Iggy's Doughboys and Chowda House

dang. while we were driving there we past a Legal Seafood . . . we'll prob'bly have to go there just to benchmark the chowda, but for now, I am willing to accept Iggy's claim as the best in RI . . . clam roll was right up there, too . . . and the calimari my daughter got was excellent . . .

for those of you who don't know . . .the white chowda is New England style (with cream); the red, Manhattan style, with tomato . .  .RI-style is clear . . . .it's the only one that might be "good" for you . . . 8^D . . .

New York Vista

there's a million stories in the Big Apple . . .
every picture tells a story . . .

I do what I can . . .

Aqavit in Manhattan

Daughter's been telling us about this place for several years . . . but we could never get to NYC with the right bells on for Swedish . . . this time, we were prepared . . . as I said: "Egyptian Sea Food and Swedish Meatballs: I can blog that!"

The decor and ambience is so cool, refined, swedish modern, comfortable. . . we wanted to take our chairs with us. We had even remarked on the coincidence of The Girl with The Dragon Tatoo being out in the Theatres now, it was to be a perfect serendipitous synchronicity . . . but see earlier blog entries about the depredations imposed on us by DELTA AIRLINES / KLM, that totally ruined our plans . . . well, not totally, but instead of spending a fun-filled, yet leisurely 2 days rollicking in the auld Knickerbocker, we hadda scramble to squeeze in fast visits to Bed Bath and Beyond superstore in Chelsea and the Strand -- of course, I didn't actually make it to the strand, I couldn't find it from Union Square . . . much to my daughter's amusement, but she covered up by saying that the virgin megastore closed, and that must've confused me . . . 8^D . . . but we didn't have time for the movie, dangit . . .

So we had to go without the FSIL, he had a Mets game, but we soldiered on bravely. I ordered a bottle of Gruner Veltliner -- odd, never had a bottle before we went to Wien, and now I see it everywhere -- and a shot of Limon Aqavit, just to get the juices going. They brought us some little toasts and salmon mouse . . . I didn't get a picture ii didn't seem momentous enough, but it never fails . . .the mousse was excellent . . .

so the daughter had Swedish Meatballs. and the one I took with Linden Berries on it was just fabulous . . .

Mrs & I both had the smorgasbord . . . I love the dishes with lots of different things on them . . . and the swedish have a word for it . . . God Bless the Swedes!

On the right were Pickled Herring and Herring with salmon roe & dill, with cheese wedges and a tiny potato. . . .
In the middle were smoked salmon on some sort of hash-brown-potato-pancake and the other, gravlax, with lemon and frissee and coffee-honey-mustard.
on the left was red-beet with smoked venison, and shrimp salad on a crustini . . . my daughter was afraid I was -- disappointed -- not at all . . . it wasn't as weird as I'd hoped, if you see what I mean . . . 8^D . . .

So we didn't have dessert . . . we went back and had a flight of aqavits: the AQNY, their signature NYC Aqavit; the Mango-Lime-Chili which should be CHILI-mango-lime (we were warned, but we like spice, but WHOA!), then an Anise-fennel Aqavit that was like sweet  licqorice.

Next time, I'll just get the smorgasboard & the flight of aqavits.Fantastic place.

FSIL says the mets humiliated the Braves last night. . . new rookie I-Like-Ike Davis jacked a moonshot onto the bridge in right-center field. . . 450 ft. Kewl.

Lenka Hlava - Clear Head - Chcolate Fondue

In a strange turn of events . . . Lenka Hlava fouled up our dinner reservation . . . had to scramble up a table for us . . . they were horrified .  . .it was by the door . . . they gave us a dessert in compensation .  . very generous . . .and I would have said unnecessary . . . we love it there . .. we would forgive them almost anything .  . . but the fondue was very nice . . . .

Update to Flame Mail to Delta for Lost Luggage

posted also into their complaints section, for all the good it will do . . .

An addendum to my prior complaint. . .



you have gratified my worst fears . . .


