Estonian restaurant blogs

I recently found two blogs that review Estonian restaurants in (native speaker) English. The first one, Tartu- City of Good Food, is obviously based in Tartu. The author writes very long, thorough reviews, often with a good dose of tongue-in-cheek humor. The other blog is Heaven & Hell of Restaurants in Tallinn, which– you guessed it– reviews Tallinn eating establishments. The blogger writes honest critical reviews and focuses on various aspects of the dining experience. He also has a considerably larger budget than I do, since many of the places he’s reviewed I don’t even dream of visiting without a special occasion. At one point he also listed some of my favorite places on his list of the worst places in Tallinn, so we clearly have different standards :-) . But that’s OK– check out either blog for a good read and some valuable reviews.

Tuesday, 17 November, 2009. Tags: , . Blog Stuff, Expat. Leave a comment.

Tallinn’s Christmas market ranked among 20 best in Europe

Today I want to share a link to an article in the Times Online about the 20 best Christmas markets in Europe. They’re not ranked per se, but the very first one listed is the Christmas market held on Tallinn’s Town Hall Square, and the picture included at the beginning of the article is absolutely breathtaking. It’s one of those pictures that makes me think, even after more than two years, “Wow– I can’t believe I live here.” This is my city. I get to walk along Medieval cobblestone streets week after week, passing by historical buildings, but most of the time I don’t think about because I’m preoccupied with my work assignments for the day or what ingredients I need for dinner that night. But every once in a while I do look, and I notice the beauty this city has to offer, all of which could have been destroyed during the Soviet occupation but wasn’t. I’m grateful for the chance to live here, a chance that my parents’ generation never had, and every day see evidence of the history that took place, and also that which didn’t. I may complain sometimes, but at the end of the day, I really do love this city.

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Friday, 13 November, 2009. Tags: , , . Expat, Foreign Estonian/Väliseestlane, I Like to Write. 1 comment.

100 must-eat American foods

Here’s a list of 100 must-eat American foods, which I mentioned the other day when I revisited my Omnivore’s 100 list. This list of 100 American foods one should try before they die was created by Slashfood. All the ones I have eaten before have been made bold.

  1. New York pizza
  2. Hoppin’ John
  3. New Mexico green chile
  4. Homemade buttermilk biscuits
  5. Tasso
  6. Whole Maine lobster (can anyone actually eat a whole Maine lobster? Those things are huge.)
  7. Calabash-style shrimp and hushpuppies
  8. Kansas City barbecue ribs
  9. Hot glazed Krispy Kreme (my sister and I got them for free when we bought coffee! That was a happy moment).
  10. San Diego fish tacos
  11. Cheese curds
  12. Key lime pie
  13. Philly cheese steak
  14. Memphis pork barbecue sandwich (Does this mean Memphis style or in Memphis? For all the ones that include a place name, I’m going to assume they mean the style, not that it had to be consumed in said place)
  15. Lowcountry boil
  16. Huckleberry pie
  17. New England clam chowder
  18. Boiled peanuts
  19. Buffalo burger
  20. Eggs Benedict
  21. Pastrami on rye
  22. Corned beef and cabbage (does a Reuben count?)
  23. Pancakes with maple syrup
  24. Everything bagel with cream cheese and tomato
  25. Thin Mints (preferably frozen)
  26. Frito pie
  27. Potato knish with mustard
  28. Silver Queen corn on the cob
  29. Soft pretzel from a street cart
  30. Fresh-picked blueberries
  31. Sourwood honey
  32. State fair funnel cake
  33. Chesapeake crab cakes :-)
  34. Candied yams
  35. Oyster dressing
  36. Snow cone or snowball
  37. Wild Alaskan salmon (not absolutely sure I’ve eaten this one)
  38. Sautéed morels
  39. Persimmon pudding
  40. General Tso’s Chicken
  41. Frozen custard
  42. Italian sausage with peppers and onions on a hoagie bun
  43. Chili dog
  44. Buffalo wings with blue cheese
  45. Spam musubi
  46. Saltwater taffy
  47. Fluffernutter sandwich on Wonder Bread
  48. Black and white cookie
  49. Frybread
  50. BLT with thick-cut applewood bacon
  51. Baked beans
  52. Pumpkin pie
  53. Collards with vinegar and Tabasco
  54. Tex-Mex fajitas with skirt steak and sautéed peppers
  55. Fried green tomatoes
  56. Succotash
  57. Shrimp and grits
  58. Hot water cornbread
  59. Barbecue chicken pizza with red onions
  60. Chicken fried steak
  61. Carnitas burrito
  62. Apple butter
  63. Geoduck
  64. Soft-serve ice cream cone dipped in chocolate shell (especially Dairy Queen)
  65. Pecan pie
  66. Catfish supper at a church or fire station
  67. Oysters Rockefeller
  68. Homemade cranberry sauce
  69. Pimiento cheese
  70. MoonPie washed down with R.C. Cola (I don’t know if I’d even want to eat this)
  71. Pickled watermelon rind
  72. Cracker Jacks at the ball game
  73. Smithfield ham
  74. Meatloaf and mashed potato blue plate special at diner
  75. Chicken and waffles
  76. Po’Boy
  77. Green bean casserole with French’s fried onions
  78. Stuffed sopaipillas
  79. Turducken
  80. Shad roe on toast
  81. Sweet potato casserole with or without marshmallows
  82. Cioppino
  83. New York cheesecake
  84. Pan-fried river trout
  85. Jambalaya
  86. North Carolina pig pickin’
  87. California rolls
  88. Burgoo
  89. Penuche fudge
  90. Fried peanut butter and banana sandwich (the Elvis)
  91. Scrapple or livermush
  92. Elk medallions in red wine reduction
  93. Muscadine grapes
  94. Cheeseburger at backyard barbecue
  95. Open-face turkey sandwich
  96. Chicago deep dish pizza
  97. Cobb salad
  98. Peach pie a la mode
  99. Macaroni and cheese with Tillamook sharp cheddar
  100. Root beer float

