From restaurant to restaurant across Europe
 

I forgot to photograph the Spanish tapas we ate yesterday :o
Today we are in Hungary (culinarily at least) at the Gay Hussar restaurant (look it up!).
Mr L had marinated herring and I had the Hungarian starter. Mine contained a bit of everything - salami, smoked sausage, assorted pickled veg and various pates and the herring.

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Our mains were goose and beans for Mr L and crispy roast duck for me. We both got red cabbage as a side order. I got potatoes with smoked sausage and apple sauce, too.


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Sent that before attaching my duck!

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You're a beauty in all aspects.
But you know the way to my heart is via photos of food.
YOU BEAUTY!

Absolutely gorgeous.
Thank you. And your post says how much you are enjoying it, even without saying how much you are enjoying it.
Love to you & Mr L, you deserve to enjoy it.

PS. Even with my small appetite these days, I bet I could polish off all the food photographed. It looks divine.

We both very much enjoyed the food. Astonishingly we found room for dessert. He had ice-cream and I had chestnut puree flavoured with dark rum and vanilla. And a glass of dessert wine each :yum:
Still feeling stuffed four hours later. Pic of dessert when I'm next in range of some free wifi ;)

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You and Mr L will have to have a long session of... uh, calisthenics, to burn that meal. :blush:

Showed your pics to Mum.
She was as impressed as I was.

Although seeing your selection of meats she did ask, "Did it come with any bread?"
That's the Irish in her. If it doesn't come with bread or potatoes (or a cup of tea at the end) it's sorely lacking.

How're we supposed to keep our belly fat without empty carbs? (raised in American Irish household)

There was bread on the table when we arrived which we polished off :D

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Yesterday evening's dessert.
Chestnut puree and cream.
I'd eaten most of it by the time I remembered to photograph it!
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And today at lunchtime we were in the USA. Here's a "proper hamburger" from a chain called Byron.
Yum!
This evening we went Italian with done friends. I forgot to photograph the food :o
Mr L and I shared a starter of bresaiola (? Sp.) air-dried beef with rocket and sun dried tomatoes and very fluffy mozzarella type cheese. Then I had whopping great prawns on a salad.
I can feel myself getting fatter by the day!
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Oooh, chestnut puree sounds decadent. :yum:

It all sounds yummmy !!

Limey, perhaps you could expand your services for the Russian rockers. :D

SWOON!

(except you were eating worms for dessert)

Chestnut puree = like peanut butter* made from chestnuts. You can order chestnut butter online, if one were looking to simulate limey's experience on the home front...

*No wonder Sundae doesn't like it! :)

I keep forgetting to photograph the food! It's easier to remember when you're travelling alone and lonely and want to share the meal with someone!
Anyhoo, there's this champagne and caviar bar at Gatwick airport, so we thought "Why not?"

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That's black caviar in the round tin on ice, served with toast, pancake, sour cream, chopped red onion and chopped boiled egg white. And pink champagne.
And yes! Sundae, it was deelish!:D

Green Tabasco! Is that an American chain?

ts Jalapeno, milder than the red stuff

That looks yummy Limey !!!

So ... in preparation for the three course lunch, afternoon tea and four course dinner we're promised tomorrow we were quite restrained in our meals today.
Skimpy continental breakfast, and this passed for lunch. Coffee and cognac :rolleyes:

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And then this evening we had a little dinner. Mr L had roast chicken with a salad garnish and fries (I could have sworn I photographed this!), followed by chocolate tartufo ice cream. I had pasta with seafood and courgette (zucchini), followed by pannacotta.
I'm glad you're enjoying this report; we're certainly enjoying the food !


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Oh dear! More champagne!


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I am full of love for this thread, thank you.
The photos are as delicious as the food.

Oh dear! More champagne!

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Lunch - first course. The meat is suckling pig.


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Lunch - main course.
Except that I think that fennel is the food of the devil so I said none for me thanks. Instead I got a little selection of vegetables wrapped round with a slice of aubergine.
You don't need me to tell you how much we're enjoying this, do you?

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Lunch - dessert. Whoops. Pix in next post.


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Why serve five macaroons at a table for two? There's been murder done for less!

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We need an orient express type train over here. Maybe going from DC to NYC and then up along the Hudson river to the finger lakes and then to Niagara Falls and Toronto. That looks really classy.

It is really classy. The dress code in the restaurant cars is absolutely no jeans or T shirts. Most people on the train are celebrating something and we'll all be dressed up to the nines at dinner tonight.
Meanwhile ... afternoon tea ....
Attachment 44775Attachment 44776
Tiny cakes - apple strudel, raspberry tart and lemon rhum-baba. Tea. Served in our cabin.
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I like the VSOE logo on the china.

Last night's dinner-

Main course - Picture if you will, two triangular wedges of pan fried fillet of lamb, cooked to perfect pink, standing proud in the centre of the plate. Nearby a slab of polenta has a cylindrical hole through it filled with finely sliced fried mushrooms, the cylindrical plug sitting nonchalantly atop the slab. To the side, daintily thin slices of steamed baby aubergine and courgette alternate fanned into a roundel. With a carefree drizzle of jus all around.
Sorry, I forgot to photograph it!
Pictured is the starter.

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Cheese and dessert.
Three cheeses with a bit of bread, a biscuit, a slice of fruit dumpling and some fig chutney.
The "sail" over the block of bavarois was a proper brandy snap.
Again, five tiny pastries (about an inch across) for two of us. We only managed three!

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I'm having trouble keeping up!
Here's the breakfast tray, served in our cabin. Coffee, fruit juice and fruit salad under the paper caps, bread and butter and jam and cheese, pastries.
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It all looks wonderful! The Orient Express has been added to my bucket list. :)

that's a HALF order.

Another great thread. Food, I'm a fan. This looks like cruise line fare, but on wheels. At least, that's my only experience that comes close. And it was unbelievably delicious, night after night.

This kind of thing irritates me. Intellectually, I get that presentation is important, at least to people who aren't me. But they basically cut a bite out of the middle of your food and threw it away, so they could artistically fill the cylinder instead if just putting the mushrooms on top of the whole polenta piece. Was the idea of a haphazard pile really so offensively bourgeois that they had to bin some of the very food that you're supposed to be enjoying?

Unless the little cut-out circle of polenta was somewhere else on the plate, in which case I'll shut up now.

Noted so you'll feel better, NOT so you'll "shut up now".

Thanks for your interest, guys and girls. Nearly done, now!
Brunch today.

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Oh man, you've been eating very well.

This is the man responsible for it all. He's been cooking on the Orient Express for 29 years, in a kitchen that measures about ten by five feet. M. Christian Bodiguel.


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All of it looks gorgeous. From a kitchen that small, for three dining cars! The man is a genius.

To be completely honest, two kitchens that size. There were 95 or so passengers on the train. Two sittings each for lunch and dinner.

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Doh! I was thinking "cylindrical plug" was still referring to the mushrooms, but you're right, she clearly meant the extra piece of polenta. My apologies to Monsieur Bodiguel, I did not mean to denigrate his obviously divine victuals. This thread has put his train ride at the top of my dream vacation list--even despite the presence of all that pastry!