Vienna, Austria (April 27, 2012): Lunch at Plachuttas Gasthaus zur Oper. My goat cheese with Rucolla and tomatoes was very nice, not too much, but very artistic. The chardonay was very tasty, full-bodied; I had to have two glasses in the middle of the day. It was my last few hours in Vienna, just before my transfer to the airport, so that was o.k. I was sitting outside under a sunroof. The place was busy with Viennesian people mixed with a few tourists. The groups looked mainly like business people out for a joyful lunch. To my left a couple of undefined scope and origin and no visible reasons for their mutual attraction. I could hear some English with Austrian accents indicating international relationships in progress.
The large group of seven in front of me included a mix of young and old and sofisticated and simple people. A lady in black exposing in a early summerly mode much of her skin with a face too long and this alien shape emphasized by a long hair style revealing the high "stirn" dominated the conversation, which was mostly inaudible for me, though. The woman at the head of the table next to the big guy with a "40 years Jochen Rind" T-shirt looked like a mannequin in a shoping window with bright red fingernails, matching lips, a somewhat translucent skin, and a kind of red-orange hair color, holding her cuttlery with her fingertips, which was consistent with the mouse-shaped face with a touch of red skin underlining the appearance of a transparent fairytale figure. What didn't match with the elfen-like appearance was the voice and the language used by her, which were more street-proven.
The all-male waiters came with approns, old-style, well-trained, all with green ties on white shirts and black pants, except for the managers in their black suits supervising the waiters. A truly old-fashioned Viennesian place well suited for a lunch before leaving this somewhat outdated city.
Vienna, Austria (April 25, 2012): Dinner at Dai Fratelli's. I walked in at 9:00 in the evening, sat down at a table for two at the margin of the outside area, and there she was - like in a bad movie, where we would think that this accidental crossing of world lines was unrealistic: the worst enemy was there, sitting only three tables away from me, engaged in a conversation with her i-phone. I don't know about you, but there are very few people I consider enemies, but the unlikely took place: there she was. Not that I had problems with this, I just ignored her. I am good at that, and the white blond trash three tables away from me did not take anything away from the otherwise nice and lively ambiance of the restaurant. Another couple was sitting right ahead towards the center of the outside area. They were friend with the restaurant's manager, who came and talked to then in a friendly, acquainted manner. He, the slick, shinny clean business guy - although not revealing what type of business -, and she a white-blond, full long-haired well-aged beauty with dark eyebrows painted artistically in a wide bow above her eyes, the smile on her big mouth revealing a set of perfectly white teeth, using her assets to live the life of a paid compainon. The scene could have been taken out of The Sopranos, with him being a thin edition of Tony Soprano. To my right, a group of four, three at the upper-end of middle-aged males and one female rambling along a random walk through their lives, jumping from the time they did their phd, working on a boat in 1979 making a lot of money with fishing in the coastal ocean close to river deltas, the daughter studying architecture - which is almost fine arts, but more solid for making money - in Auburn, Alabama, a small town with the second-ranged school for architecture only a four hour drive away from them, although a dangerous drive, to flying into Europe now while having to deal with overbooked flights; it was interesting to observe how the dinner conversation jumped around from unimportant details to life-determining topics - with none of the topics being followed up for more than very few minutes. The enemy left soon after I arrived, first unnoticed by me. I hope, my presence made her leave. The group to the right talked about a scientific papers the alpha-male had submitted recently; the reviewers, whom he thought were rude, liked the geology but recommended that he'd leave the physics out of the paper, which he obviously considered the key part of his worked; so he could'nt believe the reviewers stupid attitude. When I arrived, I had to ask for the heater pouring abundent infrared radiation over me to be turned off on the nice evening that seemed warmer than the day itself. The 2009 Gaja was very nice, full-bodied, and smooth with a story of Tuscany's sun and soil to tell. The Ruccola salad with pine seeds and Parmesan cheese was balanced except for the creamy dressing, which was overburdening rich. The tortellini with Ricotta cheese filling and salmon came in too much creamy, heavy sauce, and so did the pasta I noticed served to the group of four to the right. A crowded, creamy place, not worth to be revisited if you don't have a lot of time to spend in the gym to get rid of the large amount of calories. At a table ahead were five sex-in-the-city girls Austrian style, less exciting, older, more settled, and constrained by invisible bounds. The hairstyles were there: two Miranda Hobbes, one Samantha Jones, one Charlotte York, and, unavoidably, the Carrie Bradshaw. In color, the hair wealth was more homogeneous and biased to the dark side of the spectrum. They were more Eastern European, revealing the closeness of the location to Croatia, Slovenia, ... At the right table, the alpha-male educated his wife that "here, the word extreme is inappropriate, I will except the word end member." He kept narrating about a dispute he had with another (alpha?) male about two numbers that may or may not be statistically different, which seemed to be of life-determining significance to him. How does this relate to a dying Earth? We are sitting here, enjoying the meals, engaged in hefty Brownian conversations while our home planet is falling apart, species are dying, and the planet if drifting into a new and unpredictable state. We talk about the unimportant details, while the undoubtable numbers, the species extinct, the population growing, the depletion of resources, are ignored. The factual blindness of the supposedly brightest of our kind is hard to explain. Are we a doomed species who are considering the blindest to be those that can foretell the future? Samantha with her huge golden ear rings, in the true sense of the word, thin rings with at least 3 inches in diameter, kept throwing (hot?) looks at me, and I kept repeating in my mind lines of LMFAO's song "I am sexy and I know it, ..., Girl look at that body, I work out." All five had black, perfectly painted eyebrows - and it dawned to me that this must be a new fashion European-style. When I left, I walked past their table, feeling sexy ...
