My summer vacation

This will be the first of a few posts about my summer vacations! It's the least I can do for my readers after so long without a new post.
My parents in law came to our new home in Switzerland to spend a month with us. My husband had 3 weeks off so we decided to go on a trip with them besides staying at home. The problem was that my mother in law has been to most places in Europe, so it was a challenge for me to find new places for us to go. Our first idea was Eastern Europe(Prague, Berlin, Hungary, Austria, etc..) but it would be a little too much cause we would be doing all this by car, and the idea was to rest a little bit. So, we thought: "why not a cruise?",  so I started looking and found the perfect itinerary, from Kiel, Germany to Copenhagen, Denmark to Stockholm in Sweden to Tallinn in Estonia to Saint Petersburg in Russia. It was all new to all of us, not too hot and interesting to everyone! Only one problem, it was too expensive!

So here comes the first tip: be patient with cruise lines and wait for a good offer! Last year we went on a mediterranean cruise with Royal Caribbean and we got a great deal for 500 euros each for one week, and this year, I waited until mid June(to buy for a mid July trip) and the price went from 1400 american dollars to about 600 american dollars, when a one week MSC cruise trip(all food included) through Northern Europe gets to 600 american dollars, that's the time to buy it!

So of course, we bought it, but we still had about one and a half week to plan, that was partly easy because my husband's aunt lives in Germany and we wanted to spend some time there. She lives next to the Luxembourg border, and we would go by car from Switzerland to her house, to our port of call in Kiel, and we wanted something else between her house and Kiel but we had been to most of the big cities in the way(Dusseldorf, Koln) and 4 days in Hamburg seemed like a lot so of course, we decided to go to Berlin, not really in the way, but not that far too. And it was a great idea, tell you all about it later! And to be closer to the port before the cruise trip we would spend a night in Hamburg.


Ok, so now you know the itinerary, and the posts will come, one for each city, and one about cruises in general!!! Keep you posted in my posts!!!!

Caves Ouvertes - best thing ever!!!

This past weekend I felt so lucky to be living in Switzerland! I went to one of the best Wine related events I've ever been to or heard about. It basically works like this:
In one weekend, most wineries in the Vaud canton open their cellars for tasting! You buy the glass for 15 swiss francs and you're entitled to one tasting(usually one glass) in each wine maker (about 300 that participate). There are about 5 regions of wineries and each region puts small trains or buses from their main train station or the town center to the wineries, these local transportation are free, but f you plan to go to more than one region I'd suggest getting a train pass for the weekend, that way you won't have to worry about the drinking, and let's be honest, who would?? Considering a tasting glass is about 30 ml of wine, times 300 wineries, that gives us about 9 liters of wine in two days, of course it's probably impossible to go to all the regions and drink from every place, but even us, that had only sunday to do this, and we started quite late, at about 2 pm and went until 7 pm, we had 14 glasses each, and we could have had more, but we're not that strong!!!

We've been to the Aigle area and one part of Lavaux. It was amazing, a lot of people, but you could always get to the tastings, very organized, most tents had snacks, some even had high-quality small dishes to pair with the wines(not free, but well worth it). Beautiful settings, and even grape syrup for the kids!

Now that I know about this event, I'm gonna make sure I come every year, and I'd suggest you do the same, and it's the perfect opportunity to get to know the amazing Swiss wines that most people never even heard about.

Go with a white Chasselas and a red Pinot-Gamay and you won't be sorry you came all the way to Switzerland, and of course, enjoy the view!

Let's go out for a Rosé?

I've I always felt a little bit "out" of the group after high school when after a class or just when we wanted to get together, the main question was "Let's go out for a cold beer?"! As I don't like beer, I was always an outsider, but since I moved to Europe it seems I have found my place. When April comes and the flowers starts blooming, the first thing people want to do is go out for a cold ROSE! Yes, pink wine is really THE drink in spring and summer, specially amongst women. You'll always see lots of people with a pink wine glass on their hands in open air bars, terraces and even their own balconies. Hot weather is a blessing for europeans, they worship temperatures above 25°C, even the French get less cranky when it's warm! Everyone gets out in the streets, it's just like that part in a movie, when a fun, happy song starts and you know something good is gonna happen, that something here, is summer!