NOW I am informed that the 12 hour window you grant yourself starts at 8 am . . . not the time the baggage is released to the delivery service (which was 11 pm in my case, according to what I was told yesterday) . . .

so you see -- more properly, you KNOW, BUT I SEE . . . THAT's what you should realize -- how we have been "moved along" the process, with progressive dribbles of relevations and re-statemtents. . .


we were told that the luggage wasnt lost,
we were told that the luggage was on DELTA 81,
we were told that it would be delivered the night of our arrival,
we were told that it would be on KL643 the next day and that it would be delivered that night,
we were told that it would be delivered 12 hours after being released to the deliver service

and now,

we are told that it will be delivered at some time in a 12 hour window starting at 8 am this morning. . .

oh, the insufferable cretins that designed these policies must be laughing like the imps of perfidy as they squeeze nickles out customer service into their own bloated compensation.

the cretinous abject menials that carry out such perfidious policies because they cannot find any other gainful employment must suffer their own torments at the hands of such gleeful demonology . . . that gives me very little comfort, except that I still believe in the limits of human suffering -- that is at some point, these humans will rise up against their masters, that is my only comfort, and small it is.

Flame Mail to Delta for Lost Luggage

Well, here is what I want to know. . . We will be travelling twice more this year from Europe to the US, and if we are to use Delta & its affiliates, we want some consideration . . .


When we realized that our luggage was missing, I tried simply to expedite our experience by going to the next step, but the official inside the customs hall insisted we should wait longer "because more lugguage would be coing out onto the belt, once it had cleared out some-- it was too full".


This was obviously a stall, since there were several of us standing around waiting for luggage that was missing, altho' the belt was fairly full -- obviously luggage lost on some other flight and misdirected to our belt . . .


when finally this official admitted our luggage was not coming we were directed to clear customs and wait on the other side, so we did, where then we were yelled at by some customs guy for blocking the doorway -- now I'm not sure how to convey the irritation factor of this incident in a few words, so I won't try, and I reckon the airline does not control the customs officials, but to get off an overseas flight, have missing luggage, get put-off and brushed off, then to be bothered by some officious jerk, well! Thanks for nothing. So we were pushed out of the customs hall, into the next foyer, where ANOTHER officious jerk harrassed us about malingering. I mean really! I was just working up to telling this moron how the cow eats the cabbage when the airline flak-catcher showed up to walk us the not-inconsiderable distance, around several corners to the lost luggage claims office.


Now. They had difficulty registering our claim because it was KLM and they had only DELTA software . . . obviously your cost-cutting has out-raced your customer-service competencies.


So the flak-catchers told us another lie, in order to "move us along". They said that our luggage would be on DELTA 81, arriving that night and would be delivered, then. I admit that they did give us a valid claim number (filled out manually since the computer systems were not up-to-scracth), but aside from the 800 number in the pamphlet, this is all wasted information since it's all lies, too. The online baggage trace is down half the time and incomplete the rest.


It turns out, I don't know how, that our missing bag would be coming in on the same flight as we had taken, only a day later, then you generously give yourselves 12 hours to deliver it (from the time the delivery people sign for it of course, not from when it arrives in the airport -- a service level agreement made entirely for the airline's benefit, not for the customer).


So just to list our petty greivances, we were spending 2 days in new york, but we have been hampered because we have been waiting close to home, rather than enjoying the city as we had planed, for the expected delivery of luggage based on the prevarications and evasions we have been given over the last two days. Thanks again, for nothing.


Your phone people and for that matter, all of the airline personel havebeen nothing but courteous, however, they have also been unhelpful, evasive, un-responsive, and untruthful . . . maybe that is what the airline requires by its policies, maybe that is the only economical way to deal with the inevitable errors in baggage handling, but it is not the way to build customer loyalty, IMVHO.


