One has to watch one’s diet, hasn’t one? But not today, today’s the weekend, it’s Saturday, I have better things to do than to watch anyone’s diet, I’m me today, and me, myself and I, we all want carbs! “One” is therefore overruled. And let us tell you, “us” being the carblover’s pluralis majestatis, we had twelve of those little sugar-coated things, and they were just great! On Monday, we shall turn into decent people again as one has to watch one’s diet, hasn’t one?
As nobody, and I mean nobody at all, has given me any flowers for Valentine’s Day, I had to present myself with something a little more soothing than some tulips (it’s quite pathetic to buy red roses for oneself, isn’t it?) and so I went for some cheesecake, the most soothing cake there is. Sooth and smooth. Nonetheless, I added a little more vanilla than usual, just to make sure of it. Vanilla has quite soothing effects on my mind, too. The cheesecake turned out fine. Quite yummy. Very soothing, indeed. Almost mind-numbingly soothing. You see, I really have totally forgotten all about these flowers I didn’t get today. Today, not just any day, no, on Valentine’s Day! I need more cheesecake. Now!
It’s been just another grey winter’s day in Berlin, quite depressing. The moment, I woke up, I knew I needed something to cheer me up big time if I wanted this Monday to be a day worth living. That’s when I started thinking of tart. A very special tart, actually. A tart, I couldn’t bake myself. A tart, I had to get out of bed and run into town to get some at the KaDeWe, short for Kaufhaus des Westens, Berlin’s high-toned department store whose food halls took in some French people answering to the name of Lenôtre, the very people that own that very tart’s recipe. A tart so yummy, I would not dare to wash it down with milk or tea or coffee, not even champagne, just to make the aromas linger forever on my tongue. A dough rich of pistaccios and cherries to make it irresistible, some vanilla custard to make it creamy, a crumble topping to make it crunchy, and some maraschino cherries and powdered sugar on top to make it look fancy. This was the very tart that got me through the day. I’m still high on serotonine, so I guess, it’ll get me through the rest of the week as well…
Yesterday, quite out of the blue, I was confronted on Instagram with a photo I had posted years ago. Years! A fantastic little object of fine Swiss patisserie on one of my Royal Copenhagen plates. Obviously, I was still living in Zurich at that time, a time I was deeply and ever so hopelessly in love with everything the Swiss do to raspberries. At Vollenweider’s, for example, they sprinkle them with tiny pistaccio crumbs, des pistaches hachées ever so menues, just to enhance their aroma, just like what a glass of cool Sauternes does to strawberries, at least if we trust Sebastian Flyte, which I do, but I digress and on top, I’m quoting from Brideshead Revisited again, but any of Evelyn Waugh’s novels are forever stuck in my mind, so I have to ask for your forgiveness and to reread them all. Anyway, this delicious post had just gotten a new like after all these years, and by whom? By none other than the Vollenweider people themselves! I was most honoured to be reminded of what I’ve been missing in my life ever since I left Zurich… Damn!
When you are supposed to put rosemary on a cake, you know it’s going to be different from your usual hazelnut extravaganza. Truth be told, this fine herb was the only exceptional ingredient of this recipe, all the rest, puff pastry, plums, sugar, cinnamon, and quince jelly, sounds rather familiar, doesn’t it? But once you’ve put the plums casually on the puff pastry and sprinkled the rosemary on it, your eyes won’t believe it’s not butter, sorry, they won’t believe it’s not pizza. Only when it’s out of the oven and into your mouth, its case is closed. It’s cake. No doubt. A very yummy, very Mediterranian cake. If you want to challenge your eyes, do try this at home!
Normally, for a nut cake, I need lots and lots of grounded almonds and some chopped walnuts, but yesterday I only had a tiny sachet of grounded almonds, just a mere 100 gramms, some bitter joke of an amount, so to speak, and if I weren’t as stress-resilient as I am, I might have burst out into tears. But then, out of hunting destiny down and kicking its ass, I decided to replace the grounded almonds with caramelized hazelnuts, the brittle priorly reserved for the glaze, and, while I was at it, use whole pine nuts as a substitute for the chopped walnuts, lots and lots of whole pine nuts. The result? Best nut cake ever! Unchanged recipes are for losers!
Binge watching VEEP (a show, I discovered only yesterday, so far, I’ve made it to season 2/episode 4, laughing out loud every five minutes) has made me not leave my couch for quite some time now, except for short runs to the fridge in order to get some fresh supply of strawberry cheesecake icecream (not from that really famous brand, but from the other really famous brand, you see, their cheesecake layers are a bit saltier, which is a nice contrast to the sweetness of the strawberries, but I digress), a dessert, or basic nutrition, which I have grown addicted to as swiftly as to Selina Meyer and her wonderfully obnoxious crew. I wonder what I will do after the end of the last season… not much, I guess; probably, I won’t be able to move at all by then…
The best thing about Switzerland is the food. And the best thing about the food is a Luxemburgerli from Sprüngli’s. You might think it’s a macaron but it’s not, believe you me. I’ve had macarons, plenty, even those hysterically cherished ones from Ladurée, and I had them from Ladurée in Paris, on rue Bonaparte, so don’t tell me the taste was probably just affected by transportation, say a long-distance flight to Sydney, Cape Cod or Kyoto or where ever you picture me misjudging Ladurée’s famous delights, no, even those iconic French macarons are nothing in comparison. Nothing compares to a Luxemburgerli. Nothing. Actually, it makes macarons obsolete. Sad excuses for a sweet. You better take the next flight to Zurich and make it to Paradeplatz as quickly as you possibly can. If only I could do the same, but I promised to show up at my parents’ place this Easter weekend…
Since the beginning of time, we’ve met with many a famous couple: Adam and Eve, Caesar and Cleopatra, Romeo and Juliet, Harry and Sally, Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, Yves Saint Laurent and Victoire Doutreleau, Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, James Bond and an endless row of girls, Miss Marple and Mr Stringer, Tintin and Captain Haddock, but the most successful couple to me is a strawberry and the cheesecake she’s just been introduced to. Admittedly, their love affair won’t last long, a fork will be their hangman, my stomach their grave, but neither did Romeo and Juliet’s, and so I will continue to help any strawberry meet the love of her life, my cheesecake. Short live the happy couple!
Austria is very blessed a country. They not only have Sissi, that wonderful iconic empress played so heartbreakingly sweet by Romy Schneider, more importantly, they are lucky to have the very best pastries in the world. You all know the Sachertorte from Sacher’s in Vienna, probably the most famous chocolate cake in the world, although it’s not the vast amounts of chocolate that are to blame for its fame, but the fine layer of apricot marmalade, then there’s Demel on Kohlmarkt near Hofburg Palace, purveyor to the Imperial and Royal Court of Austria, the best pastry shop in the world (at least, as far as I’m concerned) with an absurdly delicious range of tarts and cakes (and a very yummy Beef Wellington, too) that make you forget all about the importance of beach bodies in general and very much of your own in particular, and finally there’s Kaiserschmarrn, a kind of elaborate pancake with lots of rum raisins—and some apricot marmalade to dip your pieces into for a slightly sour yet very fruity contrast. That one, at least, you can do all by yourself (don’t forget some grated lemon peel, it’s quite crucial), for anything from Sacher or Demel’s you need years and years of training… Years!
Clovis Sangrail 