Pille

Ok, I spoke to Kristjan, and he knew straight away the place you were talking about. He obviously knows Tallinn's night club scene much better than I do, actually much better than I thought he would know If he's right, then the place you had a tasting menu is called Ö (yep, just one funny letter), where the Chef de Cuisine is a young Estonian Russian guy Roman Zastserinski. He was actually named the Chef of the Year by the Estonian Gastronomy Society in 2005. I've never eaten in Ö myself (yet), but as I attended the Estonian Gastronomy Society's 2006 Gala Dinner in early January, I've eaten his food - the previous year's winner designs and prepares the menu for next year's gala dinner (you can read about the gala menu here). So yes, he's still there, and he's still going strong.

Thank you, Michelle! The small coffee table we had was cluttered, so I placed my plate on one of the small wall lights LucyLou - thank you for your kind words about the pictures, and I hope I'll be able to introduce my little country over the week. I like my bookshelves and study, too, Rehovot! Re:haggis towers - I have only seen them twice before, in two various branches of Peckhams restaurants in Edinburgh. Hope they're not too tacky, Abra? Re: sea buckthorns - they grow in many gardens, and have been hugely popular in Estonia over the last decade or so. My granny has one in her garden, too! And finally, mushrooms. It's ok to sell wild mushrooms at the market, as long as they're fresh and whole. I'm actually not sure if it's legal to sell non-commercially salted/pickled/dried mushrooms at the market, but considering that this has been done throughout the summer, I think it could be. Lots of wild mushrooms prepared in various ways are sold at the regular supermarkets as well. One Finnish foodblogger friend of mine was in Tallinn last December, and bought 6 kilograms of salted and pickled wild mushrooms from one shop- that's a lot of mushrooms!!! Apparently the cashier had looked rather amused

Now something for all those of you who celebrated Rosh Hashanah recently . While Cafe Peterson will continue to be one of my regular lunch places, I'm also very excited about this new 'venue' just across the road from there: Tallinn got a new Jewish Synagogue (Juudi Sünagoog) recently - it was officially opened on May 16, 2007 by Shimon Peres, and the President and the Prime Minister of Estonia. I'm not a Jew (like majority of Estonians, and our Finnish and other Nordic neighbours, I'm a Lutheran), but ever since reading Claudia Roden's wonderful and informative book on Jewish food, I've been fascinated about the cuisine. I spoke to an old guy in front of the synagogue last Friday, and he proudly informed me that a Kosher restaurant will be opened to the general public in October, and that it'll be the best restaurant in town I'll be there checking it out as soon as it opens. Here are two more photos of the new synagogue - quite a fancy building, don't you think? The architects were Tõnis Kimmel & Kaur Stöör from KOKO Arhitektid. a beautiful front door: a view from the side:

Wednesdays are my longest days, at least this autumn. I've got a cookery class from 4-7pm, and a photography class from 7-10pm. A substantial lunch was therefore needed, to last me until the late evening (though I'm bound to grab a chocolate between classes ) I won't be cooking any dinner tonight, as I get home way too late. Kristjan will be having the leftover haggis from yesterday, so he's fine, too There's a very nice and light cafeteria just down the road from the university, called Cafe Peterson. They do both breakfasts and lunches, offering a hot cereal porridge for the former, a daily soup and short daily menu for the latter, in addition to cakes, salads, quiches and a la carte menu. You can also order various cakes and pastries and kringles from the cafe - quite popular among people who don't bake themselves. Many people have their favourite cafe/bakery they turn to when they need a 2-kilogram kringle or a fancy cake for their own or their child's birthday. I've never ordered a full quiche or cake from them, although I've tried many of them when I've eaten at cafe. And they inspired one of my great recent baking successes, a pear and blue cheese quiche that I can see myself making again and again during the Christmas season (you can see a picture here). Today's soup was chicken and knedle soup, and you can see the soup container on the far right: It's popular with people from nearby offices - university, few banks, the National Audit Office. It's connected to a small art gallery in the back, and has a slightly bohemian feel to it. It tended to attract heavy-smoking intellectuals as well, but luckily smoking is forbidden in all cafes, bars and restaurants in Estonia now, so I don't have to worry about sensitive eyes and stinking clothes after lunch anymore I meet my university friend Rutt for lunch once every week, and Cafe Peterson is the chosen venue, as it's conveniently located exactly in the middle of our respective work places (Tallinn University for me, National Audit Office for her), and it's a great opportunity to catch up. We both chose the same dish from today's special menu - Mozzarella and Eggplant/Aubergine casserole (50 EEK). The dish was served with a lightly dressed white cabbage and radish salad: Nothing spectacular, but still a very satisfying homey meal (the food is prepared in a tiny kitchen in the back). Other today's special dishes included the above-mentioned soup, mushroom risotto, honey-glazed chicken, and some fish dishes.

