Well-Hung Cheese Cake

Toño likes cheese cake. Most probably because he is under the impression that cheese cake does not influence the waistline. Denial can be such a comfort.

However no matter how hard I tried, I was not able to please him. I tried numerous recipes, but none could appeal to Toño. Until this weekend when I found out that it has nothing to do with the recipes...



Last Thursday, my swim buddy, trained chef & fellow pooftah Beat gave me the decisive tip: let it rest in the cold. A cheesecake has to be treated like a steak. It should only be served well-hung.

This actually worked. A cheese cake must not be freshly made. Why didn't anybody tell me this earlier? It would have made my life so much easier.

Saturday Flowers

Rivaz, Lavaux, Switzerland

111 for 1111

4 years, 8 months and 6 days ago I started this and have now reached my 1111^th post. So I use my lunch break to make a 111 random stuff that might but must not necessarily has to be mentioned in the 1110 preceding posts. Here we go:

1. I arrived in a home birth.
2. I was born in a house that was built in 1613.
   
3. My mother milked the cows on the eve of the day I was born.
   
4. The midwife held me out of the window and announced to the black smith across the street that it is a boy.
5. The midwife ended as an alcoholic but I don't feel responsible.
   
6. I did not have a name then.
7. My family could not agree on one.
8. My mother wanted to have Kurt
9. Nobody liked that
10. My mother then suggested that I have to be called Michael
11. My paternal grandmother announced that she does not condone a "Michel" in her house.
12. Michel aus Lönneberga (original title Emil i Lönneberga) turned then out to become my favourite TV series and I would have loved to be called Michel.
13. My brother is 12 years older.
14. My sister is 9 years older.
    
15. My brother and sister then suggested the name Urs, which was not opposed.
16. I was then baptised Urs Michael.
17. I don't think my father did involve himself in the decision process.
    
18. I eat a flower when the Soviets ended the Prague Spring on my first birthday.
19. I grew up on a farm.
20. I like climbing trees.
    
21. I fell on a hoe when I was 4 and missed the temple by a whisker, though I still got a decent hole.
22. I squashed a finger and lost the nail in a potato harvesting machine when I was 5.
23. Thanks to the scars I learned to distinguish between left and right.
24. I still check my finger if I have a doubt about left and right.
25. My driving instructor did not like this behaviour.
26. I have scar on my forearm which look like a suicide attempt but I got it from a wine bottle that broke when I tryed to uncork it.
27. There are 3 scars in my face,
28. one from the surgical removal an abscess,
29. one from the surgical removal of a basal cell carcinoma; and
    
30. one from a barrier that hit my forehead.
    
31. The barrier hit was my only work related accident,
32. besides of being exposed to several electric shocks.
33. They were all my own fault but they did not cause any harm (I think).
    
34. I broke my left shin and foot while skiing when I was six.
35. I later broke my right arm while snowboarding.
36. and my skull and right foot when cycling.
37. I went to a primary school that did not have a catholic teacher for 200 years,
38. since traditionally the protestant pastor was also head of the school board.
39. I made my first experiences with another boy with the son of the first catholic teacher in the village after the ban was lifted.
    
40. My great-great grandfather fought the Catholics in the Sonderbund war.
    
41. My great-great grandfather also bought the house in which I was born.
42. Nowadays, the Catholics and the Protestants share the same church in the village were I was born and raised (on a time-sharing agreement).
43. Since I was not a gifted farmer I moved to the big city (Zürich) when I was 15.
44. My sister would have been a great farmer but my parents did not let her learn that profession,
45. but my brother was the one who took over the farm.
46. My mother is 77 and my father will turn 86 next week.
47. They still work on the farm.
48. I caught them once during a horizontal limbo and got very confused by this.
49. Well my father caught me once too while messing around and he did not like it either, since I was supposed to feed the cows.
50. My father told me once that he was caught in the bed of our neighbour's fiancée (when he was still a bachelor) . The neighbour then had to marry a less pretty girl.
    
