Buying cilantro

Back at the riad, the staff dressed us in chef’s coats and aprons and we looked awfully proud of ourselves for some reason:

Our menu was a few different Moroccan salads, chicken with preserved lemons and olives, and a frozen nougat dessert.  The cook was a really sweet woman who spoke to us in a combination of French and Arabic while another staff member did her best to translate.  We all enjoyed joking together and nodding eagerly over the few French words we understood.  We were entrusted with tiny blades that were basically x-acto knives, which meant we weren’t any great help in the kitchen when it came to chopping onions or garlic.  That was ok though – it seemed our main responsibility was to watch and drink tea.

Preparing the preserved lemon and onion sauce

Breads were also being prepared while we were in the kitchen

Hot bread

For dinner we ate the meal that we’d “helped” prepare.  Even though I don’t think I’m taking many cooking tips home with me, we really enjoyed getting to know the staff better and learning some of the kitchen secrets, like the fact that the creamy dessert the staff swore was non-dairy is about half creme fraiche.

Everything was delicious and beautiful, as always.

It mostly rained during our stay in San Sebastián but we made the most of a break in the weather by heading up Mont Igueldo for a view of the city.

The weather did not stop us from our primary objective: pintxos.  The very best we had were at Bar Zeruko, which was so popular that we had to elbow our way up to the counter to fill our little plates with snacks.  There were probably sixty or seventy types of pintxos laid out on the counter and each one was a work of art.

Round 1

Happy pintxos eaters

Happy cider drinker

In between pintxos, we walked around the city and popped into lots of cute shops, including this chocolate shop where you could propose to your partner with a chocolate sheep:

Spain, you do things so very well.

Cutest hat shop

Pretty fish at La Boqueria market

Ian and I were excited to go back to Sagrada Familia and see the progress since our last visit.  The cathedral now has a completion date (2026-2028!) and a lot has changed in the last seven years.

The most magical thing to see was the effect of the light shining through the stained glass on the interior:

A climb up one of the towers was also a great chance to peer out over the city and to see the new fruit sculptures topping some of the shorter spires.

We were extra fortunate to cross paths with one of Ian’s best friends from high school, Adam, and his wife, Alli, and all six of us had an excellent tapas meal together.  So much to be thankful for!

You can eat your pastel and have an espresso at a long marble counter, Italian style, while watching new batches of pasteis being made.

There are other famous pastel de nata bakeries in Lisbon, most notably in Belém, but Manteigaria is the one that stole our hearts.  We’ll be back.

The dishes were all delicious, and it was clear the staff had a lot of fun presenting them with some flair and mystery.  It was really dark in the restaurant so the following photos are not the best.  Here’s the full menu:

1st course: Margarita apples. These apples were themselves a cocktail, having been soaked in (or injected with?) tequila and lime.

2nd course: El Bulli’s famous exploding olives. These are basically liquified olive and brine.

3rd course: Shrimp ceviche. We are suckers for ceviche, as you know.

4th course: Tempura avocados. Lisbon is the first place we’ve been on this trip that regularly uses avocados and we’ve missed them so much.

5th course: Beef croquettes. Simple but yummy.

6th course: Foie gras with fig jam, basil, and parmesan. Sounds weird but totally works.

7th course: Smoked mackerel, apples, and celery. This arrived inside a glass dome full of smoke.

8th course: Tartare cones, a la French Laundry. One is beef and the other is tuna. These might have been our favorites.

9th course: Cod croquettes with a spicy, tangy sauce (ingredients still a mystery).

10th course: Hamburger and tots, but perfectly done.

11th course: Chocolate mouse cones with fleur de sel.

12th course: Lime ice cream and yuzu foam inside a green apple candy shell, served on lemon curd. We love all those things!

Many restaurants in Portugal have a couvert, or a snack they bring you for a small fee to help cover costs and ensure a minimum bill total.  You can refuse the couvert if you don’t want it, but A Cevicheria’s fresh bread with octopus butter and gazpacho looked pretty good to us.  We also ordered a pisco sour from their limited (two drinks only) cocktail menu.  They know what they are doing with those two drinks – it was the best pisco sour I’ve had, and I sampled many during my semester in Chile.

A Cevicheria has a small menu with four or five ceviches and a couple of other fish and meat dishes.  We ordered two ceviches to share.