Time to be happy - spring is here!!!

But enough about the weather, let's go back to the rosé! Rosé wine was and still is in some places underestimated and looked down on, as it's not worth it. But in France and Switzerland, it's just like any other wine, they're usually dry(not sweet at all), you have some good and some bad, and you have a right time to drink it. I love a rosé for an afternoon break, but you could also accompany food, usually light food, salads, some fish, light meat like veal and pasta with vegetables.

For more rosé anedoctes, read the post 10 Common Ordering Mistakes People Make in Paris by my inspiration David Lebovitz, a great blogger, that was a pastry chef in a great restaurant in California and moved to Paris to enjoy his life and now he writes about food and Paris, in this post, on the number 7 he talks about rosés, but read the full post as it's just as fun!


My favorites rosés today would be Oeil-de-Perdrix, a Swiss wine made from Pinot Noir, really easy to drink, dry but not too dry, and it goes with most things,  and a traditional Côtes de Provence, delicate and fruity. Of course if you actually drink it in Provence it will be much better, as the Oeil-de-Perdrix if you drink it on the shores of the Lac Léman!

Vineyards and Lavender in Provence, France

Martha Stewart, really?

I'm a Tv series addict, specially those gooey romantic comedies and so, in most of them and also all the gooey romantic comedy movies that I watch, I've always heard someone mentioning Martha Stewart! So, of course, I know who she is, what she looks like and what she does, but until a couple of months ago, I had never seen her on tv. Until then I really thought she was great, like female Jamie Oliver with decorating skills, everyone always talks about her like she's a goddess, and of course I'd never doubt my favorite characters, then again, who would???

Martha before watching her show

So, as I was saying, a couple of months ago I received an email from iTunes store with an ad for a Martha's "How to make pumpkin pie" video, and I decided to watch! Really??? Really?? That's what Martha Stewart is?? She looks like a robot, she doesn't feel anything, she has no charisma at all...now my question is, how did she get where she is now? I have absolutely no idea! Like, everyone on food tv has their one thing that makes people like them, Jamie Oliver is charismatic, Ramsay is crazy nervous, and people love to see others getting yelled at, Nigella is passionate about all food, and doesn't mind eating as much as she wants to, Andrew Zimmern eats everything you don't want to, so that's pretty interesting, Anthony Bourdain travels and bring history unto food's life, but Martha, she does everyday food with no passion, no jokes, no anger, no traveling, no history, nothing really!

Martha after

Well, I'm sorry crazy americans that love her, but that's not for me, but I'm open to whatever you wanna say you see in her, is it the kitchen? Cause it's actually a nice kitchen, but not enough to watch her! Or the website, cause the site is great, really, I love it, I wish I had never seen her on tv, I'd probably still like her...damn you iTunes ad!!!

See you soon!

Mettlach - the german city of Outlets

Since I moved to Switzerland I've been wanting to buy a set of Villeroy & Boch china for my future new home. I'd usually just go to a big "galerie" like Galeries Lafayette or Printemps, but I decided to go to Villeroy's website to see if they had a big store somewhere in Europe, and for my surprise they have a really big OUTLET STORE. The store is in Mettlach, a small town in Germany, right next to the borders of Luxembourg and France, which for me is just perfect as my husband's aunt lives about 45 minutes from Mettlach.

We went this weekend to his aunt's home for easter and on our way back we've passed through Mettlach to see what they had. The Villeroy's outlet is amazing, they have most of their china and cutlery at 20% off or more. It's really worth it, and in the city you'll find other outlets like Silit and Rösle, two great brands for kitchen ware. 

But outlets are not the only thing you can find, Mettlach is a medieval city with the Saar river by it's side, you could visit the city by walking and also don't miss the Villeroy & Boch's discovery center, where you can learn about the history of ceramic and tableware and also take a walk through the gardens of Mettlach's old abbey. The abbey was acquired by Jean-François Boch in 1809 to become their first ceramic factory and today is the main headquarters of Villeroy & Boch.

