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on the-Danube a real Budweiser
from Czech, not that US rubbish I forgot that I had taken some snaps on the small camera of the trip down the Donau/Danube on that Twin City Liner cat or whatever it is called. Somewhat like my pictures of the Rhine last year if you remember in terms of the odd riverside rocky castle etc. And even though I got to Bratislava tp spend two nights there, with the view to getting around to see a bit, this did not really prove the case in the end. Woke up and it was raining and as I could look down on the roof 3 floors below I could tell how wet it was. So decided at almost 4pm (rain can ruin the best of holidays) that best thing to do was stay dry and go to the Slovakian National Gallery next door. For some reason they did not seem to want me to pay and just waved me upstairs. Some quite good glass blowing pieces by Czech/Slovak artists. The rest was from the permanent collection – 18th and 19th cent. Czech painting (yawn), some wooden altar pieces/retables, some general religious art, some 17th and 18th cent. Italian masters and that was about it. I had hoped that
there was a selection of naïve art, but had a chat to the very nice receptionist at the hotel and she had a look at their website – that exhibition was not at the main gallery but at an annex out in the suburbs somewhere. After that went to the Café Savoy for a coffee – and realised that the Wimbledon men’s final was on the telly in real time (makes a change from staying up to watch it) so mulled over a glass of white wine as well.
For dinner with the dodgy weather and all had dinner at the “French Restaurant” (the arrogant name) at the hotel – yes, I know, usually avoid hotel restaurants, but this had a 13/20 award from the Gault Millau French food Nazis and it was Sunday (and lots of places open, but pretty empty due to bad weather. Venison terrine to start – then you guessed it, Sandi, the duck breast stuffed with red cabbage and raisins (alleged – not in evidence if you ask me). Then had the nougat pancakes with flamed pineapple to see what it was about. Well table cooking in the style of crepes suzette folks. The
waiter caramelized the brown sugar in the pan, added butter and orange juice, warmed the folded pancakes stuffed with Nutella etc (?!) and flamed some fresh pineapple with Cointreau. It was interesting to watch the waiter do it anyway, like at Troika the old trad style restaurant I worked at in Auckland post-Uni before getting a “real job”.
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