Chocolate Review Deux

I didn't buy any chocolate this weekend. And, since it's Sunday, I won't be able to get any. I really need to stick to my guns and keep buying chocolate or I'll never get the opportunity to try all the different shops. So, today I'll review last week's chocolate, Martel, as well as as the popular export chocolate: Lindt.
Martel Chocolates
Martel is a cafe that also sells chocolates and unbelievable looking desserts. The glory of the dessert case led me to decide that once I've throughly evaluated all of the chocolates in the city, I'm moving on to desserts. Martel uses this wonderfully playful font on everything they do and on this alone I was excited about their chocolates. Tim and I went in pror to catching the bus to France and La Saleve to enjoy with our picnic. We choose a box of four truffles. Two were in dark chocolate and two were covered in cocoa powder. As usual, we had no idea what were inside, since the only french word we know that comes in usful in a chocolate shop is "chocolat" and "merci". This was the first of the three chocolate shops that I've visited that did not give me a sample when I bought my chocolate. At the top of La Saleve, Tim and I had our first truffle. The truffles had a chocolate shell filled with Bailey's Irish Cream chocolatey goo in the middle. The texture of the chocolate was excellent and Tim really enjoyed his. But anyone who knows my chocolate preferences knows that I'm very anti liquor/chocolate combinations. Because I didn't like the flavor of my chocolate, I can't really evaluate whether it was good or bad. I guess I'll have to go back.

Favorite French Words, Deux

Voila.
Of course, I was familiar with this word long before coming to Switzerland. Yet, in the nearly 1 month (whoa!) that I've been here, I've been amazed by the depth of meaning that this word has. I hear it dozens of times a day. I not only love the zillions of meanings this word can take, but I love the way that people say it. When spoken aloud it has the tone of genuine pride. "Look at me. I did this. I'm extremely proud of my work. I solved the problem. And now I'm handing it over to you. Enjoy." Voila!

4:00am? Really?

A Hungarian, Pole, Brit, German, American and Swede walk into a bar. No punch line. This was my Friday night. Only we walked into many many bars. Tim and I left at 3:30am. There may have been more bars after that, but we were exhausted.

One of the coolest things about my office is the diversity. Everyone is from somewhere, few are from Switzerland. I've never seen such a diverse group of people get along so well. Everyone loves to poke fun at the other cultures...I've heard some pretty mad impressions of Americans...but it's all in good fun.

Friday night we were celebrating a successful summer for one of the interns on the Mr. Clean team. We started at a cute little bar in Paquis called Le 5 Portes. The atmosphere was artistic and chill, a place you'd expect the grad-school crowd to hang out in...if this were a university town. What I didn't expect was such unbelievable food. When am I going to realize that the food in this city is consistently awesome? Tim and I shared a buffala mozzerella appetizer unlike any other we've had before. The mini-mozzerella balls were served with cherry tomatoes and basil in a parfait glass. On the side was tomato glace....tomato icecream. No kidding. A couple of bottles of wine later we sat back from our equally tasty meals and realized that we were in for a great evening.

Bar One: Can't remember the name. Can't remember where it was. Can't remember what we ordered, but it came in a shaker and the group of six got 5 shots each out of it. It's party time.

Bar Two: The Lounge at the Kempinski. The worlds beautiful people...and wealthy... chill here. Sitting right on the lake, the dj spun house music and the richy-riches drank 20chf cocktails. Not a place I would hang on your average weekend evening, but the place I'll be taking my girls when they come visit.

Bar Three: SIP in Plain Palais. According to the owners, this is not a night club. Whatever. This place bounces. In a multi-store renovated factory building, there's a outdoor patio on the first level, a lounge on the second, and a dance floor on the third. The dance floor was packed when we arrived and we kept it occupied for the next few hours. The music was a dance/house/hip hop melange. I was practically falling over from exhaustion and Tim still had to drag me off the floor cause the music was so good. Ladies, bring your dancing shoes. When you come visit, we're going to show them how it's done.