51. In Zürich I lived in 3 different houses, all within 1 km.
52. I did not share an apartment until I was 35 (Tigresa, we should do this lunch thingy soon, travelling might pick up again).
    
53. My mother once claimed that Zürich has tainted me.
54. She meant this with respect to my political views (not my sexual habits).
    
55. I made an apprenticeship as electrical draughtsman.
56. I have degrees equivalent to a bachelor degree in electrical engineering and business administration.
57. I'm a certified Senior Project Manager.
    
58. I have had 7 employment contracts,
    
59. but have only worked for two different employers.
60. I earned my first money catching mice and splitting wood.
61. I needed the money to fly to Canada when I was 15.
62. I used up to 80 traps to catch mice,
63. but I never beat my father, whose mouse per trap ratio is twice as high as mine ever was.
64. The mice were fed to the cats.
    
65. We had up to 15 cats at home although my mother suffers from a cat hair allergy,
66. though a busy street next to the house kept the cat population at bay.
67. The only personal pet I ever had was a guinea pig.
68. It died after I gave it a bath (it did smell)
69. My sister's horse put me in bed for a week.
70. I wanted to go straight and the horse preferred left. It won by knocking me out.
    
71. The name of the horse was Whisky. It was my first bad experience with whisky.
72. I got drunk the first time with my fellow boy scouts.
    
73. I fell numerous times riding horses and cows, but got only severely hurt once.
74. My brother ended in hospital with an open fracture of the leg when he was a wee boy after an accident with horses
75. He was home one week when he broke the other one while chasing a cat.
76. I saw the film True Stories by Talking Heads 10 times within 5 days in the cinema because I loved a song so much.
77. There used to be a time when I saw around 60 films a year in the cinema.
78. Now I hardly see 6 a year in the cinema.
79. I made a film with some friends when I was 17.
80. I did run in the contest of the Swiss Youth Film Festival :) but did not win the big price :/
81. I was not allowed to set off fireworks when I was a boy,
82. because my father once ignited an expensive dress of a bystander.
83. I prefer briefs to boxers when wearing trousers.
84. I prefer boxers to nothing while sleeping.
85. I like cooking but Toño is the better cook,
86. however, I'm the better pâtissier.
87. I usually make lunch and Toño dinner.
88. On weekends, I do the shopping while Toño is running. He then has to cook with whatever I shopped.
89. The one that does not cook does the dishes.
    
90. Toño does the cleaning, I do the laundry.
91. I take care of recycling for paper and card board, Toño takes care of recycling for glass.
92. Those roles are not engraved in stone.
    
93. I met Toño in crawl class.
94. I first spoke to Toño under the shower, when I told him that I'm learning Spanish (I know, quite lame pick-up line)
95. We both accuse each other of having seduced the other,
96. Toño claims I did it with my eyes,
97. I claim Toño did it by kissing me.
98. So it must have been a mutual seduction.
99. He did know all about wine, I needed advice, this and swimming brought us together,
100. Like a new passion was born out of two others (this is as poetical as I get)
101. We got engaged in a bus in Mexico after we spent Christmas with Toño's family.
102. We did not want to mix bureaucratic processes and waited with tying the knot until Toño received his Swiss citizenship.
103. We tied the knot in the wrong order.
104. We first went on our honeymoon (Mexico again),
105. we then held the reception,
106. and registered our partnership months later.
107. Toño is the most amazing thing that ever happened to me.
108. Toño has high standards and it is not easy to live up to those.
109. Toño has changed me a lot.
110. Toño has made my life so much more colourful.
111. It's good to be in love and being loved :)
     

Why To Dress Up For Urban Cycling

To my post about my new urban cycling wear naturgesetz commented:

When I was a boy, the purpose of riding a bike was to get from point A to point B, and it was possible to do this wearing everyday clothing. I suspect that even if the purpose is exercise, one could ride a bicycle in normal clothes.

Well naturgesetz, of course you still can, but...