Salmon with corn, lime, mango, and orange

Tuna with kimchi, sesame, and avocado

I’m not sure better ceviche exists.  These dishes were phenomenal – perfectly balanced flavors, ample fish, great textures, and beautiful presentation.

For dessert we ordered the piña colada cake, which is a rolled cake with coconut cream, dulce de leche, and pineapples caramelized in rum.  It was as good as it sounds.

We tried to go back last night but the place was packed.  We will work around your schedule though, A Cevicheria!  If it means eating dinner at 4pm we will do it!

Pasta tube: When you have leftovers but no tupperware or utensils.

Gotta save dat money, after all.

When you have scrambled eggs with white truffles for a starter you know you’re in for a luxurious meal.  After basically licking the plate clean we mixed things up with black truffles:

Possibly the best dish of our whole trip.

How do you follow two truffle dishes?  With steak, of course.  Stari Podrum cooks meat in the fireplace right in the middle of the dining room, making the whole place extra cozy and delicious-smelling.  We opted for a steak dish that came with grana padano and arugula, so we could have vegetables and call it a balanced meal:

Also, the steak came with this, which I will be making immediately upon returning home:

Skillet-fried mashed potatoes

This meal was beyond words.  It’s not the kind of thing you can eat every day or every week or even every month, but I sure hope I’ll be back.  We were too full for dessert but the owner brought us some local grappa made from mistletoe.  She was good about at deciding for us what we wanted to eat.  The mashed potatoes were her idea, and when she suggested grappa the offer sounded like, “Do you want local grappa?  Of course you do.  I will bring it.”  Croatia…they know good things here.

Istria’s proximity to Italy is reflected in both its food and architecture.  We spent a day in Rovinj, a colorful seaside town that is popular with cruise ships but was pretty empty the day we visited.

In addition to walking around town, we took a hike to a nearby park.  Along the way, we befriended a happy dog who accompanied us for about an hour before disappearing (hopefully to find his owner).  The dog must have known we are ready for our own pet!  Ian threw a stick for him at the beach:

We lucked out and got a same-day reservation at Konoba Batelina, a restaurant about an hour outside of Rovinj that is famous for doing great things with “trash fish.”  We knew we were in the right place when our starter arrived: ten small plates of different fish preparations, each delicious and expertly prepared.  It was like having a whole meal from State Bird’s fish cart – a dream come true.

Add to that some great local wine, grilled scorpionfish with the traditional Croatian kale and boiled potato side dish, hot bread with really good olive oil, and two desserts, and you have two stuffed and very happy travelers.  You order without a menu or price list, so we were excited to find out what a bargain it was when our bill came.  The restaurant delivered on all counts.

Love these little rings left behind on the tablecloth.

If you want to see more of the restaurant, you can watch Bourdain eat there and have some more adventurous things than we did.  No one offered us shark liver – perhaps they sized us up and decided we weren’t ready for it.

After our meal we stopped in the nearby town of Pula on the way home to see its Roman ruins.  This colosseum is from the 1st century AD, and has the distinction of being the sixth largest surviving Roman arena.  There’s a list for everything.

It was a winning day all around!

Prague is famous for its many historic landmarks and sites of cultural significance. But we’re not interested in those. Here are our top five trivial and bizarre things we spotted while walking between the actually famous stuff.

#1: Door Covered With Creepy Heads

While it probably does deter burglars, I can’t say I’d feel safer living behind this door.

As far as we could tell this didn’t belong to any business or museum, it was just some random door.  I can only assume that behind this door is an onyx pedestal draped in black velvet holding the Necronomicon.

#2: Statue of a Giant Pixelated Pregnant Woman

Careful observers may notice the empty beer can resting on her inner right thigh. Stay classy Prague!

This was on the walk from our AirBnB to Old Town, so we got quite familiar with it.

#3: Crane Tow Truck

Need a lift?

If you’ve been to Europe you know it’s full of narrow streets and tight parking spaces. Maybe you’ve thought to yourself: “I can park here. How could they possibly tow me even if they wanted to?” And now you know the answer.

#4: Animated Statue of Peeing Men

I think this art piece speaks for itself.

Trdelník Making

This one is not as weird as the others. But it is impressive how quickly this lady was able to whip out Trdelník (pronounced “turtle-neck”, I assume).  Delicious.

Here’s the zoomed out shot showing the roasting station where the Trdelnik take on a lovely golden brown hue.

Honorary Mention: Anonymous Bar

This already got a full write-up. But… gah! So creepy.