A twenty minute walk home and Tim and I realized we'd stayed out way past our bedtime. Saturday was a little slow going, but Friday was totally worth it.

Favorite French Words, Part Un

Ouef
If someone were to punch me in the stomach, this is the sound I would make.
But, this word is not "the sound one makes when chucked in the gut". Instead it means egg.
I love eggs, or ouefs.

Aubergine
This is a very elegant word for one of my other favorite foods, eggplant. It's a beautiful vegetable, and clearly, the french wanted a more beautiful word cause if it had been a direct translation it would be ouef-plant. And that just sounds disgusting.

Happy Birthday Pizza

If I had wanted to, I could have spent my birthday in Italy. It's only about an hour away. But I didn't. It was a Tuesday. I had to go to work. And I don't have a car. Or know where I'm going. Instead, I went out to dinner.


My most wonderful boyfriend took the train in just for the occasion. I gathered advice from former expats as well as people in my office on a great place to get some dinner. There is no shortage of great places to get dinner in Geneva. The city caters to those on an expense account and prices and food quality reflect that. I was looking for something a bit less gastronomic and a bit more no-wallet-regrets. As a bonus, I wanted to partake in the heavy Italian heritage in Geneva.


We went to a little Italian place called L'Incontro. I'd been told by two people to have the Pasta Sicilliano. It has eggplant in it, commonly called the much more eloquent word "aubergine". I rarely turn down aubergines, but walking in I walked by table after table of tempting pizzas.

Pizza has been my favorite food for years. I can hardly resist it. I could eat it everyday of the year. Arris's, Shakespeare's, Ian's, Dewey's, even Godfather's and Pizza Hut. I love it. The pasta sicilliano would have to wait. I wanted pizza for my birthday.

I ordered something that had "jambon" on it - stands for ham, although it really doesn't resemble ham ala lunchmeat. The other ingredients were a bit of a mystery as the ingredients were listed in Italian and French. Good thing I know English and German.

Tim and I sipped our Montipulciano and chatted and I noticed that pizza is a knife and fork affair in L'Incontro. When our pizza's arrived, I knew why. It's really just a light thin dough with a melt of goodness on top. While the edge crust is crispy, everything in the middle is melty gooey wonderful. And in true European fashion, where convenience is an afterthought (if a thought at all), the pizzas are not cut, but served as one big uncut pie. Knives and forks definately required.

I ate my rand0m-melty-stuff pizza, lost in it's yummy goodness and Tim ate his, which he also enjoyed. Next time I may need to skip the pasta sicciliano again as I'm ordering Tim's pizza. Right in the middle, shining to the world, rested a sunny-side up egg, cooked right along with the cheese, jambon and whatever else was on there. Brilliant Italians. Eggs on pizza. Like a little gift to the pizza-eater....or the birthday girl...or the birthday girl's boyfriend. Regardless, just brilliant.

Chocolate Review Un (1)

Switzerland is known for a few important things. Skiing. Peace. Chocolate. I'm already a huge advocate of peace. I don't know how to ski (yet). But I do believe I'm qualified to evaulate the variety of chocolate available in Geneva. I've decided I'm going to spend the fall testing the varieties of chocolate around the city so I can bring home the most tasty and decadant for my family to enjoy at Christmas.

Today I review my first two: Rohr and Aver.

Rohr Chocolates:
Rohr Chocolate's operates an adorable little store at the edge of the old town on a side street that I never would have noticed had I not decided to take a detour along a new path home last Saturday. I was charmed by the store window and went in. Tim was coming to visit later in the day, so under the guise of buying him a welcome gift, I purchased a box of "Mini-pralines 6" for 7.50 Chf. They were packaged in a little golden box with golden ribbon wrapped around it. After the purchase they offered me a plate with a variety of chocolates to sample. The box contained six mini-truffles. Four were round, two were square. Half were dark chocolate, half were milk chocolate. My first piece, a dark chocolate round one, was delish. It had an intense dark chocolate flavor, but with a creamy inside that melted in my mouth. The other two were also fine, but the dark chocolate truffle was superb.
I would definately purchase Rohr chocolate again.

