bites of europe

I think one of my favorite things about being abroad is the different lifestyle and food you get to experience. A few things you could say about Europeans is that they seem to take their time with food and food seems to be made with few of what I like to call "fake" ingredients. (You know the ones with complex names like maltodextro-blah blah.) It tends to be yummy, but not always.

Paris:
The artful meticulousness of the corner patisserie was very impressive. I can see why everyone else seeks to emulate French dessert making.


Cheap eats: Ahh the baguette sandwich. So filling, fast and cheap. You see all the tourists walking around with one. I think we had one for lunch almost every day we were in Paris.


One thing I really like about European menus is that salmon is everywhere! It's smoked and put in baguettes, salads, pasta and served rare as pictured below in tartare. Yum!


Switzerland:
But as soon as I lose the comforts of mommy's wallet, I am back on the student budget. Several friends have termed this the "euro-diet." Basically food is expensive, so eat less. I was pretty serious about this diet for a good week or so. And then I discovered grocery shopping and the prices work out to be more or less comparable. Still...the cheapest thing in Swizterland is....water.


You can still pay the normal prices for bottled water, but tap water is drinkable. It essentially comes from the same source as evian since we're right there.

Geneva is super international. So I have been able to enjoy some neat ethnic foods. One of my favorite cheap eats comes from an Iranian grocery store. This english-speaking Iranian dude has a killer seafood salad pictured below. These were the first veggies I found in Geneva, so they were very near and dear to my heart. I have since found veggies and other delicious things at the local grocery store, farmers markets, hole-in-the-wall restaurants and, yes, at the WHO cafeteria. For any tea lovers out there, Moroccan restaurants serve this amazing mint tea that's sweet and refreshing.


Prague:
I really like soft serve ice-cream and this is one of the coolest flavor combos I've seen: strawberry and banana sorbet. It's served in a neat waffle cone and topped with raspberries. I promise the cup was much smaller than what you'd think...but I still probably had more ice cream than is good for you during my stay in Prague.


But ice cream is not particularly unique to the Czechs. The meal below, on the other hand, came from a restaurant that claimed to serve traditional Czech food. The duck with cranberry sauce was pretty good, but my veggie side (not pictured here) must have been marinated in salt. Even now I can remember wanting to choke or down a gallon of water.


Anticipating: I have plans to visit Italy and Spain in the near future and I am really looking forward to REAL italian food and REAL Spanish food. Goodbye to cheesey swizterland at least for a little bit.