1. normal clothes are cut for the upright position. If you bend as cyclists do, you easily expose your lower back. This can be quite sexy (I had a delicious sighting yesterday when I was tailing a hot lad), however your kidneys do not really like it. Cycling tops are thus cut lower at the back. Boys don't have this problem but when you are getting older...
   
2. there is a lot of sweat and you cannot change after every ride. If you wear cotton, it never dries. If you wear synthetics, you kill your fellow beings with bad odour (sweat looses its aphrodisiac qualities after about half an hour). Merino keeps you warm, it dries fast and does not smell when the sweat dries.
3. cars have only blind spots. Car drivers don't see anything. They are as blind as a mole. But to see and being seen is essential for surviving as a cyclist. Bright, bold and showy clothes, reflecting elements, and switching on the damn light when dark really help. I once caught a broken skull and foot because a car driver did not see me and thus denied me my right of way (though the police wrote in their report I was speeding... :O).
4. never even try to subordinate fashion to reason.
   

Getting from A to B is still the purpose. Using one of my bikes (there are 4) is just the fasted way of doing so in an urban environment (I don't take prisoners when cycling). For recreational or exercising purposes I prefer a less car cluttered environment. There I don't have to be that showy. It only has to be functional.

Dressed To Soak

There is no bad weather - only bad gear! But it really looked like a gap in the clouds when suddenly it went all tropical.



Now I have to change my gear and rush to the City pool. My swim buddies were not keen to swim outdoors during a thunderstorm. I loath the City pool. It's full of dirty old men and pervs.

Added Later
Katalin really put us through the mill. Who was I to think that this would be a relaxing swim. It started with a warm-up of 1 km crawl... and the fade-out was dolphin. I'm completely worn out.

Me Looking Even Hotter

The main purpose of doing sports is looking good when naked. The main purpose of urban cycling however, is always looking hotter than the rest of the world.

Thus my eternal quest for The cycling gear, which brought me recently to OUTLIER, a New York City based outfitter with the tag line Tailored Performance, which provides bike-to-boardroom clothing. Well boardroom, make room for my bike! My shipping arrived yesterday.



You do not even have to ride a bike to wear it ;)



Since the quest is eternal I'm already coveting a new object of desire: A POC RECEPTOR+ helmet. But no luck so far. They are out of stock everywhere :(

Dinner at Denis Martin

Menu "Evolution"

Chrysalide Bellota
Cornet Hollywood
♥
Rösti virtuel
Retour d'Asie
♥
Lingot d'or
♥
Langoustine, concombre à la coriandre et émulsion curry
♥
Sorbet sardine, framboises, estragon et faux pain
♥
Truffes noires, endives, yaourt à la livèche et bouillabaisse
♥
Qui l'eût cru
♥
Birchermuesli de foie de canard
♥
Rocher Granit - Argent de Boya
♥
Mojito, clémentine et lard torréfié
♥
Soufflé de merlan et cryo d'escargots
♥
Le pain à la tomate
♥
Rien
♥
Crevette dans l'amer
♥
Sourire
♥
Paysage Vaudois abstrait
♥
Choucroute garnie
♥
Brouillard et avalanche sur l'alpage
♥
Bicolore d'oeuf cassé aux truffes
♥
Filet de boeuf cuit & crû
♥
Improvisation
♥
Cône Woodstock
♥
Chocolat blanc et cacahuètes torréfiés

This was the menu we enjoyed last Saturday at the restaurant Denis Martin in Vevey.

Denis Martin's theme is au plaisir de faire plaisir, and a lot of pleasure he had given us. It already started with the table, which was set with plates in primary colours (cutlery was provided when needed) and two colourful toys with a cow on top, which mooed if you turned them (see below). Not exactly what you expect, when you enter a restaurant that has been awarded with 2 Michelin stars and 18 Gault Millau points.

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But before I come to the food I have to praise the waiters. Spotless service, charming and attentive yet unobtrusive (and not to forget quite handsome too).

