Good food
what would you order from our three-course taste of travel menu?
We were nominated/tagged by two fellow blogger pals, A New Life Wandering and Mrs Ayla’s Adventures for #atasteoftravel blogger competition. Although we are not eligible to win the prize and we are not entering this post into the competition, we thought it would still be fun to get involved in creating a three-course menu from the foods we have tried on our travels.
But we are choosing to put a “spin” on the menu – instead of one entree, main or dessert, we have decided to make it like a set menu: a choice of one of:
- three entrees
- three mains
- three desserts
Simply because we could decide on JUST one for each 🙂 – Apologies in advance that there are no vegetarian options.
So here goes the Wise Monkeys Abroad 3-course Travel Menu.
ENTREE
OPTION 1:
White Rose Dumplings from Hoi An, Vietnam
A steamed dumpling filled with shrimp bunched to look like a rose.
It is served with toasted garlic and sweet dipping sauce.
OPTION 2:
Sashimi Platter from Hakone, Japan
A selection of uncooked seafood includes tuna, prawn, squid, octopus, yellow tail .
Served with wasabi and shaved radish.
OPTION 3:
Cheese Fondue from Lucerne, Switzerland
An infusion of gruyère and emmental cheese in dry white whine.
Served in a casserole on top of a spirit lamp and a basket of bread.
MAIN:
OPTION 1:
Beef Stroganoff from St Petersburg, Russia
Sauteed beef in a mushroom, sour cream based sauce.
Served with a side of mash potatoes.
OPTION 2:
Seafood Paella from Leon, Spain
Aromatic rice cooked with seafood, chicken and vegetables over an open fire.
Served in the pan it is cooked in.
OPTION 3:
Pork Knuckle from Riga, Latvia
Slow-cooked pork knuckle.
Served with beans, fresh tomato salad and potato wedges.
DESSERT:
OPTION 1:
Chocolate Soup from Edinburgh, Scotland
A hot chocolate served in a bowl, topped with whipped cream and chocolate sauce.
OPTION 2:
Creme Brûlée from Carcassonne, France
Vanilla custard based layered underneath a hard caramel top.
OPTION 3:
Pistachio Baklava from Istanbul, Turkey
Chopped pistachios wrapped in filo pastry and held together with a sweet syrup.
What are you ordering?
Let us know in the comments.
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polishing off polish food
Polish food is hearty but to us was not in a rich or creamy way. Everything we tried while in Poland was delicious and we never had trouble finishing anything off! Good food like this should never go to waste.
Let’s see what we tried…
BIGOS
The word translates to “big mess’ so picture a stew that uses fresh and pickled cabbage, meat and sausage, onions and mushrooms. All the ingredients thrown together with peppercorns, bay leaves and some other herbs that we couldn’t identify. We are no food connoisseurs but the pickled cabbage (aka sauerkraut) blended well with the rest of the flavours. With each spoonful, there was a burst of flavour.
In one word: flavoursome
PIEROGI
These are dumplings and can be found in any Polish restaurant. We were told that if a restaurant doesn’t have pierogi, it is not a real Polish restaurant. We tried fried pierogi filled with meat. The meat was not minced as we expected, it was meat floss and a lot of it. If you have tried meat floss, then you would know the texture is light, fluffy – the pierogi was just that but rather thick and dry.
In one word: dense
PLACKI
Potato cakes, very similar to fritters, served with goulash on top. We tried wild boar goulash with it. The serving was very big and hearty. Plaki has been described as greasy and heavy but we disagree. Where we ate this dish, the chef cooked them beautifully! There was enough crunch to the crispy shredded potato and the wild boar tasted much like beef. The meat was so tender (probably from being slow cooked).
In one word: hearty
ZAPIEKANKA
A half baguette (approximately 50 cm long) topped with mushrooms and cheese, toasted in an oven which can be topped with pickles, garlic sauce, tomato sauce, meat , cucumber, tomato and/or onions. A must try as it is considered the ultimate Cracovain drunk food. We bought ours from a kebab shop so it was topped with kebab meat – we chose lamb! Certainly tricky to eat, and you can’t eat it walking around although we saw people doing it. We sat on a door step and dug in with a fork as we couldn’t fit our mouths around the zapiekanka with all the filling.
In one word: filling
GULASZ
If we said goulash instead, everyone would know exactly what we were talking about, right? We had pork goulash on buckwheat. When we ordered this, we had no idea of the size. We also didn’t realize it came with a pickled cucumber. This dish was full of texture; the fluffiness of buckwheat, the crunch and bite of the pickle and the warm, thick meat and gravy. The flavours worked wonderfully together.
In one word: synergistic
SUSZ
This is actually a drink rather than a “food”. It is a dried fruit compote. It looks like tea and is served cold. The flavor is almost like a fruit-flavoured iced tea, the closest dried fruit that comes to mind to describe the taste is prune. We would say the first sip tastes a little unusual but subsequent gulps made the taste grow on us. Not entirely sure we would order it again as it was rather syrupy.
In one word: sweet
So, now we would like to know:
If you have tried Polish food, what is your favourite dish?
And if you haven’t, which one of these would you like to try?
Please leave us a comment here
wise monkeys abroad 