Coffee, Cakes, and Ceramics

Essen isn't all about mines and heavy industry (though the Krupps family have played an important part in its history for hundreds of years). It also has street markets the equal to some of my favorite in France, cute boutiques and coffee shops, and at least one bakery that would stand out in even the most cosmopolitan of cities.

We Saturday shop in Prague, visiting local stores to pick up staples and surcees for the week ahead. It's one of my favorite times of the week and about the only reason I can imagine waking up early on a weekend morning. So when Manuel and Isa, the friends we stayed with in Essen, invited us to join them on their Saturday stroll we jumped at the chance. We visited Essen's farmers' market, stopped off at a bio grocery, and took a break for coffee before sending the strollers with their bags of flowers, cheese, sausage, vegetables and a chicken or two home with the babies and a contingency of grownups to carry the bags up the stairs.

Then C, Manuel and I headed to Manuel's favorite bakery, Criolla. A bakery run by a Colombian couple, it offers cakes, meringues, pies, caramels and even homemade marshmellows. But not the vanilla flavored marshmellows you might be thinking of. These marshmellows were meltingly delicate passion-fruit flavored morsels of goodness. If you've ever imagined the Turkish Delight in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, that is exactly what they taste like. We also acquired two cake quarters for after lunch coffee and they turned out to be the moistest, most lemony cakes I've yet to eat. But the crowning glory of our taste test were the chocolate meringues. Chewy insides with outsides that melt in your mouth, they were so good, Will declared them the Best Ever Meringues and I had to agree. If you happen to be in Essen, I say, hie thee to the bakery, you will not be disappointed.

After lunch we took a tram-metro* to the mines of yesterday. There we visited a pottery studio housed in one of the old buildings of the mine. The Keramische Werkstatt Margaretenhöhe had an open house exhibition of their pottery, and we were lucky enough to be invited along to see the workshop and wares. We toured the studio (big enough for five potters and the many pots, plates and bowls they prepare before glazing, small enough to charm the children with its boathouse feel and bamboo garden) and ate more cake and coffee before heading home for the evening. It was a very cozy day, as Caroline said.

*We rode underground and above ground in it, and it looked like a tram, so I gave it the clunky title of a tram-metro. Perhaps someone else can tell me what these cool cars are called?

Best Coffee In Prague?

Our new favorite coffee spot - mamacoffee. On the corner of Rumunska and Londynska in Prague 2, mamacoffee's got beans that make our coffee pot say mnam, and serves coffee (for here or to go) that rivals the perkiest of the perky on the US West Coast. We don't even have to cross the river to find it, mamacoffee's in our neighborhood, just a few streets from home.

Meeting Lucy

 

When we visit France in the summer, it is almost always to see good friends of ours whom we met years ago when we first moved to Prague. They live in England now and have a daughter C's age and a younger son and we are very fond of hanging out with them, despite their acquired British slang (or maybe we like that too, I do enjoy learning new vocabulary on vacation ;-).

When we get together we tend to spend our visits talking and cooking, eating and talking, walking and talking, interspersed every now and again by the need to intervene in the dramas that only five year olds who think they are thirteen can create. We have a lot of territory to cover, nearly a year's worth, and five days doesn't always seem enough.

But every now and again, to get errands done, to remind each girl what she will bitterly miss as soon as we part, and to visit with other friends and family, we take a morning off and head our separate ways. During our morning out on this trip we had the pleasure of meeting up with one of the bloggers I regularly read - Lucy from Box Elder. I started stopping by Lucy's blog because of her photography, and in short order became a fan of her poetry (word clever and image oriented like Marianne Moore). She's funny too and writes about being an expat in the countryside of Brittany with the balance of feeling comfortable in her environment and recognizing its uniqueness which I like.

By a happy coincidence, Lucy not only lives in Brittany but in the neighborhood of Val Andre, and we were able to meet in a market town nearby and have some coffee and chat. Perhaps because she was freed from peer pressure for the first time that week, Caroline behaved like a saint. The baby decided to smile the entire visit, the coffee was deliciously strong and we talked and talked as if we'd met before. I'm looking forward to next time - Prague or Brittany, rain or shine!

Hot Chocolate Choices

Drop two squares of 70% chocolate into the bottom of a mug of whole milk. Microwave mug for two and a half minutes. Add kahlua or amaretto for supreme tastiness. Stir. Enjoy. Best when made by other half as an evening treat.

But if you are not at home with ingredients before you, there are other options in town. The best hot chocolate I've tasted in Prague came from Pavilon Kavarna on Vinohradská. We wound up there by chance, when we found the cukarna (sweet shop) we'd picked for Caroline’s after recital celebration closed on a Sunday. The café’s coffee is good, their ice cream okay, their hot chocolate delicious. I ordered the double with a touch of Grand Marnier. It had a hefty price tag - 85 CZK/$4.85 - but it came in its own pot and served three cups worth. It met our hot chocolate recipe and raised it (steamed milk makes real hot chocolate sublime). A single, without Grand Marnier, cost 55 CZK/$3.15.