Now to the food. If you look at the menu above, there were about 25 courses. This is not a tasting menu. Each item is a course in its own right. Just not in American style feed-the-beast dimensions. I mean, they are small - just enough to explore taste and texture. Talking about taste and texture, Denis Martin provides unexpected contrasts of flavour, temperature and texture. You never know if it really is what it seems, which is sometimes provoking, but always surprising and very delightful.

Below is the course Lingot d'Or (gold bullion). It has to be eaten à une bouchée. But unfortunately I have completely forgotten how it tasted. Another à une bouchée dish was a raw cube of tuna with a waver of white chocolate in Thai spices. This one was a thunderstorm in the mouth. My mouth had never gone through more tastes in such a short time.

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The next picture shows truffes noires, endives, yaourt à la livèche et bouillabaisse. The bouillabaisse is the small cube on the stick. The smallest soup I've ever eaten.

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I forgot to take a picture of Birchermuesli de foie de canard. Yes Birchermuesli is the popular breakfast cereal. But here the cereal had been substituted with duck liver and the fruits with tiny taste bombs that kept exploding in your mouth.

Also I don't have a picture of Rocher Granit - Argent de Boya. This had a piece of fish, which was coated with silver before it had been fried. Soufflé de merlan et cryo d'escargots was another fish with iced (cryo) snails (escargots). The snails were the white balls at the bottom.

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From the beginning we were wondering what Rien might be, since this is the French term for "nothing". Now I know that nothing tastes of dill and tomato (see how nothing looks like on the picture below). Another dish, which made us curios just because of the name was Sourire (smile). It was impossible to eat that dish without having a smile on the face afterwards no matter how grumpy you try to look. Denis Martin put some squid ink so cunningly on the spoon that when you ate the dish it painted a smile onto the lips.

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Sauerkraut was also served...

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...followed by fog and avalanches on the alpine.

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At the end you did not wonder that the steak was raw and cooked at the same time and served with a dill sauce and caramelised peanuts.

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A mind and tastebud boggling experience. This was a brilliant idea by Pilar, Thierry & Carlos who had invited us. They had promised us a dinner in a relaxing atmosphere. They more than kept their promise.

Nessecary Amenities

I travel quite a lot (more about) and believe me, I've seen worse toilets than this in a hotel room:



However, at The Weekend™ Toño & I experienced something completely different:



The toilet had a remote to control the water yet and to adjust the temperature of the water and then of the fan that blow dried whatever got wet.

This was not even the best gadget this room had to offer. There was also a Nespresso machine.



If only they had covered the mattress with Egypt cotton sheets...

Enchanted

Last Friday we travelled to Lucerne with extremely high expectations and we were not disappointed at all but enchanted by a handsome magician. Jamie Lidell and his band were frolicsome and just extremely masterful. If I were a musician*, I would have given up after this concert, burned all instruments and would still be snivelling.

Once his musicians left the stage and Jamie Lidell constructed the tracks of this song live on stage by continuously sampling, looping and mixing his own voice:



* I lack all talent in this respect

Lavaux

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Our weekend at the Lake of Geneva started with a hike through the vineyards of Lavaux. The weather was nasty at the beginning but got better by the minute.

Coincidentally the route we walked is part of the Via Francigena, the pilgrimage route from Canterbury to Rome. Two years ago, two of our hosts, Pilar and Carlos made a pilgrimage into another direction - that is, from La Côte (the wine region in the west of Lavaux) to Santiago de Compostela, a journey which took them three months.

Of course, we were not only walking. Like here, Toño is explaining to Pilar and Thierry how vertjus is made:

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And we also had to rest, like here in the Cave Communale in St. Saphorin:

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If I recall correctly, the first wine recommendation Toño ever made to me, was when I was invited to Château Mac for a barbecue that was camouflaged as Raclette. He recommended a St. Saphorin. The wines of this domain perfectly match with Raclette.