I remember back before 9/11 there was some loose talk about Airline Passenger's Bill of Rights -- common courtesies to be enforced by law since airlines seemed unwilling or unable to do it voluntarily . . . tha'ts all gone by the board. . .


the 12 hour time-limit is now expired, so now I will call the baggage hotline and see what other stories I will here. . .

Sabry's Seafood Astoria New York

Egyptian Seafood ? We asked my daughter? Oh, yeh, I can blog the heck out of that . . .

Our daughter's young man, our FSIL, is so knowledgeable about world-cuisine, they find these places -- ok, in NY2, there's lots of places to find, they ARE there, but there's also lots of places to avoid, if you see how I mean -- but I usually wish I just ordered whatever he got, rather than adventuring on my own . . . we all had rather ordinary salads, but he got this . . . lots of nummy sounds from that side of the table -- punctuated with agonized ecstasy from the grilled jalapenos served with it. . . 8^) . . .

The pita bread wasnt like any I've had before, very fluffy, not "spicy" at all, the whitebread of pita . . . and the olive oil was not as nice as we like. . . we maybe spoilt after trips to Naples and Barcelona. . . minor point.

The FSIL ordered BBQ Octopus -- it's really an appetizer, but he warned us, "the portions here are LARGE!" It'd be hard to overstate how good these were (he let us sample) . . . the charcoal-grilled flavourfulness, smothered in (dont-get-me-wrong-perfectly-fine) virgin-olive-oil and the perfect non-rubbery texture -- and we added a squeeze of lemon on top of that . . . Heaven!

The pasta plate my daughter ordered was so steaming hot, that it was still hot when she carried half of it home in a box, for lunch the next day. They really have a talent for shell fish there, getting it cooked just right.

Mrs. ordered the grilled sea scallops. . . they had that same charcoal /oliveoil / lemony goodness, with the added piquancy of dill . . . lovely, lovely, lovely.

So, I might never get back to Sabry's. We live in Europe. It's always a pleasure to visit NY2, but life does not always give us pleasure, n'c'est p'as? We almost didn't make it this time because of Eyjafjallajokull . . . so I ordered the combo: Calimari, Salmon, & Shrimp. . . .they tossed in a couple of scallops, too . . . I ate it all, god help me . . . then a couple more of Mrs scallops she couldn't finish . . .and more of those pita . . . my dish had that same charcoal-grilled / olive-oiled / lemony / dill goodness, plus-s-s-s-s, some je nais sans quois, almost like a cayenne pepper. . . I don't know . . . I felt delirious.

The kids say this place is michelin rated. Totally worth it. Totally deserves it.

Photographie

in Prague 1, above a Photographer's Studio, in an Alley off the street

Wien Day 2 - Easter

Our hotel was some sort of modern-euro-discount-luxury hotel, hip and fashionable . . . so we didn't know what kinda brekky they would serve, but we eagerly traipsed down to the restaurant to find out -- early-ish, so we could get a good start on our Museum Day -- Big Red & CPT wanted to drive up to the Alps, instead . . . they had an adventure, but I told them to get their own blog . . .

so we had easter 3 minute eggs . . . served in these oh-so-euro-modern egg-cups . . . we also had yogurt, museli, fresh and dried fruit, papaya juice, several cappucinos, and another plate of like, cold-cuts, as you see . . .

So then we took the train over to the Kunst Historisches Museum. I noticed on the platform as we waited that we had about 15 minutes till 10, when the museum opened . . . "Perfekt" I pronounced.

We found our way to the Museum plaza from the train station easily. I stopped on the way in to take this picture of a dumbo outside the Natural History museum. We got there just at 10, as it was opening.

Place is huge, of course, full of past masters, Bruegels (younger & older), Tintoretto, Titian, Carravagio, but the main attraction was a large exhibit studying just one painting, Die Malkunst (The Art of Painting) by Vermeer. Now when we were in Amsterdam last xmas we'd seen the Girl with a Pearl Earring, which impressed me so much I bought a poster, and declared myself newly a vermeer snob. Mrs says this (die malkunst) is the only painting Vermeer never sold, but instead kept as a marketing tool to prospective clients . . . so the exhibit studied the elements and strategy of the painting (all news to me), and included props (like the trumpet)  . . . lotta words . . . but I bot a poster of this one too . . . the GWPE looks so kewl the way we had it framed I wanted to do the same for this.