A few weekends ago we took Caroline ice skating at Hockey Hvezda, a typical Czech bunker-style ice rink used mostly by hockey players, but open to the public at random times during the week. I was banned from the rink for balance reasons, so I watched Caroline through the windows of the pub set conveniently close to the children’s corner. To pay for my spot, I ordered a hot chocolate. The pub owner finished topping up the beer from the order in front of me and then (to my astonishment) turned to an espresso machine and foamed steamed milk into a mug. He added a powder mix, but the steamed milk made it the tastiest powdered cocoa I remember. I paid my 25 CZK/$1.43, took mug in hand, and turned back to watching Caroline play chase across the ice with her friends. There are plenty of places to skate in town, but thanks to the cocoa, I'd go back anytime we can fit into their schedule and not fall asleep - weekends, the ice is open from 6 to 8:15 pm, and 11 to midnight.

Then today, after a business lunch, I persuaded my colleague to walk into the new Starbucks with me. It was my first trip (illnesses have abounded in our house since it opened, keeping me on our side of the river) and I knew he’d get a kick out of critiquing the design and layout. It is a beautiful space - an old coffee house with arched ceilings and small rooms still intact. But it feels oddly neutral, not quite a Starbucks, nor the café it used to be. A bag of beans costs more than 10 dollars. I passed it up and tried the hot chocolate. A tall cost 80 CZK/$4.70. It arrived lukewarm with whipped cream on top. I won't be trying the chocolate again, but I’ll give them another chance when I’m a bona fide coffee drinker again.

In the meantime, our microwave beckons.

Kavarna Pavilon - Vinohradská 50, Praha 2
Hockey Hvezda - Na rozdilu 1, Praha 6
Starbucks Prague - Malostranske nám. 28

Starbucks almost here

"Is it Christmas?" Caroline asked, when I woke her early this Saturday and helped her get dressed. "Something like that" I said, before pouring out cereal and hustling to start some coffee.

Just like Christmas morning, everyone moved at their own pace. I settled into patience, braided C's hair to satisfaction and found the last lost shoe before we headed out. I'd been waiting nearly nine years for today, I could handle thirty more minutes.

The tram to downtown picked us up at 10; it crossed the river, then turned onto Malostranske namesti - our stop. Just in time, Will pulled me off the tracks as another tram went by. I thanked him distractedly before taking out my camera to document what had nearly gotten me run over: padlocks on doors, signs for another day set out on the sidewalk. Despite the news reports, the first Starbucks in Prague was still closed until Tuesday.

The morning wasn't lost. We met friends and went to Bohemia Bagel for pancakes and coffee. The latte was delicious, but I'm heading back to Mala Strana tomorrow. It's time to put that long wait behind me.

Starbucks: Malostranske Namesti 5, Praha 1

Coffee doodles

Will starts his day brewing a pot of coffee in our moka machine. We have two - a 3 cup and a 1. When we go on vacation we often take the largest, just in case coffee is in short supply. Will uses the small for his early morning brew, and it is blackened with use.

I love the 1930s design of these machines, and thought of the pot as the perfect doodle subject after our visit to the Josef Lada exhibit at Obecni Dum (Municipal House) today. Josef Lada's line drawings are inspirational, to say the least, and the thirties were prime time for him. I can just imagine him having a cup of coffee from one of these, carefully poured and steaming.

Summer means travel

A few Fridays ago a very nice guy from Czech Radio interviewed me about living in Prague as an expat. Maybe it was the hiking map I’d just bought and the beautiful weather waiting just outside the café, maybe it seemed a safe angle to take, but my answers had a decided slant to them. You can judge for yourself:

Why did you move to the Czech Republic?
Because we wanted to travel more and knew we wouldn’t have time if we lived in the U.S.

What do you see is the difference between Czechs and Americans?
Czechs are more experienced travelers, at least in part because they have a great deal more vacation time than Americans!

What do you like to do on the weekends?
Travel around the countryside.

A tak dal.

By the end of the conversation, I’m pretty sure the interviewer had decided I was a travel nut and as granola-y as they come. He asked me if I’d ever consider moving outside the city to the country (since I apparently spend all my time there). Citified as I am, and never having been asked this particular question, I was caught off guard and vehemently said “no way!” My reasons were pretty weak and I believe I mentioned an overweening love of vegetable stores and potable coffee at least three times before I stopped burbling and changed the subject.

It was an interesting question though, and I whiled away some time on the subject while walking back to my office.

