braise pork…well…if Michelangelo sculpted food he would have sculpted braised pork, that’s for sure.
At the end….
At the end of the meal she asked us and one other table where we were from. Chicago and Boston. The entire restaurant erupts – everyone had family, friends, or worked or lived in one of those two cities. Instantly we were all friends. As you bask in the warmth of the kitchen, the warmth of the food, and the warmth of new friends, you realize you’re living la dolce vita, just like they say you should.
As you stumble back out onto the street, eyes adjusting to the light because it took you three hours to eat lunch, you can’t help but want to stay, to throw everything else out the window and just LIVE, here, now, delicious, full, amazing life the way it was intended to be.
As Homer had two stories so too will we – our next trip goes to Mantova for a home cooked meal that redefines lunch yet again.
A dopo tutti…
