You Say Luxemburgerli, I Say Macaron

I remember falling in love with the macarons at Ladurée in Paris. These ethereal cookies made with a layer of ganache sandwiched between two almond meringues are magic. I'd never had anything like them before.

When we moved to Zürich I was thrilled to see that there was a local version called Luxemburgerli available at the landmark confiserie Sprüngli. On our first visit to the city I made a beeline for the shop on Paradeplatz  just to try these little delights. I liked them, but they were not the really the same thing. A drier shell and a sweeter, heavier ganache. Good but not magic.

Since then I've tried the ones at Péclard, which took over the venerable Café Schober in the Niederdorf and based its macaron recipe (and its chocolat chaud) on Ladurée's. And last year Ladurée itself opened an outpost in the Old Town as well. More recently I tried Vollenweider's macarons and was very pleased that they were good enough to convert some naysayers who had previously just tried Sprüngli's version. 

With four possible versions to choose from in Zürich, it seemed like it was time for a taste test.  I got a sample from each shop and tasted the chocolate from each and then the pistachio from the best two as a tie breaker. In the end, the winner was still Ladurée with Vollenweider a very close second, followed by Péclard, and then Sprüngli.

They're all lovely little treats, and I love to give them as gifts, especially since they all come so beautifully packaged in tiny little boxes. It's just fun to order them and watch the selection be put together and wrapped.

My tasting notes are below, but half the fun is really in trying them yourself.  The shops are all fairly close together and the walk will at least partly make up for indulgence. Give it a try. Which one is your favorite?

Tasting Notes.
Ladurée. The meringue shell is delicate, almost ethereal, but it holds together against the chewy inner meringue and has a light but distinctive egg-y note, while the ganache is not as dense as the Swiss versions. The cookie is also not as sweet as the Swiss versions. The three elements (meringue shell, inner meringue, and ganache) are perfectly balanced. The pistache was perfection, with the nutty creamy filling beating all competitors. One quibble: the chocolate macaron I got was not as perfectly fresh as it should have been.

Vollenweider. Much smaller than Ladurée's (more the size of Sprüngli's Luxemburgerli), the balance between shell and inner meringue is not quite as perfect as Ladurée's but still quite good. The ganache layer is also thicker and denser. Vollenweider's macarons are basically a perfected version of Sprüngli's. A delicate shell but not too dry or too sweet. The pistachio was every bit as good as Ladurée's.

Péclard. Since this shop has intentionally followed Laduree's style, I really expected it to win. The balance of the meringue shell and inner chewy meringue was as good but the ganache layer was too thin and quite a bit sweeter. Points off also for kelly green as a color for the pistachio macarons.


Sprüngli. These are the sweetest of the four, almost sugary. The cookie shell is quite dry and basically shatters into crumbles on the first bite. The ganache filling is relatively thick. I do like the tiny size of these, which allows more than one to be sampled without inducing sugar shock.





Story and photos by Kathy

Schoggi Mail!

You gotta love a country, where the post office sells chocolate bars already ready wrapped with address blanks for mailing. They're called Schoggi Mail and they're in the greeting card rack at the local Swiss Post office. Excellent!

























Story by Kathy
Photo by Kathy

Watching the Swiss: New Essential Expat Reading

We wanted to move to Europe for a long time. Instead we moved to Switzerland, an odd little corner of not-quite-Europe, deceptively located in the middle of Europe. We kept thinking it would be like moving to France or Italy or Germany. But it wasn't.

Switzerland shares lots of traditions and (some of) its languages with its neighbors. But it's different here. Sometimes in little ways, like greetings or the almost obsessive punctuality of trains (and people). Sometimes in a bigger ways, like the Swiss practice of direct democracy or the oddity of a nation made up of so many different languages and traditions. The differences all add up to something that's a little hard to get hold of. What makes the Swiss, well, Swiss?

That's why I love the newly released Swiss Watching: Inside Europe's Landlocked Island, which explores the difficult-to-grasp intangible of Swissness. In an engaging and witty voice, expat author Diccon Bewes  moves from the formative impact of a geography of mountain barriers and critical passes, to the history of Switzerland's emerging identity in the face of repeated invasions and threats of invasion from surrounding empires, to the creation of the modern, decentralized federal state. Against this history, Bewes suggests that "it's the myth of Switzerland, be that Tell or Heidi or the wartime experience, that is as important as the reality."  If all nations are imagined, then surely Switzerland stands out in its self-conscious willingness to co opt the best available images to fuel national unity coupled to its simultaneous reluctance to impose uniformity on that unity.


