Breakfast was boring. Let's move on to something more exciting.
At the Chopin concert, our group was given an hour to enjoy the outdoor concert. And what does one do when attending an outdoor concert? Eat ice cream, of course!
This ice cream was different from the lody of the day before in that it was scooped from a tub as opposed to poured from a machine. But while it was more like traditional ice cream in the U.S., it was still much creamier and more flavorful.
We encountered difficulty again as we ordered our cones. It was beginning to seem like we always struggled when ordering ice cream. We could not afford to mis-communicate information about such a valuable commodity!
After the concert, the group was brought to a tiny restaurant next to the park. We were seated in the garden, a picturesque little graveled area with flowers and vines encircling the numerous tables. Despite the unexpected heat, we all settled in for our meal.
Ela approached Mom and I again, informing us that the kitchen could make us pancakes either with cheese or spinach. This seemed like a strange proposition until we figured pancakes was another word for crepes. So that was less strange, but still cheese or spinach wasn't a very detailed description. We went with the cheese and crossed our fingers.
While we waited for the pancakes, our soup arrived.
Like most soups I encountered in Poland, the contents of this one was a mystery. But after some careful dissection, I decided that it was a very thin tomato soup with noodles, sour cream (a favorite condiment in Poland) and parsley.
The soup was delicious and refreshing. Because of the thin consistency of the broth, it wasn't like slurping down a bowl of Cambpell's on a cool fall evening. On the contrary, it felt appropriately summery.
At this point, I'm sure you're as anxious to see what the "pancakes" looked like as I was. Well, here you go.
This was seriously delicious. I am a huge crepe lover, (I may have mentioned this before) so the fact that I got to have dessert crepe for lunch definitely made my day! While everyone else was eating pork in sketchy brown sauce, we were feasting on sweet crepes!
Before this lunch, I never would have thought to put marscapone in a crepe, but it was actually very good. The mild sweetness of the cheese blended nicely with the natural sweetness from the raspberries. It was perfect. Once again, not eating pork or red meat paid off.
The restaurant also felt the need to give everyone dessert. This is when things went downhill.
Looks tempting, right? I mean, who doesn't like a doughnut? I, for one, love a good doughnut. (Krispy Kreme is my favorite, but I digress...) So I eagerly cut into the dough, expecting something delightful.
My expectations were completely dashed when I saw how dense and dry the dough was, not to mention a certain prune filling I discovered inside. It was disappointing.
Thus, we ended our time in Warsaw and loaded on the bus, headed for Gdansk.
Little did we know that our drive to Gdansk would require many, many long hours on a small tour bus. Granted, there was plenty of room for our small group of 15 people, but still. You can only watch the countryside for so long until your eyelids droop and your head starts to bob like a puppet's. (In my case, this happened quite often.)
When at last we made a "comfort stop" as Ela called it, everyone was tired and hungry. The only nourishment available was candy and junk food. I wasn't exactly complaining. I mean, how can you say you've eaten a country's food if you've never sampled its candy?
After much deliberation, I went for a mango peach drink (in an adorable little bottle!) and what appeared to be chocolate-marshmallow candy. Both were just what I needed to spike my bloodsugar and keep me going for the rest of the afternoon. As a side note, the most popular (or at least the most well stocked) candy seems to be something called Prince Polo. We ate it on the plane and it's similar to a Kit-kat, but with more layers. I'm not sure if I took a picture of it, so I figured I'd just fill you in now...
After securing the goods, we loaded back in the bus for another three hours, arriving in Gdansk at around 8 in the evening.
Needless to say, at this point, I was beyond ready for dinner. Luckily, our hotel was barely a five minute walk from the center of town. We had arrived during a festival time, too, so the city was especially alive as we walked down the main street.
There were countless restaurants and eateries to choose from. (Always a challenge when you're hungry.) Eventually, we settled on a restaurant with an almost completely full outside dining area. The inside was cozy, and we quickly settled into a large wooden booth in the corner.
Not having the energy (or patience) to peruse the whole menu, I ordered the pierogie Ruskie and crossed my fingers that I'd made the right choice. There's not a whole lot to mess up when you get a cheese pierogie. But there is a lot that you can do right.
I like to think there's a baseline for all pierogies: decent dough, decent filling. Mediocre pierogies are still edible, they're just mediocre. The best pierogies (like Nina's) go above and beyond. It's like the difference between getting a A or a B grade. There's nothing wrong, per se, with a B, but the A is what everyone really wants.
It's safe to say I had my grading criteria ready when my plate hit the table.
These pierogies were much more than mediocre, but still not as good as Nina's. What I really liked about these was that the dough was more tender than the dough of the ones I'd eaten in Warsaw. I also approved of the cheese, though I can't say it was particularly outstanding or different in any way from that of the Warsaw pierogies.