Auer Chocolates
This store is located along the main shopping street in Rive Gauche and also operates as a cafe. On my way back from grocery shopping this week I went to purchase a little treat for making it through my second week in Geneva. I purchased a box of what looked like 16 cocoa-covered rabbit turds for 10 Chf. In fact they were chocolate-covered hazelnuts dusted with cocoa powder. The desk attendent wrapped the turd-chocolates in lovely Auer chocolate wrapping paper and sealed it with a metallic sticker. After purchase, they also offered me a sample of a piece of their dark chocolate. It was excellent. I immediately thought that Sarah would love this dark chocolate. Once I got home, I admired the lovely wrapping of the chocolate and almost hesitated to open it. But alas, I like chocolate more than I like lovely wrapping paper. I was a little disappointed with the chocolates. The coccoa powder made them slightly bitter and the chocolate surrounding the hazelnuts was good, but not decadent. They were still very tasty, but I wouldn't purchase this type in particular again.

So, to recap Chocolate Review Un: Rohr trumps Auer. More to come.

Vive Geneve!!

I might possibly live in the most gorgeous city in the entire world. It reminds me slightly of Madison. It's about 200,000 people, most of whom live a pedestrian lifestlye. There's a big lake that's the focal point of most activities. The biggest differences are the mountains in the background, quite absent in Madison, and the multitudes of rich Saudi's escorting their fully-burqa'ed wives through the streets of Geneva, thankfully absent in Madison. I have nothing against full burqas...well, that's not entirely true...but that's a post for another blog.

This weekend marks the end of the "Fete de Geneve", essentially a celebrating coinciding with Geneva's National Day (like our 4th of July). The entire lakefront, rive gauche to rive droit is litttered with amusement rides, food stands, music groups and hordes of people.

On Saturday night 300,000 people showed up to enjoy the fireworks spectacle. I say spectacle because this was like nothing I have ever seen before. Tim and I were encouraged to arrive early since the population of the city plus 100,000 other people crowd along the shores of the lake to watch the show. We packed a backpack with apricots, fresh mozzerella, basil and heirloom tomatoes and a bottle of wine.

I've realized one thing I love about Europe. They are totally, 100% ok with public drinking and intoxication. When we left the apartment I was telling Tim that we would need a way to hide our wine. He looked at me and shook his head as if thinking, "silly american, we don't participate in your prudent ways." So, off the wine went with us.

We sat on the boulders just north of the beach and across from the Parc la Grange to watch the show. It was 45 full-minutes of explosions, sound and light. It was spectacular spectacular. Four different fireworks companies compete to show the best 12 minute fireworks display. They each pulled out all the stops. This was a light parade in the sky. I oohed and aahed and felt patriotic for a country in which I'd just arrived.

I may be new here, but all I can say is Vive Geneve!

The Farmer's Market

All week my alarm has gone off at 7am. Wait, that's not true. All week, the cathedral bells start donging (it's really loud, as if Quasimodo wants to get revenge on the entire city of Geneva) at 7am. About 25 seconds after the bells stop, my alarm goes off.

Generally, I'm a morning person. This week my alarm goes off and I curse the Swiss world. How can it possibly be morning already? When will my system realize that it truly isn't 1am, but in fact, time to get up and get to work.

Naturally, I've been eagerly awaiting Saturday morning. Last night I turned my alarm off and settled in my twin size bed to watch "My Family", my favorite new british television show that airs on BBC Prime every evening at 10:30. I have my choice of three english language stations here. CNN, which blows. MSNBC finance, also blows. And BBC Prime, which I adore. After the show, which was hilarious as usual, I snuggled down and looked forward to a long night's sleep. I even shut my windows to muffle quaisimodo's incessant hourly revenge.