Château de Chillon

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Château de Chillon is one of the most picturesque castles in Switzerland. I've seen the outside before, but I've never actually visited it. And since I have a thing for brave knights I behaved quite affirmative when the idea of visiting the castle was discussed at yesterday's breakfast.

The setting is perfect, although there is a highway quite close to it, but when you're in the castle you hardly notice this.

Pilar (on the left on the picture below) mentioned that the building has exactly the right size to suit her needs. She is an architect and measured the dimensions of the bedroom of the Counts of Savoy and found out that it has the size of an average apartment in Switzerland and that it was bigger than the castle's chapel.

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I was born and raised in a house that was built in 1613. That chest below was made in 1605. I was surprised to see similar decorative elements as in some furnitures and boiseries at my clan's residence.

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The castle was made popular by Lord Byron, who wrote the poem The Prisoner Of Chillon (1816) about François de Bonivard, a Genevois monk and politician who was imprisoned there from 1530 to 1536; Byron also carved his name on a pillar of the dungeon (to the poem).

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The Weekend™ - Preview of the Reviews

We had the most amazing weekend. Pilar, Thierry & Carlos invited us to Vevey at the Lake of Geneva. It was their present to Toño's and mine registration of our partnership* last year. They might now be on the brink of bankruptcy, however the memory will last. I'll have to make several review posts in the course of this week to capture The Weekend™. These could be the topics:

• Jamie Lidell's concert of the year on Friday in Lucerne (not yet official part of The Weekend™, nevertheless a perfect overture)
• Hiking through the vineyards of Lavaux
• 25 course dinner in a relaxed atmosphere
• Finally a hotel room with the right amenities
• Walking in Lord Byron's footsteps into a dungeon.

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*registered partnership is the Swiss version of gay marriage, thus our marital status is called "in registered partnership", which fits in hardly any form.

Saturday Flowers

Not Just Another Weekend

We had to put the most exposed flowers on the balcony floor this morning. Heavy storms are forecast for today. We also expect the evening to be a bit wild. We are going (finally) to see (cutie) Jamie Lidell, who will be performing in Lucerne at the Blue Balls Festival (I know, silly name).



Early Saturday morning we will embark to Vevey at the banks of Lake Geneva. Friends have invited us for the weekend. The climax of that visit is expected to be a dinner at Denis Martin (2 Michelin stars, 18 Gault Millau points). I better pack a clean shirt for that.

Though Toño has warned me. All involved but me are Latinos. Not everything might be that smoothly and predictably organised. I reckon, I will survive it, for once.

I wish you an amazing weekend. May some wild dreams come true for you!

Baby Feet

There are first times in your life, you never expected to do in the first place. Like for me, having a pedicure. However, Toño talked me into going for one and so I booked a combo with a haircut by Toño's figaro and a pedicure by his Ukrainian wife Olga. Well, Olga did a marvellous job* and turned my feet back to baby like smoothness**.



My left foot is looking a bit to the left. This is due to a skiing accident when I was 6. I broke my left shin and foot but the doctors only saw the shin break and fixed it with the wrong type of casting. It took several years until a doctor discovered the actual cause for my left leaning***.

* also by attesting that I did not treat my feet that badly myself.
** and the odour of the ointments she applied put me on a high for hours.
*** meanwhile I also broke my right foot but that did not compensate for anything.

Taboulé

Sorry, again a food post. But, inspired by a comment by Pilgrim and a tweet by Ms Mac we made Taboulé with some tuna steaks on the side.



Unfortunately we were out of Couscous (how did that happen?), but we still had some Bulgur, which I think is anyway the original way of making this dish.

Maverick Gigot

Yesterday, Toño asked me what I would like to have for dinner. My usual response is either pasta or something with chicken. Yesterday it was pasta. Toño did not oblige and brought half a leg of lamb (or Gigot as we and the French call it).





Sometimes (only sometimes!) it is not all bad, when Toño goes maverick.