The book is structured against the clichés that mark the limits of most outsiders' knowledge of Switzerland. In the process, Bewes turns these old stereotypes inside out, from cuckoo clocks to chocolate to hyper-clean cities. He also upends the stereotype of the Swiss banker and banking secrecy, a big issue for Swiss foreign relations of late, arguing persuasively that the Swiss make a distinction between privacy and secrecy and that this distinction emerges from core Swiss organizing principle of trust. The Swiss simply assume that others will do the right thing and that means that without some clear sign of rule-breaking there should be no need to intrude on individual privacy. It's not a concept that translates well beyond Switzerland's borders.

The book is also structured so that it can be read not just as an introduction to Swiss history and culture but also as an excellent guide to everyday life in Switzerland. The numbered Swiss Watching Tips are especially helpful in highlighting the pitfalls of Swiss social life (and how to avoid them), such as No. 1 on proper greeting etiquette at parties, something I utterly failed to get right at the last party I attended. (At least I realized immediately where I had gone wrong.) Be sure to also check out tip No. 8 (The Perfect Guest) and No. 9 (Table Manners) before heading to your next dinner with Swiss friends or colleagues.

If you're planning to visit or move to Switzerland, or even if you've been here a while, Swiss Watching is essential reading. Bewes is touring the book in the UK now and in Switzerland this Fall. But why wait? Get your copy now.





Story by Kathy
Photo by tylonbrew

Remembering the Sun

I'm remembering the first June weekend, when it was so hot and sunny that we just stopped and stuck our feet in the lake for some relief.

The sun will come back. Maybe not until July. But it will. And then it will be all about the boats, the badi, sunbathing and sunset strolls. Until then.

Story and photos by Kathy

New World Magic: BFE at Moods

Last Tuesday a very lucky, very smart crowd of about 200 got to jump and shout and dance with Brooklyn Funk Essentials at Moods im Schiffbau.

And dance we did, start to the finish. This was the dancing-est crowd I've ever seen at a Zürich show, and no wonder with songs to make you move like the opening Make Them Like It and Mambo Con Dancehall though to the finale Kick It/Wanna Take You Higher and in between with songs like the mad, frenetic ska of  Dibby Dibby Sound off the 2008 album, Watcha Playin'.

I Got Cash also got in the mix, although we were some of the only ones who seemed to recognize this scathing indictment of yuppie pretensions. Interestingly the final verse was cut, as well as my favorite one: consumption as multiculturalism (And on Wednesday, Caribbean. Not too spicy, please.)

The groove, the musicianship, the energy: it was New World magic. And the tiny venue was the perfect place to experience it. Just us and the lucky few.

Story by Kathy
Photos by tylonbrew

A Walk on Cap Ferrat

We had this idea to see the Riviera our way. We would find a space in between shiny, mega-wealth and package tour grind. We succeeded, mostly by not doing much at all. 

On the last day, however, this seemed wrong-headed. We should take a long walk and see something, we thought. We should go out to real a restaurant. We should do both. That's how we ended up walking halfway around Cap Ferrat, from the start of the path just at the edge of Beaulieu to the lighthouse at the tip of the cape.

The Cap is peppered with villas of the wealthy and the famous. (Ooohh! Look! David Niven's villa. Did you know it belonged to Charlie Chaplin?) After a long absence the Russians are back too, spending time at the Royal Riviera Hotel.

Oddly democratic, a public path winds along the Cap just above the shore, passing at one point though the front drive of a grand private villa. Up to and through the chi-chi little village of St Jean Cap Ferrat, the path is paved and quite lovely. The scent of honeysuckle and oleander perfumes the way. It's an easy walk with a bit of company from others out for a bit of exercise. 

After the village, however, the paved path disappears as it passes through what appears to be a construction dump. The pavement picks up again shortly, but now it runs well below the level of the villas. Suddenly it feels a little less democratic. We start to feel like intruders sneaking below the walled villas looming over us at the top of the ridge. Happily, this section is short as well, and soon we started to climb as the path twists through the tumble of jagged black and white rocks that form the point.