Vienna, Austria (April 23, 2012): Dinner at Bel Amore, right at the corner close to my hotel. A rather common place, with waiters not well coordinated and the Italian wine not recommendable: Chianti with 12% and Chianti Classico with 12.5% are just below the acceptable level and outside my league (of course on the lower end). My near-field environment contained families with kids; a old guy alone by himself looking a bit confused and uncomfortable; two woman and a man, the blond upper midel-aged one seemed to be the friend of the older boring one who could be the wife of the man; the two older ladies enjoying their bottle of wine looked like they grew old within the constraining framework of the well-established, with not sign of ever having dared to be outside of the box - except for maybe having a bottle of wine together. The one with the bright green top, short blond hair and unimpressive assesoirs. The other one more elegant, black top with some white and black stripped parts and a matching shawl. My salmon carpaccio was farm-raised, still partly frosen, and it came with lemons instead of the promised oranges. The gamberinies were not giantic as advertiesed but rather normal in size, and paired with some potatos, they looked like a traditional Austrian meal far away from the Italian region the restaurant seemed to aspire to.
Washington, D. C., USA (April 12, 2012): Again, I spend an evening at one of my favorite places in D.C.: Siroc at 915 15th Street NW. Sometimes I love to have dinner by myself in a busy restaurant, being able to observe the interactions between clients at the various tables. I was offered a table in the back of the mor or less rectangular room, not a large room, with a rather interesting ceiling, and with many tables, although not as crowded as atypical Parisian restuarant would have them. To the left, a somewhat weird couple was engaged in a male monologue. The classical early 50-tisch Italian-styled male with a black jacket, white shirt, and lots of golden assessoires, having his big hands grapping the rim of the table, was pouring his story over the patiently listening and well-eductedly commenting woman, who was younger, with overdimensioned old Egyptian, pharao-styled bracelets and cloth with fitting patterns. His voice was well above the noise level in the restaurant keeping his dialog with me all the time, and allowing me to realize that he was participating in Board meetings of a company which had already $1.5 M in sales, had relations to the Rio Tinto Minig company, and another big company in India, requiring him to travel a lot. He made himself interesting to his obviously new date by saying that he understands some sides of himsel, while he doesn't understand other sides of him. Before he order wine, he asked the waiter whether he could take home an unfinished bottle.
To the right, behing the next table was an elderly women, who's arms had seen better times years ago when she used ot go to the gym a lot; now they were thin and hanging with a memory of once attractive muscule.
I had a delicious Frisse and Fennel salate with roasted appricotes. The 2006 Nero d'Avelo Fendo Maccari had the rich Siccly sun-filled taste I love. The special, spaghetti with scallops and roasted tomates, was tasty, although the spaghetti were too thick and (over)"well done."
Across the room, mother and father were taking out their blond, mid-thirties, Swedish version of a Cameron Diaz-style daughter, who looked like she never found the one to be with. I know the look because for many years, I have been in this place.
The table to the right was very quiet. The guy looked like somebody in the "Die hard" movies, although I wasn't sure whether he would be a good or bad guy. The woman he was with was definitely not the type of chick the key figure in such a movie would be with.
I enjoyed exchanging secret smiles with one of the femal waiters, while listening to the Italian macho reporting "It is as it is, as Mom says!"
The second table to the left had a big guy, well past his 60ies, looking important, with the mandatory red tie, with white, slowly disappearing hair, and a thick white mustache, which made him look like a seal with glasses, and a woman much shorter than him, but probably with the same circumfence - a couple that makes you wonder how they made it through life together.
On one of the opposite tables, the somewhat hispanic looking guy with a hoody looked out of place in the sea of jacketed white males talking to their white females. This hich-tech individual joogled between laptop, iphone, red wine and food - just like me earlier in the day when I had a late lunch at Geoff's where I share my pizza with the laptop - but not an iphone.
At the left table, in between, the Italian-looking male declared that he is really happy in life.
I noticed that the Cameron Diaz-style woman obviously was too tall to be comfortable with her size; she looked very left-over by life moving faster than she could follow.
