Summering in Europe - Round 3

And last but not least, I visited Copenhagen.  I met Sanjay and his brother Rishi (who are on their own Euro-Trip).  You might remember Sanjay from here.

I was excited for Copenhagen, as I had heard many great things. And it certainly did live up to its expectations! Sanjay had asked a few friends for recommendations in the city.  One friend adamently suggested that we avoid Indian food at all costs.  Well, I can't say that I would travel over 5,000 miles to eat...Indian food? But we heeded her advice.  Copenhagen is filled with Michelin starred restauarants, and we tried to get a table at Noma or Formel B (recommended by my Danish boss).  No luck there, but we did enjoy some Danish/Danish-fusion cuisine along the way.
We decided to stop for some drinks at Nimb, recommended by one of my guidebooks.  We each had a  ($25) drink and I had a salad too.  I figured the salad would offset all the pastries and hot dogs I would be eating for the rest of the weekend.

{Tommygun: margarita with mezcal}

{Old Fashioned} 

{Bloody Maria}

{Grilled beefsteak tomatoes with Parmesan and balsamic vinegar}

In Copenhagen, there are no open container laws

In Copenhagen, you can go to a non-pretentious bar and order yum drinks with KUMQUATS!

I would never eat a hot dog from a hot dog vendor in New York...but as my general motto goes, "Everything is more delicious in Copenhagen"

{Hot Dog with all the fixings, including fried onions}

One of the things we had to try while we were out there was smorrebord.  So we set off on Saturday morning to find the best! Except, "the best one" was all booked for the day.  So we turned the corner and found another one.  And guess what....they had pink coffee cups! So I'd like to say everything happens for a reason.

My pink coffee cup! Yes - I may or may not have just purchased this because the cup was pink.

Smorrebord fun below!

Sanjay's smorrebord fun!

One of the many pastries we had from lagkahuset

We were lucky to get a reservation at a new restaurant, Geist. Geist opened a few months ago by chef Bo Bech.  I felt as though I were in some New York hotspot! And we figured that while we were hemorrging money for our meal, we might as well continue to hemmorage money so we got a bottle of champagne to celebrate Copenhagen and its glory. 

We had read many reviews about the restaurant, so we kind of knew what we wanted to order.  We each ordered something to start, and then another dish after that.  I also needed to have foie gras, since we were already drinking champagne. 

The first dish I ordered consisted of Fiord shrimps, elderberry and smoked milk.  It may look weird in the photo below - but all the varying textures made this an excellent dish - the cool, fresh shrimp, paired with the crunchy greens - I could see why the dish was recommended!

I know the next dish looks weird.  This is raw cauliflower, poached egg and summer truffles.  That's the cool thing about this restaurant.  Things might look weird, but I 100% assure you that this was refreshing and delicious, and very unique, as I've never had anything similar to this in other restaurants.  You can see the raw cauliflower is shaved over the dish, almost like a cheese.  

This was the big hit of our first course.  The West Coast Turbot with Fennel Ravioli of Cheese.  I mean - look at that creamy sauce, and the perfect ravioli sitting on top of the fish.  Melt in your mouth.  

Also per recommendations, we ordered the veal tartare.  It had some grapefruit pieces in it.  This dish was a fail in my opinion...until we discovered if you slather it on the bread we were served, it was infinitely more flavorful.  Alone, it lacked any depth or taste or any form of being unique as the other dishes we sampled before.

Black lobster with Tomato and Pineapple.  WIN!

Smoked Eel with Spinach and Parsley

Foie Gras with Green Almonds...as much as I hate to say this, this was a huge fail, unless eaten with some bread.  For a restaurant that made so many other creative dishes, I was surprised that this dish was rather ordinary.

But I still ate it all anyways...

Let's not even get started on dessert.  The dessert menu had all kinds of fun items, for example, the "air in air in air arabica" (some kind of coffee).  We went with some of the more "unusual" dishes to finish our meal. 

Crystallized white asparagus w/ coconut.  Here is that white asparagus again! This was crunchy and sweet - I couldn't believe you could make a dessert out of boring piece of asparagus!

Rhubarb w/ crushed buttermilk and elder flower (action shot).  Isn't the "crushed buttermilk" idea so cool? I'm going to see if I can find a recipe to re-create.  

And last, we were offered some orange flavored cotton candy.  I could post some really mature photos of  Sanjay and I enjoying our cotton candy at a very grown up restaurant, but to spare us some embarrassment, I won't.

Even the coffee is perfect in Copenhagen

Drinks at Ruby Bar - you could tell the bartenders what you liked, and they would make you a speciality cocktail!

Danish meatballs at the Carlsberg Brewery

And now my trip was coming to an end...which means only one thing: airport food! This was my last meal in Copenhagen, some noodle to go place with all kinds of fun flavors (i.e. mine was chicken tikka with noodles! It reminds me of Becca and myself.  You know, Asian and Indian? Get it? Ok bad joke)

Au revoir Copenhagen!