Monthly Archive for February, 2007

Oubæk – fast food or the running waitress

admin / Published on February 26, 2007 in Denmark and Restaurant. 0 Comments Tags: .

Oubæk on 13 February 2007

Rasmus’ Restaurant

food:

Salted foie gras with salad
Boeuf Béarnaise
Crème Brûllèe

wine:
Domaine Ostertag Gewürztraminer 2003
Mauro Veglio Barolo [- I don't know which year]

For a very long time I have wished to dine at Rasmus Oubæk’s restaurant and unfortunately, I never had the chance to do it, when it was the fancy and Michelin star rated gourmet place. Rasmus is still harvesting good recommendations everywhere – and now also here at the good food blog. This reminds me that he was previously at the TyvenKokkenHansKoneogHendesElsker, a place I’ve never been to but one day hope to.

Being a highly recommended restaurant both as the expensive eat it was, and the more moderate price levelled thing that it is now. I had to order the classics: Foie gras (I’m hopeless!), boeuf béarnaise and a crème brûllée for dessert – but shared with my friend-diner.

The portion of duck liver was generous, and with nice firm pieces of terrine. I don’t like it, when the consistence is soft or slightly melting. I loved the taste, but I couldn’t sense the salt at all. The salad was placed in the middle of the plate partly covering the foie gras. It was beautiful dish. The vinaigrette dressing on the salad had a little too much of olive oil. I found it a bit too greasy, and it glistened my lips too much.

To accompany the foie gras I chose a glass of Gewürztraminer. It had a nice flowery odeur and sweetness too. However, it lacked a little bit from after-taste. It quickly died out and also missed a bit of dryness to balance the thick-ness and the perfumed taste of it. The medium boeuf cooked close to rare was just perfect to my taste and very tender. The French fries were great and both crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. We got the same salad as the starter, and again there was too much oil in the vinaigrette, which was killing some of the crispy-ness of the leaves, a pity because they were a neat mixture of many colours and kinds including the frisée type with a slightly bitter taste.

Vine of La Morra

Mauro Veglio is close to my heart. Not in person though, I mean his wines. A few years ago I slept a couple of nights very close to his vineyard in the La Morra area of the Barolo district, and I had dinner two subsequent evenings at the place Osteria Veglio with the most marvellous view over his green grape trees from the terrace. A fantastic and fabulous place.

Anyhow, this particular wine to accompany the beef was a little tight-nosed at the beginning, but it opened up the lovely Nebbiolo smell after a few minutes. Sorry, but I was so surprised by this coincident that I completely forgot to take note of the year and the name of the wine that was poured into my glass. The taste was good, full-bodied, and had a nice after-taste. Velour. I liked the tannin too. It matched the boeuf well, but was a bit over-kill for the fries. An even more powerful red wine would have suited the meat too; I don’t know which one – a Bandol perhaps?

Usually, I prefer a dessert that comprises something with lemon or apples or rhubarb or berries, because I adore the taste of sweetness and sour at the same time. I adore the combination of the two on my tongue. I really like crème brûlée, a favourite again, but it has a tendency of becoming stuffy, because of the lack of sour. But not at Oubæk’s! They just serve a bit of orange sorbet ice-cream on the side with the crème. And that really worked. Nice little new thing – to me at least.

Then the coffee, the only coffee: Espresso and milky variations of that theme. They don’t offer Danish coffee or any other kinds a prt from espresso based ones. I had espresso as I always prefer, and it was fine, strong and warm. Lovely.

The speed of the service was rather high, because of the fact of double-booking the tables every night. That gave us two hours for completing the whole thing, which is fine for me and my friend, but not really for a romantic date. The waitress was sweet, had a good sense of humour, and she was very busy. So busy that she to my surprise came running to another table with a plate of hot soup at some point. Because of her personality and good sense of humour the situation seemed very comical, and I just couldn’t help myself laughing a bit, quietly, to myself. A bit grotesque, but rather amusing and funny and a nice spice to the lovely experience.

Anyways, I really like Rasmus Oubæk!

What’s good food?

Trine / Published on February 25, 2007 in Petit Fours. 9 Comments

That’s a very good question! Welcome to my blog.

The purpose of my GOOD FOOD blog is to share experiences from restaurants, cafes and other places I have eaten good food. Mainly in Copenhagen, Denmark where I live, but also in other parts of the world.

I love having dinner at excellent restaurants and adore places that surprises me without being top-notch, and if you do that too, maybe you’ll find it interesting to read about great gastronomy and the nice places I’ve been to. Enjoy!

What’s very good food?

Trine / Published on February 25, 2007 in Petit Fours. 9 Comments

That’s a very good question! Welcome to my blog.

The purpose of my VERY GOOD FOOD blog is to share experiences from restaurants, cafes and other places I have eaten good food. Mainly in Copenhagen, Denmark where I live, but also in other parts of the world.

I love having dinner at excellent restaurants and adore places that surprises me without being top-notch, and if you do that too, maybe you’ll find it interesting to read about great gastronomy and the nice places I’ve been to. Enjoy!

Den lille fede – slow food

Trine / Published on February 16, 2007 in Denmark and Restaurant. 4 Comments Tags: .