The point is just spectacular and the climb invigorating. Perversely we had chosen a humid, windless, and overcast day for this walk, so the horizon was limited. But it was still beautiful. It would have made a great picnic spot, but we had other plans.

                                                                      web-provence.com
  
We headed up and around the lighthouse and inland toward the Grand Hotel du Cap Ferrat, arriving  just a few minutes before our lunch reservation. We paused outside the gate to catch our breath and cool off, taking in the passing scene of various service vehicles going in and out of the surrounding villas. I was a little intimidated by the prospect of entering the grand lobby, as I was sporting Freitag not Ferragamo. But come on, this was going to be worth it.

The hotel was completely renovated and reopened in 2009, while the restaurant reopened this year, earning a Michelin star under chef Didier Anies.  We were booked for La Veranda, so that we could enjoy a little haute cuisine at the relative good-deal price of the midday menu along with a view.





I'm glad we did. The meal was one of the highlights of the trip. The food was so good that I failed to take any notes, but I can say that the sea bass was perfectly grilled, the potatoes fondant sinfully good and the suggested white wine from Porquerolles was a great pairing and had a really intriguing bitter orange note on the finish.

The service was flawless, from the wine suggestions to the proffered stool for my bag. (Yes, my Freitag bag made out of recycled truck tarps sat proudly and delicately on its own little throne.)  We enjoyed, we dawdled, we had a digestive and then a coffee. It was a very nice day at the beach.

                                                                    Photo Grand Hotel du Cap Ferat    










Story by Kathy
Photos by tylonbrew except where otherwise noted

Saturday at the Oerlikon Market

Saturday was one of those days that make me fall in love with Zürich all over again. After a long rainy spell the sun had returned. Hurrah! Even better, we were headed to the Oerlikon to meet our guide to the farmers' market, Jack McNulty from Laughing Lemon.

The market was huge, bursting with gorgeous produce, and as we walked Jack kept a running commentary going about the vendors and the products, as well as offering with great recipes to try.  We learned loads of practical things: the best time to arrive at the market is between 8:00 and 9:00; the best butcher, fish monger, and bakers; which are the best produce stands; which things are in season now and which are coming soon, how to find good stuff from Italy, and how to identify who is selling products from their own farm (look for the word "eigener"on the price card).

 

But I also got a better understanding of Swiss food culture, something that has really puzzled me since  got here. I had been told that Swiss prefer fresh, seasonal, and local products. You can see this easily enough in the supermarkets, where in-season, local produce is prominently displayed. At the same time supermarkets are part of a gloabalized supply chain offering (relatively) cheap prices on out-of-season foods from distant lands (potatoes from Isreal, green beans from Morocco, strawberries from Spain). They also work hard to market the exotic, two-packs of sweet corn from Florida being a particularly absurd example from COOP this week. 

But standing in a section of the Oerlikon market filled with potted herbs and other plants I realized that supermarkets tell us more about the economics of the food business than Swiss cuisine. Like so many restaurants in Zürich, which offer style over substance and sociability over fine food, supermarkets serve a specific purpose: convenience. It all clicked while listening to Jack explain how potted plants are big now that the much delayed Spring has finally arrived. People are filing their balcony planters with herbs and planting their garden allotments.

Good food is very much a DIY project here. People grow their own; they visit farms where they can pick their own vegetables; they pickle, can and preserve; and above all they shop at the farmers' market. 

And shop we did. We bought gorgeous, peppery rocket (rucola), new potatoes, and cherry tomatoes. Those went into a salade composée topped with thin-sliced, grilled steak. We bought super fresh asparagus and smokey Kochspeck. That was for a pizza. And we got eggs from the farmer along with some pecorino stagionato in fossa, which made for a great omelette topped with this crumbly sheep's milk cheese.

As much fun as the food was, we also loved how sociable the Saturday market was. Lots of smiles. The vendors were really relaxed and friendly. It was altogether a wonderful Saturday morning. Thank you, Jack!



