In Food: Try this gluten-free, dairy-free chocolate cake

I came across this in the Evernote Food app, which lead me to this site with the recipe, and also to a book that this was sourced from.

First of all, easy-peasy to make, it took just about 20 minutes + time in the fridge (accelerate it by putting it in the freezer for an hour).

Second of all, delicious, very similar to mousse au chocolat, but without eggs.

Third of all, healthy, as there's no dough involved and good for the lactose-intolerant among us. It mentions Graham crackers, but the method does not actually involve them, rather it reproduces a similar effect.

I didn't change the recipe on the site, but would suggest losing very little salt as it quickly turns too salty. It does bring out the flavours however.

Check out the book here:

The Paleo Chocolate Lovers' Cookbook: 80 Gluten-Free Treats for Breakfast & Dessert

In Food: Have a burger at Sävel in Helsinki, Finland

In short: good, friendly service, order at the bar, British pub vibe, great sekection of ales and beer, with recommendations for every meal on the menu, and the burgers have just the right mix of substance and sogginess, accompanied by done seriously hot chillie fries. A good place for a simply good burger in Heldinki! Check out their site here: http://www.kallionsavel.fi/

In Food: Sfäär Restaurant in Tallinn, Estonia

Don't miss this one (http://www.sfaar.ee/) if you're there! I think it's actually in some ways a better restaurant than Chef & Sommelier in Helsinki (my review: http://favourits.blogspot.com/2013/10/in-food-chef-sommelier-in-helsinki.html?m=0), but also a fitting complement to it.  Yesterday, we ate white fish & paste made out of Jerusalem artichoke, and another paste made out of carrots and (perhaps) honey, which was amazing and very similar to a course served at C & S, as well as another dish consisting of pork, gratin, and baked apple in a delicious plum sauce. All noted for inspired future home cooking! 

Truth be told, C & S served all excellent courses, and his just happened to be a competing one, but if you, like us, go to both Helsinki & Tallinn on your trip, don't miss visiting both restaurants. 

In Food: Chef & Sommelier Restaurant in Helsinki, Finland

I like restaurants where the menu consists solely of individual ingredients and you don't quite know the outcome. Typically someone (skilled) comes up to you and says: "I got these two ingredients and I will use them to make something special for you." That's what C & S (http://chefetsommelier.fi/en/) was like. 

The four-course menu, which can also be three- to nine-course was selected from a handwritten menu and was presented in a two-ingredient format. I won't bother recounting the exact ingredients, except that it was predominantly root-based, fitting the autum season. They change the menu every 8 weeks, but it wouldn't surprise me that if I came back tomorrow, my two-ingredient dish would look and taste different. It's the mystery that I love, along with the unique combinations, and the excellent service, without it feeling to rigid or posh. 

I will mention one dish though that was entirely special, because it was a traditional dish assembled from entirely different ingredients. It resembled pasta with parmeggiano, but it was arctic turnip rasped into a thick pasta shape, cooked, and sprinkled with sage. Rich in flavours and very, very good (I wish I could reproduce it at home, but like my lobster cappuccino in Iceland (review: http://favourits.blogspot.com/2013/09/in-food-lobster-cappuccino-at-fririk-v.html?m=0) I probably never will...).

Great place to visit in Finland!

In Food: Leek - Sesame Soup at Gartine, Amsterdam, the Netherlands

Ok, Gartine is probably my favourite place in the Netherlands right now, let alone Amsterdam. Amazing, delicate brunch, amazing, delicious high-tea, best jam that you can buy all around. Today, I had a Leek - Sesame soup for high tea, which was … too die for. It had a creamy texture with very subtle green flavours. 

So, I tried to replicate it. It wasn't a success, in the sense of it being the same, but for an experiment, it was still pretty good. Here's my recipe:

Ingredients:

• 2 leeks, the white and light green parts washed & chopped
• about 4 large potatoes
• a thumb of ginger (you can omit this, it's too strong a flavour)
• 4 cloves of garlic
• slightly more than a teaspoon of dill
• (lemon) salt & pepper
• vegetable bouillon about 2 cups
• ca. 1/5 cup (2 table spoons) of sesame seeds
• half a cup of cream - semi-skimmed
• a table spoon of mustard

Steps:

1. I started with frying the leeks in the pan, for about 2 min, or until they turned very slightly brown
2. I then added the potatoes, (skip the) ginger, garlic, dill, salt, pepper, and bouillon.
3. Let the whole thing simmer for ca. 20 min or until the potato is tender enough
4. After 20 min, add the sesame seeds and cream (I actually fried the sesame seeds just prior to this, without oil, in a pan)
5. I added the mustard for flavour
6. Food process the whole thing, but not too strong, make it rough in texture.

