Delphi Greek Restaurant, Dvorce, Prague

an awesome interior . . . one of the most beautiful and comfortable dining rooms in prague, spacious with cool colours . . . extraordinarily cordial staff, starting with the ravishing hostess at the door that seated us, even toss-up whether shes Greek or Czech, just gorgeous . . .

we ordered starters the waiter blanched . . . 8^D . . .  

the tomatos & onions with feta were great, awesome in their simplicity . . .

the olives, kalamatas, & peppers were giant with us . . . our hands kept bumping grabbing while the grabbing was good. . .

the spinach/cheese puffs, spanikopitakia, were straightforwardly The Finest We Ever Had Anywhere in the World . . .

the tsatsiki was very fine, one got dizzy going from the feta to the tsatsiki in combinations with the other starters . . .

 

we loved the starters so much that we were kind of surprised by the mains:

my calamari seemed as if plated indifferently . . . but the grilled calamari came with this weird sauce already on it and just plopped on the plate . . .

Mrs was so excited by the prospekt of broiled lamb with aubergine and feta, that she jumped the shark and ordered lamb before I could . . . we do order the same thing sometimes, but we're never happy when we do . . . aside from the blogging aspects, it just seems to add to our enjoyment if we don't have the same thing . . . . but just off the top of her head, she flagged the-cooked-from-the-bottomness that charred the tomato sauce, overcooked the aubergines, and petrified the feta . . . whoa! I had a bite too of the lamb and the meat was fine . . . I didn't really care for the sauce, tho' charred or not . . .

 

so we will have to go back . . . Mrs just wants to order more starters . . . but I believe they must have better mains . . . something off the chef specialty menu . . . maybe . . .

La Bodega Flamenco, Prague

you how sometimes you just HAVE to HAVE what you want . . .

but if you're not where the cuisine is comes from, it may not be, er, uh, ALL that you remember . . .

the one exception ,in prague, now is Las Adelitas, which carries such an authenticity and uniquity to itself that there's no disappointment possible . . .

so I had a craving for Tapas, and the ambient excellence that is all of Barcelona, and had recos for La Bodega, so we went . . .

 

the menu is interesting, but the Tapas are not on the menu, just selectable from the display case . . . but not as kelemenopic selection as in Barcelona . . . still very nice . . .

 

with a bottle of Spanish bubbly . . . a tiny bit sweet, but entirely drinkable. . . . 8^)

 

weird bottles hanging from the ceiling, like an old mom-and-pop, red-checkered table-cloth italian joint . . . 8^)

 

mushroom were fantastic; cheese was excellent; black olives, very fine; prosciutto-wrapped-cheese, very, very fine; chicken-kebabs, not terrible; some kinda fried chicken, meh . . . as nosh, totally edible; as tapas, just ok. . .

 

oh, this meatball soup was not good enough to order again . . .

 

and the paella . . . for two . . . hah!  . . . for 4! . . . very deep dish . . .very aromatic, tiny shrimp, chicken, mild sausage (milder than we like) . . .we couldn't eat it all, to our sadness . . .but OTOH, we got it to go, with the cheese & olives left . . . for another dinner . . . looking forward to it . . .on the tram on the way home, the smell fill the car . . . I hope the others didn't mind . . . 8^) . . .

 

it's kinda smoky in the restaurant -- which is a deal breaker for us -- the food was fine, better than fine . . . not barcelona fine, but very, very good . . .

Dong Do, Sapa, Prague

Shes So Money had a duck . . . that duck was the best I've sampled in Prague . . . chinese duck, anyway . . . crispy, sweet, pungent . . . the summer rolls were good, but they came with the fish sauce, rather than peanut sauce, which is much more preferable . . .my bun nem was the finest ever . . . those rolls were sbsolutely perfekt, not greasy at all, so savoury I was kinda single-minded in my devouration . . .I did remember to squeeze a "little" orange chilli on 'em . . . I just want the whole package, spring rolls, bbq pork, and grilled shrimp . . . especially when the bbq pork CPT got turned out to be the best I've ever had, so tender, juicy, and spicy . . . Mrs' Pho Ga looked good, but she didn't like the chicken skin suffused in all thru the soup . . .and it wasn't spicy enough, so the final verdict was thumbs-down . . . so we enjoyed it but would love to explore the other places in SAPA . . .some looked kinda grimy, even tho' they smelled wonderful . . .you can spend a serious amount of time browsing and sampling . . . which we'd like to do . . .

Mozaika

"our" place . . . on short notice . . . packed . . . dependable as usual . . .having some "Italian Festa" motif going on now . . .

with occasional splashes of incandesant excellence . . . e.g. my grilled calamari . . . the best I ever had . . . the lentils were merely wonderful. but the smoky, not-rubbery, light fishy taste was perfekt.

She's So Money just had a caesar salad. She was very pleased.

Mrs had the italian motivated Sea Bass "osso bucco" . . . kinda wierd but wonderful in its peculiar, un-categorized, unique way.

Tujuh Maret, Amsterdam

Indonesian Reijstaffel in Amsterdam. We had 3 platters, with assorted bowls of extras. The Regular, The Not-so-Spicy, and the Spicy plattter . . . The spiciest was also the largest, by some weird logic of which we are totally in favor . . . 8^D

Masala, Manesova v Italska, Praha

over a year ago, I had a business dinner at the other Masala, and went to this one by mistake  http://www.masala.cz/manesova-en/menu . . . I didn't want to leave, the cozy, aromatic interior was like a spiderweb . . . 8^D . . . but we have enjoyed the pind so much, and it's so handy, could never just get it together to get over there. . . finally did . . .

 

started with vegetarian samosas, and had them bring our chutneys right away, tamarind, mint, mango, and "piccle" . . . the samosas were great, light, crispy, not-greasy, and filling . . . if you see how I mean, and the chutneys were very, very savoury.

 

The dark bowl is my lamb Rogan Josh . . . I think the lighter Chicken Vindaloo is recognizable . . . the middle brown bowl is something we'd never had before, Matter Paneer, cottage cheese and green pea curry . . . nothing like what we expected . . . none of it was as spicy as we normally like, but very toothsome, nonetheless . . . we'll have to ask for extra spice next time, and there will be a next time . . . the promise of the enticing smell of the place is fully, er, uh, fulfilled . . . 8^D . . .

 

Mrs often doesn't care for rice, so I got some Matar Pulao, basmati rice cooked with green peas, cardamon, cloves and bay leaves. She said this rice was acceptable to her, more than the plain white sticky rice . . . 8^) . . . I tho't it was fantastic, and a great addition to the mix on my plate of curries and chutneys. Whew!

 

we had garlic naan with it all . .. and this was so good, mrs made me split the 3 pieces with her . . . that's kinda unusual, so it must have been better than usual, too.

 

We loved the interior, it was like Gaudi went to India . . .8^D . . .  Next time I'll leave room for kheer, I swear it.

George & Dragon, Staromestska, Praha

The cozy, chummy, apparently manufactured out of thin air authentic british atmosphere brings us back again and again for some classic, quality english comfort food. The lovely, friendly, helpful staff is a major draw to us, also.