Villeroy & Boch headquarter in Mettlach's old abbey

The region is also very lovely, with small towns, boat excursions through the Saar and the Mosel river, wineries all over the place, with great Riesling tastings. Not to far away is Trier, the oldest city in Germany where you should visit the Porta Nigra, a gate from about A.D. 180. 

The Saar river

Other cities to visit: Saarburg and Bitburg(and their brewery Bitburger - attention, their presentation is only in German) 

Have a nice trip, I know I had!!!Oh, I'd advise you to go on spring, it's beautiful!!!

Villeroy & Boch outlet hours: 

Monday-Friday 9:30 am - 7:00 pm

Saturday 9:30 am - 6:00 pm

Sundays 2:00 pm - 6:00 pm

website: http://www.villeroy-boch.com/en/us/home.html

New York's biggest secret!!!(for anyone who likes to cook)

I know, I know, it's been too long since my last post...but as I'm moving to Switzerland and am actually homeless, it's not quite easy to write, but I'll try to be more generous with you from now on, and I am gonna start with this great tip!!!

New York is a really big city with lots of amazing things to see, eat, drink and do, so one post isn't gonna cut it, but as this blog is not only about traveling, but about food too, I decided to write this post about a marvelous hidden bookstore I discovered last year.

This is really not a tourist spot as it's exactly 2 streets down from where the upper east side turns into east harlem, but it's worth the trip and it's a nice way to get to know another part of New York city, and it's actually quite interesting to see a place with no tourists(or almost none) and observe the daily life of the "latino" neighborhood of New York.

Kitchen, Arts and Letters is the name of this heavenly place and if you are as addicted to cookbooks as I am, consider at least half a day to spend it there! Don't underestimate it by their size, because they are quite small, but they have a lot to offer, you just have to look through it! There's a lot of old cookbooks, most of them are not even printed anymore, they have a section for business books, like "How to open your restaurant", those kind of things, and much more. The owners(at least I think they were) are really nice, so don't mind asking questions or even asking them to find a book for you, even if they don't have they will try to find it!

That's it for today, I hope you enjoyed it!

How to get there:
Address: 1435 Lexington Ave, New York 10128 (between 93rd and 94th)
Subway station: 96th street - line 4 or 6
Hours: Monday 1-6 pm
Tuesday to Friday 10 am - 6:30 pm
Saturday 11 am - 6 pm
website: http://www.kitchenartsandletters.com/

Spending the night inside an igloo

About a year ago I went on an italian road trip planned with my husband and my brother in law. Since we were living Versailles by car and our first stop was Genova, on northwest Italy, I thought about making a stop on my beautiful Switzerland, but couldn't have any ideas about a place we could enjoy on one day and a half. Looking for ideas I found this website called Iglu-dörf, it's a "hotel"(more like a camp) inside an igloo made of snow(not ice), and it's made from scratch every December and destroyed(melts) every beginning of April. They have several locations in Switzerland, plus a couple of ones around Europe, always on the top of a mountain.

The one I chose was in Engelberg, a ski resort next to Lucerne. We left Versailles at 6 AM and got to Engelberg at noon, we left the car on a parking lot, went to have lunch at a Rösti restaurant(very good one btw, i don't remember the name, but it was next to the sports center) and then bought our tickets for the lift.
To get to the Igloo meeting point, we had to go up the mountains on a lift until about half the way to the top of the mountain(there are several stops) and meet our guide inside a hotel(real hotel, not one made of snow).

My husband and I at the hotel before going to the igloo

Waiting for everyone to show up, we had a glass of Swiss red wine and got warm. We thought maybe we could stock some heat before our adventure, which by the way, didn't work...
When all the guests were there we left the hotel and after a 10 minute walk, we got to the igloo.
If it's a cloudy day, have in mind that it will be very difficult to find the igloo. The snow mixes with the clouds and you don't know where the snow stops and the sky starts, so my advise, don't walk around without a guide!

Outside of the igloo

The igloo looks like, well ... an igloo ... though instead of ice blocks it's a whole lot of compressed snow. Imagine the sand castles you use to make with your siblings when you were little, now paint it white and make it adult size! That's about it, but a little more difficult to destroy it (I hope so!)!
But that's only the outside. Inside everything is carved into beautiful pieces of art! Every year they choose a  theme, and when we went, it was China. All the walls from the bar were carved to form a dragon, there were ancient chinese portals between each room, chinese warriors, etc...