The museum wouldn't let us photograph in that exhibit, or in some other areas, but when I saw people taking pictures openly, I tho't about what I had wanted to take pictures of, but hadn't  . . . what I mostly came up with were these three pictures of Salome with the head of John the Baptist . . . saw an opera-concert of Salome by Strauss earlier this year and watched the movie with Rita Hayworth, too, dancing the dance of the 7 veils . . .va-va-voom!

None of the pictures turned out as well as they should . . . with the good camera I got a flash (I forgot to turn it off and didn't notice); with the phone camera I never get as good a resolution as I want. But I liked the pithy characterization of Salome in this one especially.

It took a couple of hours to speed walk the picture galleries, slowing down at the pictures that interested us, when we recognized the artists -- they have a lot we didn't need to examine . . . even so, doubling back to get a few photos didn't take much time . . .

then we headed over to their antiquities exhibit -- the egyptian exhibit is very large and had details we hadn't seen before. I liked this hippo . . . very nile-ish...if you know what I mean . . .

but there Greek & Roman exhibits were very interesting too . . . bearing in mind we were in Naples & Pompeii just a couple of months ago, we still judged these exhibits very fine . . . in Naples they had a hall of busts of caesars & philosophers that was amazing not only for the number but for the size of the sculptures, but they did well here, too . . . I'm calling that standing figure an etruscan. . . pre-roman . . .

but the humour in this small bust seems so modern . . .and so timeless . . . gee, you can get great pictures out of those digital cameras if you just turn off the flash and hold it still . . .

this is the gallery that was an amazing collection like the one in Naples, tho' the individual busts were smaller . . . you could stop and ponder every single one of them . . . as if they were a caesar or a philosopher . . .

these 3 pompeiian portraits were part of a larger group, but I couldn't get a picture of more, and show any detail . . . might have been from a post office wall in pompeii . . .8^P . . .

Well, we were famished by then, so we trained back over to where we had missed the Wiener Schnitzel the day before, Figmuller's. There was no line. We walked right in. They did seat us with another family of 4 at a table for 6. We didn't mind. Out of the 6 of us 5 of us ordered the same thing. Wiener Schnitzel, potato salad, and green salad. We also had glasses of Gruner Veltliner. I started ordering in German. I tho't I was doing well, but the waiter, waved me off, said, "In English is OK!"

I know that Schnitzel looks as big as it was, it overflowed the plate, but the salad bowls look deceptively small in this picture: they were enormous, but very deliscious when you got to the bottom of the bowl where the green salad and the potato salad merged . . . 8^) . . . but look at those beer mugs of wine . . . at least 10 ounces 

It was fantastic . . . doesn't leave any room for dessert . . . and kinda makes you want to take a nap instead of museum-trekking, but we pressed on.

We beetled over on the tram (trains and trams are pretty easy to navigate there . . . but sometimes on the trams its a challenge to figure out the pick up points) to the Belvedere, the estate of one Prinz Eugen . . . his picture is everywhere in Wien . . . and maybe he was an ok guy, in a teutonic sort of way, but looking at him makes me want to charge the Bastille.

Guy had a faboulous estate, tho', no two ways about it. The Belvedere has an Upper Palace and a Lower Palace, meaning two separate chateuas, about a kilometer apart,  with a giant garden in between . . . now the garden was full of flowers, but maybe it is during other parts of the year, or maybe not, because of all the foot traffic, still a pretty impressive facade.

We only went to the Upper Palace, we went, like everybody else, specifically to see the Klimts there, including the Kiss, that every single girl I knew in college had a poster of  . . . which fact I vaguely recall Rod Stewart memorialized in some song in the 70s.