When I awoke, I felt fully rested, light as air and ready to start my day. I flipped over to check the time on my blackberry. Blerg! It's 7am. My jet lag has officially sped off.

Like every good Swiss person, I need to do my grocery shopping on Saturday mornings. If you don't, and you work between 9am and 6pm, then you don't eat for the next week. Off to the farmer's market I go.

Every Saturday morning the street in front of Les Halles is filled with fruit and vegetable stands. The vegetables all come from France and Switzerland, the stone friuts come from the same and the citrus fruits come from Spain. I wandered around the market twice, before decided exactly what to buy. I had 50 chf in my pocket and wanted to be smart about what I purchased. Also, I was terrified about interacting with the people behind the stands with my vocabulary consisting of "bonjour" and "merci". Still, I did it. I purchased a motley blend of heirloom tomatoes, unbelieveably fragrant basil, haricots verts (green beans to the rest of the world), mountain-grown strawberries, wild mushrooms and apricots. Next, I went to the indoor portion of Les Halles. This is where the butchers, cheese-makers, bakers and fish-people set up their stands. This place is chaotic. Little old swiss women with thier push carts hollaring over the counter about exactly what they want and every other swiss person in the world hoarding in to place their orders. I had the balls to order 6 slices of succulant-looking ham (it was 9 chf, so it better be succulant) bread, fresh yogurt and some jelly. My hands full, my pockets empty, I headed home to enjoy my bounty.

I made it through my first week! Beautiful food. Beautiful city. Now I just need to make friends!

Bonjour! Day One in Geneva

When I first moved to Chicago at 21, I moved into an apartment roughly the size of my thumb. I looked at it as a stepping stone to bigger and better things. Yet here I am, not quite 10 years later (close, but not quite) living in temporary housing in Geneva roughly the size of a postage stamp. But, did I mention that it's Geneva? I'd love to tell you how adventurous I've been in the six hours since I've landed, and I have been, only my adventures have included 1) Getting 136 lbs of luggage to my temporary housing 2) Pulling myself out of my 30-minute power nap after two hours. 3) Buying groceries.

Buying groceries has been my favorite adventure so far and is closely linked to my second adventure of pulling myself out of my power nap. I got to my hotel around 2:45 and decided a quick 30 minute nap would allow me to refresh after which I could hop in the shower and be to the grocery store before it closes at six. This is key because once the store closes at six, there will be no more grocery shopping until Monday morning. That's the way they do things here. I set my alarm, laid back...and woke up...when?....at 5pm. Doh! The worst part is in that half-state of awake I seriously considered choosing sleep over food, laid there for about 10 minutes considering the idea, and grudgingly pulled myself out of bed. Fortunately, I made it to the store prior to closing. Unfortunately, I still haven't showered.

I've always loved going into foreign grocery stores to see what is available and wonder at the interesting foods and choices. But I've never had to actually figure out how to subside on these foods. My list was pretty simple, milk, eggs, oj, oil, salt. The basics to get me started. Geneva is an eat-at-home culture due to the expense of dining out, so if I'm going to do this I need to stock the pantry. I felt like I walked through the looking glass. Milk comes in a box, mayonaise comes in a tube (like toothpaste), eggs sit on a shelf (refrigeration optional), cereal is $7 a box (ugh!) and did I mention everything is in French? I didn't realize how much I loved marketing until today. I need pictures, direction, claims, point-of-sale so that I know what to purchase. Did you know how to say iodized salt in French before today? Neither did I...nor did I know that non-iodized is still an option. I stared at the butter for probably 10 minutes trying to decide between the "bio-buerre" or the "buerre de cusine." I decided on the latter...I'll let you know how that works out later when I scramble some non-chilled eggs. 76 Swiss Francs later, I've got enough food to get me through the week.

The next adventure? Hiding 136lbs of stuff in my postage stamp apartment so that I can see the floor.