RESTAURANT FILE – Page 12

Cocktails at Tweed Bar, Stockholm

Published on May 25, 2016May 25, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

After dinner with my parents at Den Gyldene Freden, they went back to the hotel and I went on to have drinks with my now Stockholm based childhood friend Carina at Tweed in the old town.

I’ve heard a lot about this bar (mainly through my Instagram feed) and I was so thrilled to finally try it out, as I’m not in Stockholm that often.

When I arrived, a bit early (for once), I had a glass of cava by the bar while I waited for Carina. When she arrived we were shown to our table and Chesterfield armchairs. The whole interior was similar; very colonial, but it worked just as well as an American Bar works in London. It was cosy, busy but not too busy, and the absolute best thing was the sounds proofing; we could easy chat at normal volume while the music was playing. I don’t know many bars where that’s possible!

We moved on to drinks later and I had two perfect pisco sours. Carina joined me for one but also tried a drink with elderflower, raspberries and egg white from the menu – also very nice!

This is such a gem and the perfect place to go when you want to go out but still be able to talk and not have a crazy late one.

Tweed, Lilla Nygatan 5, 111 28 Stockholm, Sweden

Classic Swedish fare at Den Gyldene Freden, Stockholm

Published on May 19, 2016May 19, 2016 by Hanna1 Comment

Den Gyldene Freden in Stockholm is probably the most classic Swedish restaurant I have ever visited, and having dinner here was a very enjoyable experience.

The restaurant is located in Stockholm’s Old Town, Gamla Stan, and is several floors deep with cave-like vaulted ceilings. The ambiance is both cosy and a little formal.

The food here is classic Swedish (this is where to go if you want proper meatballs), but still up to date enough to not feel stuffy.

For our starter my mum, dad and I all had the same; a traditional landgång sandwich. Yes, it’s a glorified open sandwich, but a seriously delicious one! It’s named after a gangway plank, probably because it’s longer than a regular sandwich, and has more toppings. This long slice of rye bread was adorned with eggs, prawns, cured salmon, hot smoked fish, asparagus, wild garlic crème and pickled onions.

Dad also had a snaps with his starter – very traditional – and something not many restaurants serve nowadays. Mum and I were happy with our wine but dad was in good company as two tables nearby also had snaps and sang snaps songs.

Dad and I chose the same main course as well; duck sausage with thinly sliced duck breast, seasonal vegetables and a deliciously smooth potato purée. This dish was a lovely mix of rustic and gourmet. Delicious!

Mum chose the catch of the day; fried pike-perch with new potatoes tossed in butter and chives and it was also absolutely delicious. The portions were very generous here as you can see, and no, I couldn’t finish the whole sausage even if I made a good attempt.

We were too full for pudding but lingered with our wine for a while before I went on to meet a friend and my parents headed back to the hotel.

Dad had been to this place before and really liked it, so that was the reason for going, but we all really enjoyed it! Everything about this place is classic; the interior, the food, the service. And the snaps.

A little gem I hope can stay in its spot for many more years to come, looking after our culinary heritage. As a tourist I urge you to go. Try this and a place serving New Nordic cuisine to get the whole range of Swedish food. Because this is traditional, but done very well.

Den Gyldene Freden, Österlånggatan 51, 111 31 Stockholm, Sweden

Wonderful dinner at Rolfs Kök, Stockholm

Published on May 18, 2016May 18, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

My bank holiday weekend in Stockholm was fabulous in every way but the best restaurant experience was at Rolfs Kök, on a Sunday night. My parents and I had such a lovely meal here, we can’t wait to go back!

Finding a restaurant open on a Sunday night is almost impossible in Stockholm, but it was nice to see that there is a market for it – Rolfs Kök was full the whole time we were there.

We started our evening with champagne (very un-Swedish of us on a Sunday night!) and the lovely bread and butter.

Not long after the lovely starters were put on the table. Dad’s snails with lardo, sage and garlic were absolutely wonderful. Especially the lardo added another dimension to the melted butter.

Mum chose the cured pike-perch with apple, avocado, horseradish and hazelnuts. It was also absolutely delicious and tasted so so fresh, like spring on a plate!

I couldn’t resist the oysters a’la Rolfs Kök; baked with mayonnaise and pata negra and served with house made tabasco on the side. They were incredible!!

For our main courses dad chose the fish stew with prawns, mussels, cream and aoili and loved every spoonful of it. It tasted of fennel but also had a kick to it – delish!