Voila. It was delicious, would've been better without the ginger, but I'm happy with the attempt. PS, did I mention that you should visit Gartine? :)

In Food: Flan di Zucca (Pumpkin Flan) at La Zucca Restaurant in Venice,Italy

This is an incredibly hard dish to make. The most difficult is the texture--this is my perhaps 7th attempt at making it and I got it wrong two times.

Tip 1: Don't use the food processor before cooking it. You can ruin the texture and taste by doing that. Tonight's version looked like scrambled eggs. At other times, because the pieces of pumpkin I chop are too large, before I mash it with a fork, the outcome is more of a post-bombardment-like flattened mess, though it does taste a LOT better!

Tip 2: Spicing. So far, I think you can make it with either nutmeg & mint, or with anise. Either however has drastically different flavouring outcomes. 

The biggest deal is the uncertainty, caused by the many Italian interpretations of this recipe out there, and the many possible Google translate errors causing you to mistake butter of cream or nutmeg for youdontwanttoknow...

So, why is this one of my favourites? It's simply an amazing texture and taste (when you get it right). I would recommend using this recipe, which uses nutmeg & mint, but perhaps switching it up with anise if you want a different flavour (though I wouldn't recommend food processing it before).

It's never going to look as good as what I had in Venice, I would definitely recommend visiting the La Zucca Restaurant for the authentic taste, not to mention all the other vegetarian food they make.

In Food: Lobster Cappuccino at the FRIÐRIK V restaurant in Reykjavik, Iceland

This one is a bit of a back flash to June of this year, but is still worth a note. I had tears welling up during a 3 course / beer tasting meal at FRIDRIK V, and this "Lobster Cappuccino" was the absolute top, along with some very good local Ales. I can't tell you the recipe, it had lobster, cream, quite some salt, all in a tiny cup. Worth a visit on your next visit to Reykjavik!

Oh, and I just saw that the restaurant lists a number of recipes on their site. The food was brilliant, cook it at home! 

In Food: Greena Colada Smoothie at Sage Organic Vegan Bistro in Los Angeles, CA

Ingredients from the website: Coconut milk, banana, pineapple, spinach, kale. That was a $9 shake but totally, and utterly worth it. On a 33 degree Celsius day (that's 91.5 Fahrenheit), it kept me fed for well over 4 hours.

In the absence of being in LA right now (very cool city), I'm going to try making this at home ASAP.

Oh, and it looked something like this:

In Food: BEAR FLAG BURRITO at Bear Flag Fish Company in Newport Beach, CA

How do I best describe this in one word: "Mmmmmmmmmh".

I should just leave it at that, right? Let's talk a little more about what made this work. I think it was the simple combination of having a white fish (yellow tail?) with cajun spicing, and avocado. I've never tasted anything quite as delicious in a while.

Ingredients mentioned on the restaurant menu: Grilled Fish of the Day, served with rice, black beans, avocado, chop lettuce, Pico De Gallo & Tommy Sauce. In the absence of being on Newport Beach, California, surfing the sunshine, try this at home! :)

Newport Beach, California, September 2013

In events: Wine-tasting Klassiek Europa, Noordwijk

Note to self: use the camera on your phone more, like at least once.

Yesterday, at the Klassiek Europa event at the beach in the Netherlands, I met a lot of cool wine-affectionados, a number of wine-professionals, and drunk a lot, too much wine. Rule 101 of wine-tasting is really to spit out the wine—it might look disgusting, and you won't get drunk as quickly, but you'll still get drunk.

Good countries that I remember (note to self: take pictures of bottles):

• A red wine from Italy—yum, fruity!


• A white dry wine from Spain—yum, dry!


• A white Riesling from Germany—yum, dry!


• A white quasi-Riesling from the Netherlands—omg, I've never tasted anything so horrible in my life.

Was hoping to track down a white German whine that I tasted in Luxembourg and was the best I ever had, but I didn't.