Story by Kathy
Photos by tylonbrew

La Vie Quotidienne on the Riviera: To Market in Beaulieu

We didn't have a car in Villefranche, which was good. But that meant we didn't have a car on the Riviera, which was bad. We realized this as we watched our long delayed bus to the next town roll by with a "Complet" (full) sign in the front window, leaving us just under an hour to get to market before it closed at noon. Too late to walk there now and potentially too late for a train, unless the trains run on time.... No, we thought, that's not really likely.

We decided to solve this whole transportation problem another day and headed back through town, foraging along the way. A green grocer offered some decent mesclun and new potatoes. Good. The tiny little Spar grocery store yielded some decent goat cheese and some great Provençal wines for 5-10 Euro. Wow. That is just unbelievably cheap after Züirch. 

And then the boucherie. Cue choir of angels. The spit roasted chickens were just being pulled out of the roaster as we arrived right before noon. The tantalizing aroma said pick me, pick me. Clever butcher. That's a lunch (or two). For dinner, we chose a dry-aged, grass-fed entrecôte. Yum.

Note for future visits: The butcher just off the Place de la Paix is really, really, good. So is the baker just across the place.

All that foraging and we were back at the apartment by noon with plenty of time for lunch, a siesta, and ramble around town. Then an apero on our balcony. Then dinner (a perfect steak). The good life.

The next day we started early and caught the train to Beaulieu, which has a small daily farmer's market in addition to the big Saturday market. The train, by the way, was not a bad way to travel along the coast, although it did tend to run late (5-30 minutes). It actually does make the stretch from Nice to Ventimiglia pretty accessible without suffering the pain of Basse Corniche traffic.




The Beaulieu market, on the Place du Marché just up the from the train station, was small but wonderful. We got some green and cloudy olive oil, fresh broad beans, green beans, and cranberry beans, more mesclun, herbs, asparagus, some lumpy, bumpy lemons from Menton still on the stem, a small, ripe melon from the Var, and strawberries.

There are actually many great markets in the region, and the biggest are usually on Saturday. We're really looking forward to visiting the Cours Saleya market in Nice on our next trip and taking a market tour/cooking class with food writer Rosa Jackson.

Back at the apartment we realized we'd gotten a pretty odd assortment of products. What the heck. We put most of the vegetables together with some red rice from the Camargue and chorizo. A little weird but tasty. Provençal jambalaya, anyone?

Story by Kathy
Photos by tylonbrew

Best of Schwiizerdütsch

One of the first things you learn about (standard) German is that this isn't what you'll hear on the streets of Zürich. That's because people here speak Schwiizerdütsch (Swiss German), not standard German. It's not easy to find references or textbooks to help you learn either. There are a few and some classes, but mostly you just have to learn as you go.

Pretty early on I got that  Öpfel was Apfel (apple) and Chääs was Käse (cheese), but why did all the shopkeepers keep nagging me about an öpis? (I finally found out it was etwas, something, as in would I like something else.) I find I like the Swiss Velo more than the German Farhrrad for bicycle, and who doesn't like to cheerfully say Grüezi, Mittenand to a group fellow hikers on the Wanderweg?

But I know there are just tons words to learn, and lots of them have no obvious relation to standard German. That's why I was happy to see the results of the "Best of Schwiizerdütsch" vote. Brought to you by Swissboox, publishers of the Swiss German phrase book Chuchichäschtli, nominations for the 'Word of the Day' (Wort vom Tag) were taken and now the voting for the top 50 has begun. The voting is still in process, but you can already see the current result.

I don't speak Swiss German, so I am abstaining from the Abstimmen (vote), but here are my favorites so far.

• Chrüsimüsi   Durcheinander (chaos, clutter, muddle)  This perfectly describes the current state of my home office.
• füdliblutt       splitternackt (stark naked)  There is a notable minority of hikers in Switzerland who prefer to hike the trails in the buff, which is kind of charming in a weird way. (They do wear boots, however). The folks in Apenzell Inner-Rhodes don't think it's charming and banned it in 2009. One of füdliblutt hikers was recently acquitted in an Apenzell Outer-Rhodes court. 
• He?  wie bitte? (What? Implies you didn't hear or didn't understand something.) Now that's useful, because that happens to me all the time. I'm not sure what the difference between He? and the separately nominated Hä (was or what) is though.

What's your favorite Swiss German word?