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Mum and I went for meat. The ox cheeks braised in red wine served with truffled potato purée was also amazing! But it would have been nice if it was served with some vegetables. The potato purée with truffle was the best I’ve ever had (and it’s something I order in London fairly often).

My Iberico pork chop with nettles, leek and rosé pepper was pure heaven. Every dish we had were great but this one was my absolute favourite! The meat was just perfect, still pink inside, tender and juicy with lots of flavour.

The portions were big so we were really full after our two courses (and extra bread) but somehow dad was still in mood for pudding and had the crème brulée. It was very good but mum and I were happy with a small spoonful each, and an espresso.

Our dinner here was just amazing! The food was perfect and just to our taste, but I must say that the service was impeccable too. In a friendly, relaxed yet efficient way. The ambiance here is very relaxed and fun, and it feels like everyone is welcome, from families to couples, young and old.

A nice detail is the wine pairings to every dish on the menu. We used that guide for the wines for the main courses and they were a perfect match. I also like that when ordering a glass of wine it gets poured at the table.

Such a great place. I will definitely be back.

Rolfs Kök, Tegnérgatan 41, 111 61 Stockholm, Sweden

Zetas trädgård, a nursery near Stockholm

Published on May 17, 2016May 17, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

On the Saturday morning of our Stockholm weekend, we travelled (by metro and bus) to a lovely nursery called Zetas trädgård, near Kungens Kurva. My keen gardener mother was very excited to come here, but dad and I could also see the appeal. It’s a beautiful nursery, an oasis, with lots of plants and decorative things to buy. Plus a lovely café with seating both inside and outside serving still warm cinnamon buns straight from the oven, nice sandwiches and soups. That’s where we hung out while mum walked around looking at plants!

Dad and I first shared a cinnamon bun and had a hot chocolate each and then we had lunch with mum a bit later.

The ham and avokado crème on rye was really nice, just like the sourdoug baguette with local washed-rind cheese and fig jam.

A lovely spot for a café, don’t you think?!

We had a lovely few hours here, and although we were mainly for my mother’s sake I still had a great time, and even found two nice vases to buy.

Zetas Finsmakarens Trädgård, Blombacken 2, 141 70 Segeltorp (Kungens Kurva), Stockholm

Private dinner at The 10 Cases in Covent Garden

Published on May 11, 2016May 11, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

The month of March was all about this lady (the one in the tiara), and after a lovely spa day we had the dinner for her hen do at The 10 Cases in Covent Garden. We had a room in the basement all to ourselves, where we could play silly games, unwrap lots of underwear and listen to our own music.

The menu was cleverly displayed on three blackboards on the wall so it was just for us to choose what we wanted to eat on the day.

My choice of starter was the scallop with coral croquette and samphire, very nice!

For my main course I had the lemon sole with mushroom fregola (pearl pasta) and it was lovely too! For pudding I had the classic creme brulée, but we must have been playing a game at that time as I forgot to take a photo of it.

We also had some wonderful wines as this is a wine bar first and restaurant second.

This was just the sort of place we were after for Laura’s hen and I hope everyone enjoyed it as much as the bride and I did. Afterwards we headed to Marylebone for cocktails to toast the bride to be.

The 10 Cases, 16 Endell St, London WC2H 9BD

Eataly, our saviour

Published on April 27, 2016April 27, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

Our last day in Italy wasn’t fun at all food wise. It started fine with a nice breakfast at the hotel in Ravenna and we had a good drive back to Bologna as well, but then it went downhill from there. Sob.

We really wanted to have lunch at Casa Minghetti (the cute bar and restaurant where we had a pre-dinner drink on the Saturday), but they were closed. So we then walked to a restaurant Caroline got recommended by a friend, that according to Google was open, only to find another closed door. Most places were open the other holiday days, but for some reason everything was closed on Easter Monday.

So we walked back to the centre of town to find only a handful of restaurants open for business, serving the same amount of people as the other days when everything was open which of course resulted in full restaurants and massive queues. By this point we were both hangry and about to cry. So we had to decide between a shorter queue for a lighter meal (it seemes less popular) or longer queue for proper cooked food. In desperation we chose the former and went to Eataly (they have a restaurant in New York too, that you may have heard of) as they had lots of tables and a fairly short queue. We weren’t really in the mood for cheese and charkuterie, but as we sat down with it in front of us it was heaven. The mortadella was actually the best one I had during the whole trip!