Den lille fede restaurant, the menu on 7 February 2007:

Jerusalem artichoke soup
Smoked eel & apple

Oven baked salmon
Fingerling potatoes, pimento & olives

Fried & braised beef
Truffle risotto, mushrooms, & pearl onions

Caña de Oveja
Thyme honey, walnut bread & salad

Spice cheesecake
Carrot ice cream, preserved carrots & raisins

Wine:
Tokay Pinot Gris Reserve, Fernand Engel, 2004
Vosne-Romanée, Jacques Cacheux, 2002

Den lille fede

I’ve been dining at this restaurant a couple of times, and I really liked it. I found that the interior, the service and the food matched each other very well. It’s not pretending to be something that it’s not. The waiters were competent and at the same time relaxed, they made me feel comfortable there, which is absolutely important for providing a nice atmosphere, a ground for a good experience.

The concept of this place is that you get several, but small, tastings of the only one menu.
Delicious dishes forming an adventure of perception and that’s the essence of what I’m looking for and enjoying about dining out. Sure, I’m greedy. Want to taste as much as possible, explore as much as possible. So, a place where you get a little bit of everything, that’s just me!
I was seated with 8 work colleagues – truly excellent company. The restaurant was fully booked that evening – classical for the Fashion Week of Copenhagen.

All arrived and set to go we decided to order wine bottles instead of the offered wine menu with (almost) a new wine by glass to accompany each dish. Bad choice – not in terms of the wine we had selected, but in terms of the speed of the service, and the arrival of the first plate. And we were starving, and not offered any bread either, unfortunately.

I’m not quite sure why, but it took at least 30-45 minutes to order the wine and to get it and that’s absolutely way too long. The sympathetic internationally speaking Swedish waitress was very busy and some of the listed wines were out, which she wasn’t aware of.

Anyway, not too long after we had ordered the wine and got the white one, the soup arrived, and what a nice soup. I must say that artichoke soup is one of my (many) favourites. I liked this white beautiful green-coloured chives decorated one a lot, because of its thin texture, which provided some lightness to it, where the taste can be a bit sickly. The creamy taste was kicked with a little piece of eel swimming around and tiny fresh pieces of apple.

Unlike the second dish, the Tokay Pinot Gris wasn’t perfect for the soup (wondering what Jerusalem means in that sense. Perhaps the artichoke came from there. If you know about this please inform me!), but very much appreciated for is good full-bodied lovely taste. Thick consistency. Sweet. I think it was the peculiar eel’s taste, which by the way suited the small bacon bits, but didn’t match the wine so well. However, it wasn’t only that. It was also the artichoke – a combination of the two that eliminated the good taste of the wine. I think perhaps it could be something of a chemical process happening inside my mouth because the same wine with the second dish was much more appropriate.

The second dish was also smoked to some extend, so I don’t think that it was the smoke of it that teased the Pinot Gris, the fish was salmon instead.

The salmon brought out the dry-ness of the white wine and that was fantastic. The first mouthful quite sweet, and then after swallowing it different flavours suddenly spread over my tongue, almost like turning into a completely new wine. And wonderfully surprising.

Some potato thing came with the salmon, which was OK but certainly not surprising. But it was a mystery why the two of them were on the same plate. Each one was good but didn’t at all communicate with each other.

The third dish presented itself marvellously – positive stimulation to my eyes, nose and mouth. What absolute wonderful exquisite smell of truffles, oh yes, no doubt about that. And the taste of them too, with the risotto, which by the way wasn’t really stiff enough to my taste and not near what I’ve had in Italy. The beef was roasted to perfection: very red, very near rareness in the centre, the way I prefer it.

It seems that I’m almost growing into a studentessa of French wines, mainly Burgundy. Me – the Italophile? The red wine to accompany the main course – and the following cheese – was magnificent. Just that, and I liked it better than the formel B Rene Engel Vosne-Romanée, I believe. What I like about this Pinot Noir was that it was served at perfect temperature, for one thing, second the taste, which was very powerful like the smell also was. Full-bodied, tannin, a must in such wines, and very very good! Really, I can recommend that one. Matched the tenderloin steak and the risotto very well.

The red wine also suited the sheep milk cheese in goat disguise, strong flavour, semi-soft texture. Nice stuff too on the side, Chardonnay vinaigrette poured salad providing sour and balanced the richness of the sheep. I liked it.

So the food was fine but the problem that evening was that there was almost an hour between each served plate, and considering the very small portions we got, we were left at the brink for the first three hours, like being the butt in some way.

A lovely dessert came at last. Carrots ice cream, which I’ve never had before, so good, and as carrots are kind of sweet I’m astounded that it hasn’t crossed my table before. Liked the cheesecake as well and it was good together with the ice cream and the sweet raisins.
And surprisingly, my last mouthful of red Jacques Cacheux suited this sweet dish too. I would never have guessed that.

I love coffee. Did I tell you that? Absolutely warm strong short and powerful espresso. I’m addicted. An understatement. I looked forward to it because the food had been so nice, and a good cup of coffee on top would just make me happy. But what a gross disappointment. The coffee was cold. COLD – how on earth can you serve a cold espresso?

Like a spoiled child I was disappointed too that I found no chocolates with the coffee.

Despite the few mistakes, I still like this place and the friendly atmosphere and it’s still good enough for a recommendation at my good food site.

Anyways, in my opinion you do get quality food and value for money at Den lille fede – but only if you have plenty of time, and like the masochistic feeling of being a little bit hungry almost throughout the entire evening. Four hours for five minor tastings? Slow food, I must say.