Why I prefer to live in a city:
1. I love to walk and get somewhere I need to go. I love that I can walk for kilometers around Prague and still be in an interesting area and not on a highway.
2. A house in the country requires a lot of work. I begrudge time spent changing light bulbs. At times I do wish I had that maintenance bone in my body, as I love visiting chatas and camping out in the country, but I just don't possess it.
3. I like living in a place with enough people for me to blend in with and be ignored on those days when I don't feel like chatting.
4. In a city there is always a new person to meet. (See, I’m not a misanthrope!)
5. Have I mentioned vegetables? There are four veggie shops within one block of our flat. They compete to see who has cilantro, even in the winter.
6. In a city, there is always something new to experience: a new restaurant, an exhibit, concerts, new playgrounds. This is also why I like to travel.
7. I like the idea that there is an English bookstore within a few blocks of our house, just in case.
8. And then, there is the coffee.

MPs cut VAT on coffee, tea, chocolate

Isn't that a nice headline to wake up to?

Yet another reason to go to Riegrovy sady on the weekends

I’ve been a fan of Riegrovy sady, a local hillside park, since the second day we moved to Prague. That was the day Will and I hiked to the top of Vinohrady from our pension across the river so that we could check out one of the English language bookstores we’d read about before we arrived. The bookstore was at the far end of Manesova, one block from Jiriho z Podebrad, and on the way up that endless hill we passed by an edge of a park that made me think I had seen a mirage, so green was the view in the middle of the gray city. We had caught a glimpse of Riegrovy beach - the south-facing hillside where sunlovers lie even in spring to catch the rays. It turns green sooner than any place I know in Prague and it is a sight for eyes jaded by the cold.

We wound up renting a flat a few minutes from Riegrovy and ever since I’ve often gone out of my way to walk through it on the way to work, to play basketball on its outside courts, meet up with friends in the beer garden in its center. Now we spend many a Saturday morning at the Riegrovy playground, hanging out with friends until we can wrest the kids away and head to a restaurant or café for lunch or coffee.

There are a fair number of kid-friendly restaurants in the area, especially on a weekend at lunch time. In the summer the best place by far is the Greek restaurant Olympos, because it has a garden with its own playground. But come winter and fall, Olympos is too crowded inside for children, so we rotate between the friendly Italians at Roca and a table tucked into a corner at Kaaba. This last Saturday, we decided to try some place new.

I’d noticed the café before Christmas, walking home through the park. Its Illy sign suggested good coffee (and wise management) but with December upon us I mostly forgot about it. Friday though, one of our friends mentioned the café had paired with a bookshop next door - a used books bookshop, of the English variety - and from some place to try sometime soon, Cafe Metropole became some place to try tomorrow.

Saturday it was cold. Very cold. We skipped the playground and instead swung C between our hands as we walked. We swung her to make up for missing out on the playground, and so we could get there faster. As we ducked into the basement bookstore my ears began to melt and my glasses to steam up, but I could still see enough to make a beeline to the children’s books, looking for something that would serve Caroline as a distraction we could afford to take home. Mother Goose! In seconds C was posted in the store’s chair, reading, and it was my turn.

The store is the little sister of the larger Anagram bookstore downtown. It is a small collection, but tasty, not the usual canonical stuff you often see in used book stores along the great college kid migration path in Europe. I found a book of short stories by Ellen Gilchrist and an Ellis Peters mystery; we bought the Mother Goose book too. Then we moved next door to eat lunch and try out the coffee.

Both the café and the bookstore are in a basement, with low ceilings and high windows. The owner has lightened what could be a dark space with leather chairs and walls just the darker side of cream. He said that he’d kept painting until the walls looked right, not too white but light enough to reflect light back into the room for those dark middays in winter. We tried some sandwiches and a coronation chicken wrap, and all were good: a real BLT, delicious curry, sandwiches C could eat with relish and ease. The coffee was as good as I hoped, and the owner proved his client friendliness by serving it to me twice - once just before Caroline started to howl (and I ducked with her into the bathroom) and then when we came out, face washed and ready to try civilization again.

We’ve already got plans to try the café out again too - next weekend. I’ve heard they’ve got karaoke Saturday nights!

Café Metropole and Anagram bookshop - Anny Letenske 18, Prague 2.

Filed under: Prague coffee

Prague's coffee culture

Today Tchibo is running a promotion in our local drogerie, giving away balloons to children, filtered coffee to adults. Grateful for the balloon, I accept a coffee. It is, predictably, lukewarm and scalded. Balancing the cup carefully on the checkout counter ledge, corralling Caroline with my legs, I pay for diapers, bird feed, trash bags (sundries but no medicine found at drug stores here). Outside I try another sip, but it is dreadful stuff and we caffeinate a tree before throwing the cup away in a city trash can.