The charkuteries from left to right (top pic): mortadella, serrano, pancetta and salami and the cheese from left to right (above pic) were: a nice hard cheese I don’t know the name of, mozzarella, parmesan and dolcelatte.

After lunch our plan was to buy food we wanted to take home with us. We had eyed up courgette flowers at every greengrocer since our first day here but as they wilt quickly we wanted to buy them fresh on our last day. That back-fired as most the food shops were closed as well. What was going on?! In the end I managed to find parmesan, ricotta, salsiccia, erborinato cheese and asparagus to take home, but it was a real mission. Still quite happy with our efforts we drove to the airport only to find out that our flight was two hours delayed. No probs, we read magazines and enjoyed a glass of wine in the lounge. But there was no food, so after consulting an online map of the airport we thought we’d have dinner at one of the two restaurants after security.

Again, things back-fired. There was only one restaurant and one cafeteria after security but the restaurant was closed and the café didn’t really sell anything edible apart from two scary looking sandwiches, ice cream and snacks so we had another glass of wine and some parmesan snacks for dinner. Now, it’s almost funny how we could have such a bad food day in Italy of all places. But in the moment it wasn’t funny at all. I’ve never been so happy to come back to Heathrow and see an open M&S late at night!

The rest of our trip was absolutely fab, and luckily both Caroline and I react the same way to not getting fed, so at least we were in it together.

Eataly, Via Degli Orefici 19, 40126 Bologna, Italy

Dinner in Ravenna: Enoteca Ca’ de Ven

Published on April 26, 2016April 26, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

After the lunch in Cierva, we drove to the city of Ravenna, a UNESCO World Heritage Site by the coast. We checked in to the hotel and walked around the town, which was quickly done, and then sat down outside on Pizza del Popolo for a drink (frankly, one has earned one after driving in Italy!).

With our Aperol Spritz and prosecco we also received a basket of crisps and a plate full with different nibbles: pizza slices, toast, chicken nuggets and a ham sandwich cut into pieces. Quite random stuff, but I like the idea of receiving a snack with your drink.

We then had dinner at Ca’ de Ven, a very large and popular rustic restaurant. There must have been well over a hundred people eating here when we arrived, so do book ahead.

We really wanted to try the local speciality piadina, two flatbreads sandwiched with a filling in between and as this seemed to be a very popular place for it we asked the waiter to recommend a filling and we thoroughly enjoyed his recommendation of creamy cheese, ham and rocket. It was really nice but also very filling. I recommend sharing one like we did or have a whole one as a light meal.

Then we, unsurprisingly, had a pasta each for our main course. My ravioli with asparagus was nice, but not fantastic, but it was nice to eat some vegetables after all the cheese I had for lunch.

Caroline chose a very interesting pasta made with eggs, flour and breadcrumbs which created a coarser texture. It also came with asparagus, but also tomatoes and clams. It was nice and different.

The food here didn’t blow us away, but it seemed to be a very popular place, filled with locals and the piadina was great so I would recommend coming here if you find yourself in Ravenna.

Ca’ de Ven, Via Corrado Ricci 24, 48100 Ravenna, Italy

Lunch by the coast: Cruderia Al Porto, Cierva

Published on April 25, 2016April 25, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

Our third day in the Emilia-Romagna area we drove to the coast for lunch. It seemed like all Italians had made the same plan for Easter Sunday as us, so it took us a good half an hour to even find a parking space about a 15 minute walk from the restaurarant. But it was a nice day for a walk so we didn’t mind.

We started our lunch with some thinly sliced raw fish (tuna, salmon, octopus and two types of white fish) served with a grassy olive oil and lemon juice – nice and fresh!

Thinking of the lovely red prawns from the night before we decided to also share a red prawn tartar with endive, fried garlic and saffron. It was nice but sadly not as fantastic as we had hoped.

The restaurant was full to the brim with guests, and the staff was very busy looking after all the guests, but between our starters and our main courses it took about 45 minutes. I honestly think they had forgotten about us, and as we were absolutely starving (the starters made us more hungry if anything) it was a long wait.

My ravioli with burrata (inside the ravioli – such a brilliant idea!) with large prawns and the most amazing tomato sauce with both depth and sweetness, was well worth the wait. It was one of the best dishes I had during our trip and it was just fantastic. So wish I had the recipe so I could recreate it at home.

Sadly Carolines squid ink pasta with squid and bottarga wasn’t as impressive. In fact, we couldn’t understand how it was produced in the same kitchen as my delicious ravioli.