Suddenly, the restaurant started to empty with many parties leaving more or less at the same time. But the story on the left table continued to unfold. He informed his date that according to his therapist, kids are growing up much faster. The date was responding but with a very low voice, not audible to me. You don't want to spend the rest of your life with that person, he informed her and others in the restaurant. He boldly stated that he doesn't want a second opinion. He had been the paragon of wealth in his family, with a married life, until HIT happened: His wife turned into a woman he did not marry; she now was beyond the shaddow of herself.
A very interesting evening, which was ended with a double espresso accompained by the never ending stacato of words from our Italian to his Egyptian-styled much younger woman, who hopefully was smart enough to take his story for what it was: a report of a failed life.
Beijing, China (November 5, 2010): Having had Chinese food for almost two weeks, I was very pleased to end up for a group dinner at Alameda's. A restaurant owned by a Brasilian. We got there because several in the group were friend with him. Following the recommendations of the owner, we had great Spanish wine (a lot), good international food, and, with no recommendation needed, an enormous amout of fun.
Austin, Texas, USA (November 2009): One evening, I went to Truluck's, which I didn't know from before. I immediately like the ambience, despite the fact that the restaurant was in a mall right next to a major highway. I went back a second time, but then with two colleagues.
I chose to sit outside next to a nice water feature. I had a "knife and forge" Caesar Salad and Hawaiin Tuna "Nicose", both very good and prepared in an attractive and creative way. The Caeser salad was excellnet, perfect style, fresh, very well balanced with the Pecorino, and two good anchoviese. The tuna was also of excellent quality, fenell-crusted, combined with olive-stuffed potatos and sundried tomatoes. The green beans and cheese mix was a well-suited compliment.
The first evening, I had a wine tasting with a flight of Chardoney Showdown. The Joseph Drouhin Pouilly-Fuisse, France was exiting but not original. The Rombauer is one of my favorites, very mature and fully developed; what I would call a classical Chardoney. The Le Souchais, Loire, France, was very friendly and amiable, compatible with my likes, fresh but not without secrets. The Jordan, Russian River had an unusual buequett, almost like a candle store, and a very flowery, spring-like first encounter. It got a bit too frutty and artificial after the second taste.
The second evening, I had Hawaii Wahoo for the first time. This is an excellent fish, almost as firm at sword fish but with a more characteristic taste.
Brussels (2001-2007):
Frankfurt (2003-2009):
San Diego (2008-2010):
San Francisco (1998-2009):
Toronto, Canada (May 2008): I have been there only once, at a meeting, with no time to go to Downtown. However, I was lucky and noticed Chez Laurent, a small French/Italian Restaurant at 4965 Yong Street, not far away from the Novotel North York, where I stayed. The restaurant is in a small building just the size sufficient as a family home squeezed between skyscrapers at this busy street. The customers are distributed over several small rooms each stuffed with a number of tables. I was there on Monday and again on Tuesday, had delicious food, and reasonable open Valpolicella. On Thursday I tried to avoid the place, I even went to the metro station at Stewards to go to Downtown and have dinner at Il Fortinello on Kings, which I had identified on opentable.com. I put $2.75 into the ticket machine, but it refused to given me a ticket - obviously it wanted me to go back to Chez Laurent. I kept walking up and down Young Street, past the many Sushi, Indian, Thai, Vietnam restaurants, some looking really good, several times past Chez Laurent, until I finally surrendered. The Lady was happy to see me again, and so was the German waiter, who finally dared to speak a little more to me. I was placed in the same small room I had enjoyed the evenings before, a room much smaller than my living room at home, stuffed with five tables, and me in the middle. Right in front of me the big round Asian girl, so big that the once relaxed red cotton shirt, which was cut open at the bottom, had problems not to crack and leave her exposed to the eyes of everybody, her small Asian friend, so small that she was almost fading out of sight, and the pale white guy, who didn't really seem to have any relation to the two girls but was at the table - watching these three, I realized that there was a time when dinner was not dominated by today's touristic pictures, when we had to wait days, weeks, and sometimes months before the pictures we took during our last trip finally were developed. Their meals were disregarded, if not disgraced, because all attention was directed towards the pictures they took during the day on their small pocket-sized digital cameras which they were misusing as TVs they showed around to each others while the delicious food was not able to catch their attentions despite sending of the most intriguing scents.
And on my left, there were the two Asian men, one quite old, the other much younger. They were like wax figures, very artificial, very mechanical. The old man ate his soup, a chickpea soup, like a robot, the plate tilted away from him and his spoon collecting the soup mechanically at the far end of the plate and then shoveling it into his mouths. He was efficient and done very fast.
Slightly behind on the left the middle age couple, he a weird guy with a nose hopefully indicative of the size of his manhood, who stated that he's afraid of loosing his wife after she finds the partner she is looking for, and she, transpiring frustration of life in every word, telling him that the one guy she had was a nice guy but without ambitions and the other was a guy with ambitions but not nice, and she was wondering whether she would ever find a guy who had both aspects in his personality.
But my food was good: again I had the fried eggplants with Parmigiano, served on two plates hot enough to warm up your hands and bones after a long winter day in the cold, followed by a Caesar salad and a delicious crème brulée. And the mandatory double espresso.