Polish pierogies are so interesting in that the cheese inside is crumbly. When we make them at home we use a potato and cheese filling, so it's smooth. Both are delicious in their own right, but I thought that was a major difference worth noting.
After a long day of sitting in a bus, I was not prepared to end my meal after one course. The creme brulee had been calling my name ever since I noticed it on the desserts page, so I had to try it!
If there is one thing that improves the taste of a meal, it has to be presentation. People are drawn to attractive things. I am drawn to attractive foods. Put any dessert in a little white mug and I am so there!
The sugar on top of the creme brulee was perfectly golden without being burnt. One of the worst things you can do to a creme brulee is char the sugar, but that was not a problem here! I ate up every bit of this dessert, quite happily, might I add. It was a very successful first taste of Gdansk.
The next morning, there was breakfast.
Later in the day, after a morning tour of Gdansk and Sopot, we had time to explore Gdansk on our own. Since shopping for amber jewelry can really make you work up an appetite, we stopped for lunch at a place recommended to us by some of the people on our tour and seated ourselves in the outside dining area.
Hot chocolate was a necessity.
This one needed the sugar packet, but the whipped cream was awesome!
When it came time to order food, I went for the pierogies, once again.
These were nice because they had caramelized onions on top. Let me just say that caramelized onions taste good on everything! Baked potatoes, pizza, pierogies...literally everything is better with the addition of caramelized onions. The dough, however, was not as tender as the night before, and I didn't have the option of ordering only the Ruskie. Instead, we had a mix of cabbage and mushroom and cheese.
The cabbage and mushroom pierogies are fine, but definitely not my favorite. But everyone has their own personal favorite, so they might have been right up your alley!
To cap off the meal, the four of us shared a slice of apple pie.
This may have been the best part of the entire meal! The pie was hot with a crumbly top and lots of juicy apples. Mmm....it was awesome. Even one of us who admittedly isn't crazy about apple pie said she liked it. 'Nuf said.
We have now come to the time in this blog when I must tell you about the BEST food of the entire trip. It was completely unexpected and had we not been in Gdansk during the festival time, I may not have found it at all. I give you Oscypek with cranberry sauce.
This little street food positively blew my mind. Oscypek is a special smoked sheep's cheese made from the milk of Polish Mountain Sheep who feed on a very special diet. The cheese itself is soft and smoky. Then they grill the cheese on little grills until it's hot and bubbly.
At this point, you can eat the cheese on its own, or you can increase the deliciousness and choose to add a sort of cranberry sauce to it. (But don't think Thanksgiving cranberry sauce. Think thin, sweet cranberry jelly.) The combination of the sweet and the salty was perfection.
The closest comparison I can make to something at home is a smoked gouda, but even that does not come close. There was something so smokey, warm, and unique about this flavor combination. It was like nothing I'd ever had before and was seriously the most delicious, mind-blowing food I ate on the entire trip. I even went back for seconds... to the same kiosk I had bought it from the first time. I have no shame.
Although I tried to savor the taste of the Oscypek in my mouth for as long as possible, after more sightseeing that ended in a 400 step climb to the top of the largest brick church in the world, it was lody time!
Ever since I'd landed in Poland, I'd seen people walking around with these tall, thin spirals of ice cream that looked oh so yummy. It was an intriguing style of ice cream, really. We'd never seen anything like it before, so Mom and I had to try it!
The line was long outside of the Soprano Lody shop, if you could call it a shop. In reality it was more like a stand that happened to be under a permanent roof. Regardless, it was doing great business and seemed like a good chance to try out my Polish.
The ice cream girl smiled as I ordered our lody. (I thought she was trying not to laugh at my wretched pronunciation. Mom thought she was impressed by my attempt...we'll never know.) But in the end, it was all worth it.
This was one of the better ice creams in Poland. See what I was saying about the shape? The style is called "Soprano" and is apparently very popular. I understand why.
I should probably note that I didn't eat the bread and lard, but I did partake in the pickles. They were very briny, but very good.
Next came the main course: salmon.
Once again, while the rest of the group had some sort of pork, we got an upgrade! Salmon is delicious, especially when it's doled out that liberally. As for the pillow-like substances next to the salmon, they were a gnocchi-esque sort of thing. There's a Polish name for them (knedel?) but basically they're gnocchi. They were awesome, too. Because there was so much food, I had to make a decision between the salmon and the gnocchi and I chose the gnocchi.
The last food of note in Gdansk was my new favorite yogurt, Apple Cinnamon.
There is something so fun about eating an unfamiliar, familiar food. I mean, we're all pretty familiar with yogurt, right? But are we familiar with apple cinnamon yogurt? And are we familiar with the awesomeness that is European dairy products? It's the little things that set European yogurt apart. But those little things really add up.
That wraps up Gdansk. Next up, Malborg, Torun, and Poznan. (They're little stops so we'll group them all together.)
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