OK, the actual pasta was well cooked and the squid was nice, but it lacked a lot in flavour and didn’t really come together as a dish. Such a shame!

Even though we were (finally) full after our pasta dishes we couldn’t resist the mini tiramisus we saw carried around the restaurant on trays, and it was just a perfect ending to the meal. It was great in flavour but a little more crunchy than your regular tiramisu but I liked it!

I’m a bit ambivalent in my opinion of this restaurant; my ravioli was extraordinarily good and I really want to come back to eat it again, but at the same time I don’t think the other dishes we had quite measure up, but since they can produce that amazing ravioli I’m willing to give them another chance. They were incredibly busy, and the potential is there, I just wish that all the dishes were as good as the one I had.

Al Porto, Lungomare D’Annunzio 2 – 48015 Cervia Ra, Italy

Pasta Bolognese in Bologna!

Published on April 15, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

After our pre-dinner snacks on the Saturday evening we had dinner at Drogheria della Rosa, a very old school restaurant in Bologna. When we arrived, we were shown to our table and after ordering water and wine a starter arrived. We hadn’t seen a menu or ordered anything, and we soon realised they gave everyone the same antipasti, we just didn’t expect it. But the tender guinea fowl vegetables and delicious buffalo mozzarella was lovely. I would never have thought to try this combination myself, but it really worked; I guess you can have mozzarella with everything.

After finishing the starter the waitress came and told us about the menu that day. As I said, old school.

One of my food goals for this trip was of course to have a proper pasta Bolognese when I was visiting the very city it’s from, and this place seemed to be a good bet to have just that. And it was. The lovely tagliatelle was coated sparingly with sauce but the flavours were amazing. It was just right and I’m so glad I had it here. Caroline, who doesn’t even like Bolognese, enjoyed it too and that’s probably the best praise you can get!

Her pasta with artichokes was delicious too! Plenty of flavours, quite salty and just yummy. I definitely recommend a visit here when you’re in Bologna.

As expected we were more than full after all the food this evening, so we declined pudding and walked to a bar by the main square and enjoyed a glass of wine outside under the heaters.

Drogheria della Rosa, via Cartoleria 10, 40124 Bologna, Italy

Pre-dinner nibbles in Bologna

Published on April 12, 2016April 12, 2016 by HannaLeave a comment

On the Saturday in Bologna we went all out before dinner and had pre-dinner drinks and nibbles at three different places. There were so many things we wanted to eat and places to try and not enough time, so this was a good solution.

We started with this little (yes, it was intended for one person but we shared it) charkuterie and cheese platter at Zerocinquantino Vino e Panino, and a glass of wine each. I love the fact that when you order ‘a glass of white wine’, the waiters ask if you want still or sparkling, as if it were water. I do like my sparkling wines though, and later this same evening Caroline introduced me to another Italian sparkling wine, besides prosecco; franciacorta, with smaller bubbles. So nice!

On the platter we had mortadella, salami, serrano, a type of fresh cheese which I later identified as dolcelatte in a deli shop, a nice hard cheese and an amazing blue cheese called erborinato. Remember to try it when you’re in Italy! We also got to try the local tigelli bread which was nice but extremely filling.

Next we stopped at a fishmongers on the same street, which sold fish and seafood ready to eat, like tartars, oysters, red prawns etc. And wine. But we just had some seafood. We both love the raw red prawns so had a plate of those each. They’re so sweet and juicy and absolutely delicious raw!

We also tried a oyster each, I can’t remember what type or where it was from but it was really nice. The fresh shellfish was a great palate cleanser before our actual dinner though; we actually felt less full after the prawns than when we came into the shop.

We had time for another quick stop before dinner so when we walked past Casa Minghetti with it’s popular outside seating we decided to go inside for a glass of wine. Even though the restaurant (inside and outside) was full to the brim with people the staff welcomed us in and gave us some space at the bar counter. The atmosphere here was great – really friendly with a mixture of different types of people, good music and friendly staff.

The wine was nice, and the cocktails they made looked great too. We also got three different types of snacks with our drink. It’s another thing I like about Italy, you always get snacks with your drink.

Zerocinquantino Vino e Panino, Via Pescherie vecchie 3/e, Bologna

Fiskaffären kan jag tyvärr inte hitta namnet på, men den ligger på Via Pescherie Vechie, snett tvärsöver gatan från Zerocinquantino, mot Via Drapperie till.

Casa Minghetti, Piazza Minghetti, 1A, 40124 Bologna, Italy