Carved Dragon bar

Following our warm welcome we went for a tour of all the types of rooms.
They had 5 kinds of rooms we could choose from when we made the reservation.
The standard one holds up to six people and it has almost no decoration, only the sleeping bags on top of a mattress covered with animal fur.
The romantic holds two, that's the only difference from the standard one.
The romantic plus holds two and has a private bathroom.
The romantic family holds a family of 6(and i'm not sure if you have your own bathroom).
The hot igloo is a warm room(tent) connected to the igloo(I really don't see the point of having this room! If you want to sleep in an igloo, it's implicit that it'll be cold!)

Rafael(husband) and Otavio(brother-in-law) inside the sleeping bags in our standard room.

After having our hot drinks and touring the whole igloo we had dinner!!! Cheese fondue...yayyyy!!!! The dining room had wood tables and wood stools covered in fur which made it a little less freezing!

After our great dinner we had a shot of Kirsch, a cherry brandy, that is commonly drank after heavy meals to help digestion! You almost don't feel the alcohol because of the temperature. All the alcohol goes directly into your body to help heating it!

Myself in the dining room!

After dinner we had the option to go on a night walk with snowshoes(in the form of a racket) and of course, we went! We first learned how to walk on this strange shoes, shoes that I never thought would work, but they actually do and make walking around in snow much easier than with regular shoes. We had a lot of fun, learned how to through ourselves into the snow and more important, how to get out of snow!

After a long one and half hour we were back inside the (now) warm igloo. The outside temperature was about -4°C, maybe less and windy, and inside it always stays between -1°C and 1°C.

I could barely feel my legs and wasn't able to breath without forcing my lungs, but really, it was worth it. An outstanding once in a lifetime experience! Thank god, after the walk, we were scheduled to enjoy one hour of hot tub! That saved me, the only not so good part is to change yourself into a swimsuit. In fact, there is a small warm room made of wood for people to change clothes, but it's a common room, and this might be considered normal for Europeans, but being naked in front of strangers of the opposite sex it's not something that I enjoy much, and neither do most brazilians. So, at the end I changed in our room made from snow and not wood!

View from the igloo on the next morning!

The bathroom is...hmmmm...different. There's no running water, the toilet is an actual toilet with a reaaaally  deep whole into the ground, and you don't have water to wash your hands, so you have to use hand sanitizer!

The night was difficult, I had a little bit of difficulty to breath normally, but it was all worth it. I don't recommend it to anyone that already has breathing issues or doesn't enjoy cold weather! It's really an adventure and a really different experience, one really difficult to forget. I'll do it again sometime, probably because I forgot how cold it was, but also I always think that if the temperature was thaaaaat bad, I wouldn't be able to forget. Maybe I'm right, maybe not ... hope I am!!!


IGLU-DORF 
LOCATIONS:
Engelberg, Switzerland
Gstaad, Switzerland
Davos, Switzerland
Zermatt, Switzerland
St. Moritz, Switzerland
Zugspitze, Germany
Andorra

PRICES(night, hot tea, dinner and breakfast included, lift and alcoholic beverages not included)
standard room - 149-189 euros
romantic - 249-299 euros
romantic plus - 299-349 euros
hot igloo - 399-449 euros

Raclette

If you are reading this in Brazil, this post probably is not for you, at least not right now(summer time) but this is perfect for those of us in the North Hemisphere where the winter got to us late but it decided to come strong..."better late than never" right?

So this morning in Versailles was -10°C(14°F) and I couldn't think of anything better to eat tonight then Raclette, especially because I was in Switzerland until yesterday!

Matterhorn in the Valais, Switzerland

The Raclette is a Swiss dish, from the region of the Valais, made from cheese and potatoes. This is the base and then you can add bread, cured meat, pickled onions and cucumbers, etc..

Raclette is also the name of the cheese used to make the dish, it's a round cow's milk cheese that weights approximately 6 kg.