Charlotte Russe - The Recipe

Charlotte Russe is the sister dessert of Charlotte Royal. This dessert had been invented by the French chef Marie Antoine Carême (1784-1833), who named it in honour of his Russian employer Czar Alexander I (Russe is French for Russian). The Charlotte Russe can't deny its Russian heritage. It clearly resembles both an Ushanka and a Papakhi.



This recipe serves 10.

Jam/Jelly Roll

The dessert is covered in slices of jam rolls on the top and on the bottom.

Ingredients:
4 eggs, yolk and white separated
120 g sugar
1 pinch of salt
2 tbs of warm water
zest of half a lemon
80 g flower
4 tbs of raspberry jam (jelly)

Cream egg yolk, sugar and the pinch of salt until the the mass is bright. Add the lemon zest. Put the whipped egg whites on top and sieve the flower onto it. Fold the flower and egg whites carefully under the mass. Put baking paper on a rectangular baking sheet and evenly spread the mass onto it (approx 1 cm thick). Bake it for 8-10 minutes at 220°C/428°F. Topple the biscuit onto a kitchen towel, remove the baking paper carefully and cover it with the baking sheet to let it cool down.

Spread a thin layer of strawberry jam onto the biscuits and roll them tightly to about 3 cm thick rolls. Cover them with baking paper and put for half an hour into the deep freezer.

Building

The next stage of this dessert requires more the qualities of a mason than of a pastry cook. You have to arrange ladyfingers seamlessly in a 2.5 litre mould, which involves a lot of accurate rasping.



Now tightly put in the raspberry jam rolls for the top in the bottom of the mould.



Bavarian Cream

The heart of a Charlotte is made of Bavarian cream. This is basically a Crème Anglaise made of sugar, egg yolks and hot milk, which is flavoured with vanilla. In addition, it is thickened with gelatin, lightened with whipped cream, and flavoured with liqueur. Good bye waistline.

There is hardly any procedure, besides of deep-frying, which is not used to produce this. You have to boil, to whip, to bring close to a boil and in the end, you have to whip it in a deep silver dish which is surrounded with crushed ice, as Escoffier recommends.

Ingredients:
385 g milk
1 vanilla pod
1 pinch of salt
80 g egg yolk
135 g sugar
12 g gelatine
385 g cream
25 g Maraschino

For the Charlotte Royal one is supposed to use cherry brandy (Kirsch), for the Charlotte Russe Maraschino (Marasca cherry cordial) is used. Of course, we have both on stock - the Kirsch though is home-distilled by my clan.



Preparation:
- let gelatine swell in cold water
- whip the cream and put it into the fridge
- Slice the vanilla pod with a knife and scratch out the content.

Bring milk, vanilla pod and the pinch of salt to a boil. Remove the vanilla pod. Cream egg yolk and sugar in a bowl. Add the milk while stirring. Pour the mixture back into the pan, keep stirring and bring close(!) to a boil. The poetic German term for this is heat to the rose. So if you see roses, it's hot enough.

Remove from the stove and pour mass into a bowl. Dissolve the squeezed gelatine in it and pass through a sieve into metal bowl. Put it into ice or iced water, keep stirring and let it cool down. As soon as it starts to thicken, fold in the whipped cream and the Kirsch.

Pour the cream into the mould and cover the bottom with the remaining slices of jam roll. Put into the fridge to solidify.



Raspberry Cream

Charlottes are best served on some raspberry cream. While the mass solidifies, we have time to prepare the cream. At least this is an easy step, but has to be done on time, because it tasted better when the cream is chilled.

Ingredients:
325 g raspberries
165 g icing sugar
10 g lemon juice

Blend dead ripe raspberries, pass them through a tight sieve, add some lemon juice and icing sugar. Chill it gently.



Trimming

When the mass has solidified comes the dangerous topsy-turvy part which should put the Charlotte into the perfect position onto the serving plate. Now trim it at your discretion (for inspiration see picture on top). Done. Enjoy!