My grand total is 47, which is only slightly better than my tally for the Omnivore’s 100. A lot of the names were unfamiliar to me and I had to look them up to know what they even were. It seems to me that a large number if items on the list originate in Southern or Midwestern states, most of which I haven’t visited (I am from Maryland, which I don’t really consider the South). That seems a little unfair, but the author readily admits that it’s a very subjective list. Perhaps she herself is from the South?

I’m surprised about a few things that aren’t on here. What about a Philly cheese steak? Or scrapple? (Oops– just looked back and realized that scrapple actually IS on the list). And what about Hershey’s chocolate? Was there any candy on the list at all? There are plenty of unique regional candies. (There are two on the list– saltwater taffy and penuche fudge). Once again, a fun list but rather uneven (and lacking in my #1 American food, chocolate chip cookies :-D ).

I wonder if there’s a list like this about Estonia. If there’s not, we should make one, something like “50 Foods You Must Eat Before You Can Understand Estonians”. The first three items should be dark rye bread, sült, and  boiled Estonian potatoes with dill. What else?

Tuesday, 10 November, 2009. Tags: , . Blog Stuff, Expat. 4 comments.

All dressed up for Halloween

As promised, here are some pictures of mine and J’s Halloween costumes. I’ll go first, although you won’t recognize who I’m supposed to be unless you’re familiar with Nordic children’s literature.

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If you do happen to know Muumi (the Moomins)and his group of friends, then hopefully you can tell that I was dressed up as Little My (Väike My in Estonian and Pikku Myy in Finnish).

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And then there was J.

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He decided pretty quickly that he wanted to be a zombie, and he wanted to use real blood in his costume (and of course I mean pig’s blood, NOT human). It was surprisingly difficult to find, and although he was finally able to locate some– begging a free bag from the butchers at the central market– he realized that it might not be safe to put on his face. So, relax– that stuff all over his face is NOT real blood (he used it to create the brownish stains on his shirt). Creating fake blood took some problem-solving skills, since every single fake blood recipe we found on the internet called for food coloring. Guess what they don’t carry in Rimi, our neighborhood grocery store? That’s right. So there I was in the store on Halloween, trying to think of a substitute, something else that could dye things red. I ended up grabbing the reddest thing I could think of– marinated beets.

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The “recipe” J ended up using borrowed components from a few different ones we’d read on the net. He started with dark syrup and beet juice, but it was too pink, so I suggested cocoa powder to help get a browner tone. A little bit of cornstarch was thrown in as thickener, and voila– gross, sticky, convincing, and totally edible (albeit funny-tasting) fake blood.

Monday, 2 November, 2009. Tags: , . Expat, I Like to Write. 4 comments.

Halloween at our place

Like I mentioned last year, Halloween is not a big deal in Estonia. But we still like it, so this year we figured we could make Halloween happen by having it at our apartment. It was fairly last-minute– we sent the invitation out less than a week before– but I think we pulled it off very nicely :-) .

J took care of decorations. I love the fact that even though he didn’t have the experience of carving a jack’o'lantern until he was 25 years old, he still really wanted to do it this year. He got two small pumpkins from the central market in Tallinn, and carved one in the same style as he did his first-ever pumpkin:

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and one with a slight variation:

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I love the fangs! I think they look very spider-esque. And the red smeared all over is red candle wax, which added a particularly creepy touch.

I, of course, was in charge of food. I decided to try my hand at these vampire cookies from Baking Bites. Not only were they fun to make, but they also tasted amazing– a basic butter cookie surrounding a pocket of raspberry jam. Luckily our guests liked them too :-) .

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For the rest of the food, I kept it pretty simple. I put out some veggies and dip with creepy carrots “fingers” emerging from it, mozzarella-olive “eyeballs”, candy corn (which my mother sent to me again this year– thank you ema!!!), orange slices, guacamole, and some little “dirt cups”.

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We lit some candles, turned off the lights, played some scary movies in the background (well, not that scary– the ones we ended up watching in their entirety were Scream and Shaun of the Dead), and that was it– the makings of a casual, fun Halloween party for grownups (or, you know, grownups who still like to dress up in costumes once a year). I’ll share pictures of our costumes tomorrow!

Sunday, 1 November, 2009. Tags: , . Expat, Something to Eat. 1 comment.

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