We liked seeing the original after all these years. In addition to all the other klimts that reminded us very much of Mucha, the Czech Artist almost as much in evidence in Prague as Prinz Eugen in Wien. We liked it so much we bought a scarf and a tie made from that image. Not at the museum gift shop, tho', across the street, where Mrs had seen a sign advertising discounts as we walked from the tram to the museum. The gregarious owner pretended to give us a discount on a second scarf and we pretended to be grateful . . . 8^D . . .

AFter all that walking and shopping, it was hard to believe but we were hungry again, but marilyn had the ideal spot for us: a little kiosk in some shady area, not exactly a park, just some leftover space between buildings, subways, streets where there is a leafy opportunity to sit outside, sip viennese coffee and eat apfel strudl.

We tried to hook back up with Big Red & CPT, but they were still in the Alps (at 4 pm), so we went over to the Prater by ourselves. We did see the Carousel used in The 3rd Man (orson Welles), but we can't hardly say that made the trip worth it . . . what a dump . . . maybe at night you could see pretty lights, but it was just loud and cheap looking to us. It's all very large tho', so by the time we walked around that, we were ready to head home and stretch out.

Mrs said, "It was a perfekt day: we had easter eggs for brekky, got to the museum just as it was opening, got into Figmuller's without waiting, saw the Klimt Kiss, bought a tie & scarf for 1/3rd the price of the Museum's, had apfel strudl at 4pm, just when you're supposed to, and didn't get lost on the trains or trams even once!" 

Wien Day 1

So we set off for Wien, Me, Mrs, Big Red & CPT. "Call me Jane", said CPT, with the look of pity, kindness, & condescension only the chinese have mastered for thick English tongues.


"Call me Tarzan!" -- it's the only proper response, I say.


"She already has a Tarzan" interjected Big Red, unasked . . .


"Are we there, yet?" I said retreating into juvenile sulkiness as a defense . . .


Big Red masterfully wheeled us out of Prague, thru Brno, and across the border, where she whipped into a shop to get a permission sticker for driving in Ostreich from CZ . . . "ooooh, they have a duty free shop!" the girls squealed and left me to guard the car. Only Mrs came out with something, a bottle of Australian Plonk, which was inexpensive . . .


"Wrong OZ, darling!" I cavilled.
"Emergency provisions!" she snapped.

I grumbled, but a few klics later as we crawled thru Poysdorf, I said, "Oh, look, there's a wine markt." Big Red hurtled around the circle on 2 wheels and slid into parking slot. By the time I'd crawled out of the car and snapped this picture, Mrs & CPT were inside cadging wine tastings.


The charming young woman bore with us patiently while we spoke our pidgin German, ignoring her flawless English as we tried to assimilate into our weekend. We bought 18 bottles of wine, Gruner Veltliner and a Cab-Sav Zweigelt Cuvee'.  .  . the Veltliner, we would come to find out is ubiquitous in OZ, but the CSZC we really enjoyed . . . milder than CS, and any change for CS that's not Merlot is welcome.


Big Red was getting fruit juice as the Designated Driver, so she was quickly ready to go . . . but the rest of us could've camped out there . . . they had 20 different kinds of wine to sample . . .we got coffee, bottle openers, puzzles and what-not, in addition to the wine, and left in the same flurry: we came, we tasted, we bought.


Arriving in Wien was anti-climatic, after that . . . I mean, we were expecting to see Mozart walking around, or something, but it's a very modern town . . . with antique adornments . . . we just dropped off our stuff in the hotel, admired the spartan modernity of it, had a quick drink in the bar, just to settle our nerves and whet our appetite for lunch, bot train tickets from the clerk and headed out. We were pretty central to Wien, but still a few train stops from the Old Town . . . 


Mrs asked me, reading about Frimwiggles, the famous restaurant , if Wiener Schnitzel was particularly Wien-ien . . . "yeh, they named it for Wien, like Hambuger & Frankfurter". So we went across StephanPlatz to there, but the line was long, so we sauntered on down the street. We ate outside, but they had burners to keep us warm.

