October 24, 2018

Must-try eats in Tel-Aviv

There´s a nightlife district in Tel-Aviv´s ancient fort city, an old neighbourhood called Jaffa, with plenty of great wining and dining options. Happy hour at Raisa bar on a hightable outside people watching is definitely a highlight, but any bars on the streets running north-south in that pedestrian area can lure you in, depending on your mood and company.

Eating at Onza restaurant on a Monday or Frida means live music on the street, which is also where they set up their overflow tables, as the diners spill onto both sides of the road getting their fill of world-class dining. The wine list is one of the best in Israel, including local special varieties, and the food cooked by Turkish chefs Darhani and Magriso will impress any gourmande.

Mashya

The best restaurant in Tel-Aviv is hands down Mashya. Sit at the bar and chat with the bartenders, and be mesmerised by their cocktail making skills. They´ll always answer a question about the menu with a personal touch, and definitely trust any recommendations they have for food or drinks. If you have the time and money, I´d suggest going back twice or thrice so you can try all the cocktails and plates.

dazzle your senses (and your wallet) at the Carmel Market, which sells street food that could make even Michelin chefs jealous

Haifa is a pleasant surprise, especially the stretch of (Ben Gurion) street leading up to the Bahai garden terraces and the view from the top of the staircase down to the city and nearby port and train station. Eat and drink at Fattoush, by far the best spot on the strip. The ambience, atmosphere and full tables attest to it´s popularity, and the price and portions were generous, especially by Tel Aviv standards.

If you´re going to Nazareth or Tiberias, don´t expect much in the restaurant, bar or shopping scene, but it´s still worth going for the scenery and vineyard region in and around the Galilee region. Don´t pass up the chance to get into the private home cellars of some family winemakers for wine tasting. Another highlight is of course the Sea of Gailiee – you can get a natural foot fish spa by dipping your feet in from the shore, which seems to be sinking as fast as the Dead Sea, so its definitely worth going sooner rather than later!

June 10, 2018

ÓX, the newest foodie hotspot in Reykjavik

The food scene in Iceland, especially Reykjavik, has literally exploded in the last eight to ten years. Since moving back to Reykjavik in 2008, I´ve first-handedly watched this little village of a city turn itself around from economic meltdown and exploit the infamous Eyjafjallajökull to its touristic benefit. We´ve turned the crises of other exploding volcanoes, incredible football victory in the European Championship, and more recently, the World Cup, into international fame, since all publicity is good publicity.

ÓX, the smallest restaurant in Reykjavik with only 11 seats

All corners of Iceland are explored now, all year round, meaning hotels are full in January and no more secret hotpots in the middle of nowhere are left untouched. While this comes with a small price to pay for us locals, I don´t know if I´d give it up for all the good tourism has done for us. Roads, historical buildings, deserted farms and countryside hotels are being fixed and built up at such a rate that our employment rates are virtually non-existent. With that comes a lot of employees from Europe and elsewhere, and every little piece of this puzzle is helping the culinary scene in Reykjavik grow up into a delicious food fare.

little bits of flavour explosion

ÓX is the newest addition, and already calling its own name to fame by being the smallest restaurant in Reykjavík. The publicity there is a bit special – the website gives no address, and even though you can now find a puddle of hot water big enough for two in the middle of a field off an unnamed road with a GPS point on google maps, ÓX isn´t findable. It´s a speakeasy kind of place, a back door secret entry through its sister restaurant, which guests only get directions to once they´ve booked one of the 11 seats for dinner.

Hafsteinn serving me from the chef´s table

There´s only one seating per night, starting at 19:00, open three nights a week (Thursday, Friday and Saturday), and you book a seat much like you´d book a ticket for the theatre. You enter the space, alone or plus one or two or ten, and become dazzled with the food, chefs, and cosy space over the next 3+ hours. There’s one price per person, 12-13 courses with drink pairings, for a little over €200, with vegetarian friendly and non-alcoholic pairings as an option.

the craft housebrew, amber rye beer, made in collaboration with @ladybrewery

I finally got to dine at ÓX two and a half months after its opening, and it´s not worth waiting that long. If every Icelander tried to eat at this restaurant, it would take 203 years for everyone to get a reservation with a capacity of only 1,716 guests per year. Rumors have it they may start opening Wednesday nights too, but why wait to wind up your senses and start your journey at ÓX? As the website explains, its time to “set foot on a mountain of senses, dive into an ocean of discovery; Iceland is your playground, consume your exploration.”

December 17, 2017

The Weird and Tasty in London

I never go to London to go to London – it´s usually on the way from Iceland to somewhere else, or a stopover to switch airports. I´ve been to London a dozen times, and always left the airport if I can, but never really wanted to stay long since London struck me as a grey and overpriced, crowded city. I also hate commuting, and the London underground is the most complicated public transport system in the world, but this was finally going to be the first trip to London for the sake of getting to know London.

typical London to me

For the first time, I started liking London. I stayed in zone 1 and tried to walk as much as possible, and actually saw blue skies more than once. Oxford street with all its Christmas cheer was undeniably charming, and the handful of parks around still had green grass. The trip was focused on wining and dining, since it will be my WSET Level III exam location in a couple of months, but a string of strange sights and events also made the trip quirky and memorable.

magic tricks with liquid nitrogen at Dinner by Heston

I don´t have any proof, but out of the window of my Gatwick airport express train, I saw a green parrot flying freely. I wondered where one could post to a Lost and Found forum about their missing exotic bird, or if its possible that it flew here, naturally and by its own will, from somewhere warm and tropical.

a street scene in downtown St. Helier, a weekend detour we took from London

I had one of those moments where you wish someone had caught it on camera, or suspected there was a hidden camera and it was done on purpose to record your reaction, but it was simply a stroke of bad luck, being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I was walking along the sidewalk where a small puddle had collected in the curb, and a car drove by close and fast enough to send it spraying over me, head to toe. It was stinky, grey, icecold water, but the shock factor was too much for me to worry about that. The woman just behind me, who got pretty much the same splash, gasped and screamed ´that is SO unfair!´

British people are known to be pretty rude drivers, especially in city center traffic, driving on the wrong side of the road and all. But its not funny anymore when it gets racist, and I heard one truck driver screaming out of his window down to the guy in the Mercedes Benz that had just cut him off ´where´d you get your license? Moscow right? Learn to fucking drive!´The Mercedes guy answered and they started screaming all sorts of profanity at eachother, threatening to get out of their car, but luckily the light turned green and everyone went on their way.

how did he get there?

The weirdest thing I saw was a car parked on its nose against a house. It had somehow driven, or slid, off the road and lay beside the window of a basement suite. It had taken out the railing, but missed the window and the garbage bins, even though it had fallen down a crack only one meter wide.

Dinner by Heston Blumenthal

The most impressionable part of the trip was by far the food. Dinner by Heston, a double Michelin star restaurant in the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, was mind blowing. I ate chicken liver pate that looked like a plum and tasted the best chocolate tart imaginable. Street XO had a fusion of Mexican and Asian bites, with deliciously experimental cocktails, decor, plating, and even server outfits (think tophats and suspenders worn unconventionally).

Street XO

We drank gluhwein and hot cocoa, made gingerbread men and had to catch up on our advent calendar chocolates. We had a private lunch at our friend´s work kitchen and ate the best African food in Picadilly Square at a place called Ikoyi. I brought even more of an African with me to London while watching the Lion King, but quickly started embracing the cold, crisp feeling of winter and the change of season. Christmas doesn´t feel right in the heat, you know what I mean?