Charlotte Royale - The Recipe

Charlotte is a classical dessert with its origins in the 19th century. There are various variants of Charlottes. I here concentrate on the Charlotte Royale. It is quite spectacular, however requires about 6 hours in the kitchen. The recipe here serves 15 and will look like this:



Jam/Jelly Roll

The dessert is covered in slices of jam rolls.

Ingredients:
8 eggs, yolk and white separated
120 g sugar
1 pinch of salt
4 tbs of warm water
zest of a lemon
160 g flower
8 tbs of raspberry jam (jelly)

Cream egg yolk, sugar and the pinch of salt until the the mass is bright. Add the lemon zest. Put the whipped egg whites on top and sieve the flower onto it. Fold the flower and egg whites carefully under the mass. Put baking paper on two rectangular baking sheets and evenly spread the mass onto them (approx 1 cm thick). Bake it for 8-10 minutes at 220°C/428°F. Topple the biscuit onto a kitchen towel, remove the baking paper carefully and cover it with the baking sheet to let it cool down.

Spread a thin layer of strawberry jam onto the biscuits and roll them tightly to about 3 cm thick rolls. Cover them with baking paper and put for half an hour into the deep freezer.

Cover the insight of a ball shaped mould (content 4 litres) with clingfilm. Cut the roll into 5 mm thick slices and cover the insight of the mould tightly with them. Keep some for the bottom in the fridge.



Bavarian Cream

The heart of a Charlotte Royale is made of Bavarian cream. This is basically a Crème Anglaise made of sugar, egg yolks and hot milk, which is flavoured with vanilla. In addition, it is thickened with gelatin, lightened with whipped cream, and flavoured with liqueur. Good bye waistline.

There is hardly any procedure, besides of deep-frying, which is not used to produce this. You have to boil, to whip, to bring close to a boil and in the end, you have to whip it in a deep silver dish which is surrounded with crushed ice, as Escoffier recommends.

Ingredients:
615 g milk
1.5 vanilla pod
1 pinch of salt
128 g egg yolk
215 g sugar
19 g gelatine
615 g cream
40 g cherry brandy (Kirsch)

Preparation:
- let gelatine swell in cold water
- whip the cream and put it into the fridge
- Slice the vanilla pod with a knife and scratch out the content.

Bring milk, vanilla pod and the pinch of salt to a boil. Remove the vanilla pod. Cream egg yolk and sugar in a bowl. Add the milk while stirring. Pour the mixture back into the pan, keep stirring and bring close(!) to a boil. The poetic German term for this is heat to the rose. So if you see roses, it's hot enough.

Remove from the stove and pour mass into a bowl. Dissolve the squeezed gelatine in it and pass through a sieve into metal bowl. Put it into ice or iced water, keep stirring and let it cool down. As soon as it starts to thicken, fold in the whipped cream and the Kirsch.

Pour the cream into the jam roll layered mould and cover the bottom with the remaining slices of jam roll. Put into the fridge to solidify.



Raspberry Cream

Charlotte Royale is best served on some raspberry cream. While the mass solidifies, we have time to prepare the cream. At least this is an easy step, but has to be done on time, because it tasted better when the cream is chilled.

Ingredients:
325 g raspberries
165 g icing sugar
10 g lemon juice

Blend dead ripe raspberries, pass them through a tight sieve, add some lemon juice and icing sugar. Chill it gently.



Abricoture

When the mass has solidified comes the dangerous topsy-turvy part which should put the Charlotte into the perfect position onto the serving plate. When that went well, brush some abricoture onto the surface to give it a shiny appearance. To get the apricoture, I heat some apricot jam in a pan and pass it through a sieve.



Decoration

Now the final trimming at your discretion.



Done. Enjoy!

Vital Necessity: Jam Funnel

Supposedly there are people out there trying to make jam without having a jam funnel at hand.

Guerilla Hollyhocks or Your City Needs You!

For some years, Zürich has been flooded with hollyhocks during summer.