It was Italian, not Ostereichian, but that was ok . . . the waiter was a hoot, friendly & funny. Mrs & I got Veltliner, Big Red got a big beer, CPT some juice. For starters we had some bread, Big Red got Caprese Salad, and Mrs & I had minestrone . . . not too bad . . . not as good as Mrs' Famous Homemade, but she made nummy sounds . . . it actually had enough vegetables for her, so it musta been pretty good, if you know what I mean . . .


For mains, Big Red had pasta ("Where's my pepperoni?" she kept muttering. CPT had seafood linguini ("Oh my god!" she said, "Like in Malasia!") Mrs & I had saltimbocca ("what is that again? You'll see!")

"What is this, bacon?. . . no, it's prosciutto!"
"What is THIS, pork? . . . no, it's veal!"
"This is the last tiime you order for me!"
We shall see . . . 8^) . . .


We were all pretty sure we didn't want any desert, but I like to look anyway . . . "You don't have any Sacher Torte?" I accused the waiter. 


"No! We are an italian restaurant: we have Tira Misu!"

"Naaaah. We don't want any desert or coffee!"

So we staggered back off across StephanPlatz, taking care not to plotz ourselves, full of saltimbocca and wine, breathing the earthy scent of carriage horses . . . thank goodness it was cool . . . Mrs suggested we could walk up the 343 steps to the top of the tower, but that was voted down.

Instead we walked down to the open-market . . . we were really too late: many of the vendors were packing up to leave, but it was still claustrophobically crowded. Compared to the big market in Barcelona, sadly lacking; compared to the open market in Toulouse, not as exciting in smells and sights . . . we bot some olives, some bread, and some walnut-stuffed dates, for snackers -- no way we wanted dinner that night . . . 

It's mostly a flea market . . .but there were some really interesting looking restaurants nearby, all of 'em with people hanging from the rafters . . . so many interesting chances and so little time. . . we jumpt the train back one stop to StephanPlatz then walked around the ritzy shops, all the boyz are there, Salvatore, Pierre . . .After a while, footsore, headachey, and suffering from sensory overload, we wanted respite . . . Mrs pulled another place out of her book, famous for its strudl, Demel . . . but it was too crowded so we backtracked to a place less travelled, but they had open outdoor sofas to sit and people watch.

Big Red had a beer, cuz coffee would keep her up, and CPT had tea, like a civilized person, but we had viennese cappacios and sacher torte. When in Rome, I say . . .

Well, after that, lethargy set in . . . we had just enough to get back to the hotel  . . . We felt like this building looks . . . it's like some add-on to the Gasometer, 3 circular buildings that used to store gas (for lighting?) but has been remade into . . . something . . . Mrs & I had a picnic of olives, bread, & dates while we watched our movie . . . Meet The Parents.

"Hey!"said mrs, "Where Barbara Streisand?" That's what I wanted to see!

"Sorry," says I . . . that's the sequel to this one.

Yami Sushi

yummy yami sushi . . .

we always start out with some Edamame.

Because we had my colleague A* with us we upgraded to the Boat . . . left to right, Sushi Sashimi Set, Seoul to Seoul, and Mardi Grass . . .

too much for 3 people . . . we even had wasabi and ginger left over -- Unheard of while Mrs is in the house, but she also ordered one piece of Tuna Belly, since the restaurant was hyping it . . . it was good, she said, but not noticably better to her than the ordinary sashimi .. .
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2/16/2011
Yami Open again after Remodeling.
We had been enjoying the Miso Shiru so much at Sushi Point in Chodov, that we thought the Yami version would be even better. . . . a misconception, I think . . .

Smaller, less intriguing, and served with a metal spoon . . . 

one hardly knows what to say about such a gaff . . .

the service is still friendly & fast, I can't bear to say anything bad . . . 

Those special California rolls that Mrs always gets ARE good . . .