When it first was created, people used to cut the cheese into half a circle and melt the center by putting it next to an open fire, and then with a wood spatula they would scrape the melted cheese into a plate and eat it with boiled potatoes. That's why the name raclette which comes from the french term "racler" which means "to scrape".

Today the dish is served in restaurants, usually in the french and swiss alps with an electric plate with sliced raclette cheese or a big electrical resistance that fits half or a third of the whole cheese and you scrape it yourself by the table(which is much cooler).

When we went to have fondue at Caveau des Vignerons in Montreux, the waiter told us that you should always have cheesy dishes like raclette and fondue with white wine(not too cold)or a hot drink, he explained that you shouldn't drink anything too cold like water or soft drinks, because it makes the cheese hard in your stomach and it will cause indigestion.  I'm always looking for this kind of excuses, so I can drink more wine, it's like "No, it's not good for your health NOT to drink wine", so you have to, right?

The wines that are good to pair with it are white wines, not too acid, in France is common to drink it with a Savoie wine, in Switzerland with a Fendant from the Valais, but you could also pair it with a Riesling that is easier to find!

Christmas decorations at La Calèche 

I guess that's it, oh and the best place I ever ate Raclette was in Chamonix, a ski resort in the french Alps, next to the Mont Blanc. The restaurant is called La Calèche, and the ambiance is adorable, you feel like you're actually in a chalet on top of the Mont Blanc(well, you're not really that far from it!!!).

Bon Appétit!!!

Bonjour

This tip is to anyone that comes to France as a tourist or even to live here! The most important thing you need to know how to say it in french is "Bonjour" which literally means Good Day, but you could translate it as Good Morning. You need to know that if you don't say Bonjour in the beginning of a phrase or conversation, it's just like you never said anything at all. They won't hear you.

When I first arrived in France, I had a problem with my french bank account, so I went to the bank desperate to fix it. I got there and started blabbing about the problem to the recepcionist and when I was almost finished, she looked at me, raised her hand making a "stop" sign and said to me "Bonjour" and nod her head like "Now you can start". And I really had to explain everything all over again! It's like they have a recorder in their heads and "Bonjour" is the start button!


You should know that this is only one of the many particularities of the French, but each one is worth their own post!

First post and Why cinnamon in my purse?

Today I woke up without any knowledge of what would happen throughout my day that would lead me to start writing my first blog. I actually have tried to start many blogs before with the ideas all in my head, but couldn’t quite put it in paper, or better, in screen.

I’m 23 years old and considering my age, I believe I have already travelled a lot and met a lot of places, people and of course ate a loooot of good (and bad) food! The number of places I’ve been to are not even a half of the ones I want to visit, but thinking that I don’t wanna live only till I’m 46 I guess I can still see a lot until I pass or be unable to travel (I don’t know which is worst!).

I’ll write here about the things I saw and know and also everything that interests me and hopefully will interest you too! I love to travel with my own planning, trying to find different places to go and also traditional ones.

My husband worked(until today) at a 2 star Michelin Gordon Ramsay restaurant in Versailles, and next month he will be starting at another 2 star Michelin in Switzerland. As it’s “his job” we try to go as often as we can(cause you know, the prices don’t actually help) to starred restaurants, and until now we have gathered  a few great experiences, some good ones and even some bad. We know a lot of people in this business, which helps a lot with good tips of places to go and especially of places not to go to!

You’ll see that even though we are inside the starred restaurants world, I looooove hamburgers and small cozy restaurants, so you can read about a little bit of everything!

Well, I guess you can have a pretty good idea of what I want to write about…. all the good things in life…eat, drink and travel!!!!

Oh, I forgot to tell you about the name of the blog. So, last year I went to Modena in Italy and visited a Balsamic vinegar "winery" or "farm", anyway, the owner of the place told me that nowadays, everyone that makes balsamic vinegar can't leave their homes without a small flask of their balsamic to season restaurant food. When I heard that story I immediately remembered that I love churros(you'll see that there's a logic to that) but in France they don't put cinnamon on top of churros, and for me churros without cinnamon is like Fondue without wine, so I've started putting a small container with cinnamon in my purse, and that's why the name of the blog!

Hope you like it and of course I would love to receive comments, travel tips and stories from you guys!!!