Picture by Tina Fassbind, nicked from www.tagesanzeiger.ch

They had been clandestinely sowed by Maurice Maggi and contribute to making this town the most liveable on this planet. By this, Maurice Maggi was spearheading an international urban trend called Guerilla Gardening. Here is a portrait of Maurice Maggi by Swiss Television (in German):



As I read on the Agenda page of the WoZ, another setter of this trend, Richard Reynolds will have a reading tomorrow at Sphères in Zürich at 7 pm. Time to bring your hoes and shovels into action. Your city needs you!

Charlotte Royale - Summer Edition

It has been a while that I made a Charlotte Royal and since there will be a summer party tonight, I made one in summer for the first time. Toño seems to like it too.

Saturday Flowers

Girly Gadget FTW!

We tend to do the most silliest things under peer influence, and not even the law of diminishing marginal returns keeps us from doing so.

Usually after our Thursday swim, we hang out at the cash register of the gym which is part of the indoor pool, because Doris, who works there, is a good pal.

Right now they have this contest there where you can win a NEW 2-in-1 Quattro for Women Bikini - the world's first high performance razor that combines shaving and trimming in one girly gadget. 2-in-1 means:

1. Terrific Trimming
   for a neat and fuzz-free bikini area.
2. Super-Smooth Shaving
   for silkier legs, underarms and bikini area.

Well, Doris talked us into participating. If I had been alone, she would had no chance, but under the influence of my swim buddies I caved in pretty soon and Toño followed suit. In the end, 6 men and 1 women won such a device.

I can't talk for the others, but neither Toño nor I are keen to get a bikini in the near future, and we are already well equipped with manly gadgets to take care of what has to be taken care of.

So what shall we do? We can't give them to two of our female friends. You do remember the fabulous Gus Gus song Ladyshave: I guess I must have messed it up, when I gave you the ladyshave. Any suggestions?

Added later
The two 2-in-1 Quattro for Women Bikini are taken. There will soon be two more happy gals in the world.

Wide Open for the Young

There is not only the pay you have to look at but also the perks.

Toño had to participate in this wine tasting the other week to represent his caring employer in a jury. The perk for this was this stylish wine decanter:



It has a really wide opening and is therefore used to decant young wines with fruity-notes and loads of tannins, which require to breathe some air before you can enjoy them.

Sometimes you just don't know what you're missing until you have got it.

What's Next?

A couple of months ago I increased my workout a bit by following Ms.Mac's twitter hashtag #dailyexercise more or less daily - that is, 3 to 4 times a week and mostly by swimming.

One of the goals was to shed some weight. And actually just yesterday, I was asked by a friend whether I lost some weight. Well, not really. About 1 pound in 2 months lol. However, formerly tight trousers became quite loose. So I reckon, I managed to transform at least some fat into the equal weight of muscles.

There is another goal, which I set myself when I started learning to crawl in September 2003. And there is a thing I have to say in advance. For everybody who swims, this goal sounds rather ridiculous. But I have always been crap at sport and I did not take up swimming until I was in my mid-thirties (end of disclaimer). This low level goal was to swim a nautical mile (1852 m) with at least 1⅓ kn or within 45 minutes. Finally this weekend, I swum 2 km with 1.36 kn *sips some champagne*.

And now I need a new goal. But what?

1. Should I see that after cycling and swimming I also find some joy in running, despite my dreadful experiences in school and the army? Mirrorboy keeps writing how much he enjoys this running thing that he actually tempted me to try it (eventually...).
2. Should I set an achievable goal, like swimming 2 km in 45 minutes?
3. Or should I set the bar dementedly high, by aiming for 3 km in 60 minutes? That would be 33% more and 22% faster at the same time :O

Btw, Toño got himself some flashy new running shoes:

Hermès Swimming Trunks

Spotted in Monocle issue 25, volume 03, July/August 09 on page 139.
Location: Club Natació, Barcelona
Photographer: Daniel Riera
Fashion Editor: Akio Hasegawa
Model: Jean Paturel.

P.S.: In the feature about the most liveable city in the world (i.e. Zürich) in the same Monocle issue, there is a picture with a streaming rainbow banner.