When Will and I first moved to Prague, filtered coffee was a novelty, the closest approximation something the Czechs called Turkish coffee, and we called cowboy coffee. Cowboy coffee is hot water poured over coffee grounds, left to steep, and filtered by teeth or the careful tilt application of the cup. Will and I had arrived in Prague with our first trip to Europe fresh in our memories - a visit to Italy, where our perhaps favorite pastime had been drinking espressos while we leaned on counters throughout the Veneto region, learning how to travel on our own, learning how to travel together, on our honeymoon.

A year later, Prague in May had an Italian look to us, with its blue skies unfuzzed by humidity, its burnt umber and golden yellow buildings, facades crumbling but still demarcated enough to show off the beauty of the art nouveau design. Prague had a history too of cafes, old kavarnas that matched the style of Viennese coffee houses - beautifully tall and ornate ceilings, coffee served by waiters in tuxedos bearing tin trays complete with the requisite tiny cup of water as chaser. So we had high hopes.

Drinking lukewarm cowboy coffee soon taught us the difference between Vienna, Venice, and Prague in 1999. We learned to make our own drip coffee with a filter that we could set on top of our mugs, sharing out beans that we established as toll for our first guests, who flocked to visit Prague that summer, still missing us, and with our guest room on offer. Our grinder was a ferocious thing, bought from an expat moving back to England, a treasure even after we discovered its remarkable ability to hold a charge for hours after we unplugged it, shocking unwitting handlers to this day if you don’t take care.

November 2005, Prague is a different city. You can buy excellent coffee beans in many places here now, Colombian roasted if you are a connoisseur, Starbucks if you are an addict. Within only a few blocks of where we live, cafés now routinely serve my favorite Italian coffee and I can find coffee filters even in our local green grocer (in 1999, we bought our coffee filters in certain hardware stores whose addresses were circulated amongst the desperate and under caffeinated). And even though the filtered coffee might be burnt and cold after hours sitting near the door of the local drug store, it is there, on promotion, ready to be handed out along with the balloon that will slowly lose its air while my daughter bats it across the room and back again, a few minutes worth of fun.

Filed under: Prague expats coffee

A Prague design tour: from art nouveau to cubism

Christmas is at our house this year! Though, I should really say our flat, or our three point five rooms. The thought of entertaining 12 people for a week at Christmas is slightly daunting, to be sure, so I’ve decided to get organized and forego my usual lackadaisical tour guide approach (here is a map marked XYZ, take the tram to the castle - X, roll down the hill and you’ll hit the Charles Bridge - Y, here’s our house - Z, see you in time for dinner!)

This time I've decided to think thematically, to try to come up with new routes around the city that bypass the end of the alphabet etched in red on all of our maps. Not that I'm throwing away the castle-roll-down-the-hill tour but I’m adding technical museums and architecture, sports centers and opera. Watch this space as new letters get added to the map each week.

The first tour (beyond the castle):

The Mucha museum
Just off one of Prague’s busiest shopping streets, the Mucha museum is a tiny space dominated by the oversize work of Alfons Mucha, the artist who founded the Art Nouveau movement (originally called Le style Mucha) in Paris in the mid 1890s. By spending even an hour here, you’ll exit the museum with a new perspective and understanding on a good slice of the design around Prague - from Czech money to many of the buildings built during a time of great construction in Prague, 1900 to 1910. I recommend watching the video while you're there.
Mucha museum website
Panská 7, Prague 1. Open daily 10:00 to 6:00 p.m.

Obecní Dům, or the Municipal House
A massive highlight of Art Nouveau architecture in Prague, the Obecní Dům is located just down the road from the Mucha museum. Completed in 1912, it was the last of the big Prague Art Nouveau projects, and Mucha had a hand in many of its murals. I recommend viewing it from both outside and in as the Obecní Dům is a beautiful example of design applied to everything from bathroom tiles to building facades.
Municipal House website
nám. Republiky 5, Prague 1. Open daily 10:00 to 6:00 p.m.

The House of the Black Madonna, the Museum of Czech Cubist Art
Built the same year the Obecní Dům was completed, in 1912, the House of the Black Madonna not only demonstrates cubist architecture (apparently an architectural style unique to the Czech Republic) but hosts art by Czech Cubists. It is part of the National Gallery in Prague system.
More information on the House of the Black Madonna
Celetná 34, Prague 1. Open daily except Mondays 10 to 6 p.m.

Grand Café Orient, at the House of the Black Madonna
Recently reopened and reconstructed to exactly match the plan of the original cafe, completed at the same time as the house, the Café is a beautiful place to take a break and have some coffee. Reviewers recommend the latte.
Celetná 34, Prague 1. Open daily 9 a.m.–10 p.m.

Filed under: Prague architecture tour