Good morning! It's wet and windy outside, so I opted for a heavy and filling breakfast that would keep me warm Having open sandwiches for breakfast is typical in Estonia, too, and that's exactly what I had today: A cup of black coffee, a large bowl of baked apple yogurt with some home-grown Alpine strawberries, a small bowl of home-grown tiny sweet cherry tomatoes (we've got a cherry tomato and alpine strawberry containers on the windowsill, and they're growing well. Until a fortnight ago they were outside, but as there's danger of night frost already, we moved them inside), and three sandwiches. The large oval one on the left is a shop-bought rye bread slice with Eesti juust or 'Estonian cheese', the other two slices are 100% rye bread I baked last night - one topped with beef, the other with Vene juust alias 'Russian cheese'. Here are few pictures of the cheese I used: Top row is 'Estonian cheese' which has been made locally since 1959. The recipe and technology were developed in a small town called Vändra, and it's a young cheese- ripened only for a month. A 1978 book on cheese (called 'Juust') claims that the cheese can be ripened so quickly because they use a special activated cheese starter culture that is unique to Estonian cheese making tradition. I don't know if that's true or still holds The cheese comes in cylinder shape and weighs 2-3 kg. Fat content is 45% in dry matter and 25.2% in the ready-made cheese. The bottom row is 'Russian cheese' that was first made in a Russian town Uglich, and has been made locally since the Soviet time. It has a mildly sour taste, and a 'lacy' texture, which you can see on the cut slice. It feels quite fragile, if you can say that about cheese The cheese's fat content is 50% and 28.5% respectively.

Beautiful, beautiful photos, Lisa!!!

I'd probably think there's something wrong with my lawn when it'd be mushrooming, too, Tracey Forageing for mushrooms is a hard job - you need to be properly dressed to keep you safe from elements (wind, rain, ticks, snakes, mosquitos etc), and you need to know all those secret mushroom-rich hidden forests... We drive 80 km to the countryside to find our mushrooms Thank you, Shelby! I suspect Borowik is a Polish name for porcini/cep mushrooms, Monovano, no? Wonderful! I'm sure you'll make a great soup with them (and you've just reminded that we bought a packet of dried porcini on our skiing trip in Italy in February. Need to look that up soon!). We don't get corn here in Estonia. Or rather, I've seen husks at the market, but as I know they have travelled a very long distance and that corn is best soon after harvesting, I've ignored them more or less.. Welcome, Michelle! First of all, let me tell you that I'm sorry to hear about your Venezuelan friends - hope they recovered from their hospitalisation quickly! The red mushrooms in the basket are of the Russula family. They're great, as they have a nice somewhat 'crispy' texture that makes them ideal for mushroom salads (I hate mushy mushroom salads!). Some of them can be cooked straight away, some have to be blanched for 20-30 minutes, maybe changing water twice. If you're unsure, leave them on the ground Aitäh, Peter! Well, I've posted my Scottish dinner photos now. And yes, the riots triggered by the relocation of a Bronze Soldier monument from the town centre to a military cemetery in the city did take place in Tallinn (however, Snowangel has warned me strictly not to discuss politics, so I won't ) Hope you, Peter - and your twins! - will have a chance to visit Tallinn & the rest of Estonia before, well, too long Have you checked where these are from, Gruzia? Might be from Estonia or Latvia - it'd be fun to know Hi Dejah! I made a sea buckthorn cheesecake last Christmas (thrice, actually, as it was so nice), so I might be making that - or something totally different. We'll see..

Finally, tonight's dinner. While we were waiting for the main meal to cook, we nibbled on salted mushrooms salad zakuska. I chopped those salted gypsy mushrooms I bought from the market (see above) into small cubes, mixed with finely chopped raw onion and fresh parsley, dressed all with sour cream and seasoned with salt and pepper: The salad was spooned on top of thin rye bread slices, and voila! - you've got a delicious little something: Here are all the ingredients for our Scottish meal: That's haggis, neeps (turnips), tatties (potatoes), onions (not traditional, but I love my haggis with caramelised onion gravy). I was in Scotland in early September for a conference, and brought back a packet of my favourite haggis - MacSween of Edinburgh: Many of the haggises I tried over my seven years in Edinburgh were too greasy or too bland. I like this particular one as it's well seasoned and has a nice texture. Haggis comes pre-cooked, so all you need is to heat it through thoroughly. I removed the outer packaging and wrapped it in foil, after which I placed it in the 200C oven for about 45 minutes. Here's a photo of a piping hot and thoroughly cooked haggis, really keen to 'jump out' of its packaging: While haggis was baking, I peeled the potatoes and turnips and cut them into large chunks, after which I boiled them separately in slightly salted water. When ready, I drained the vegetables, added some milk, butter and salt to both and freshly grated nutmeg to turnips and mashed them until smooth. I don't usually 'do' towers in my kitchen, but I liked the way one of my favourite deli-cafes in Edinburgh, Peckhams, serves haggis, so I tried it at home. And it worked : The sauce is a simple caramelised onion gravy. I chopped three onions finely and slowly sauteed them in some oil on a heavy frying pan, then I added some demerara sugar and water and Marigold stock powder, later some Marmite for flavour and colour (yep, my secret gravy colouring ), and finally thickened the sauce with a bit of flour. We didn't make any extra dessert, as there's still some apple cake left. So apologies to all of you who were expecting a gorgeous Scottish cranachan to finish off the meal!!! Now, Suzi was asking about my relationship to Scottish food: Well, I do miss a good haggis occasionally, but then I've had it thrice already in Estonia this year - in January for Burns Supper a friend brought back some, and I brought some haggis back from my trips to Scotland in June and in September. Apart from that it's hard to say what I miss. There's no particular Scottish product that I long for, but I do miss the great range of 'ethnic grocery stores' available in Edinburgh.. And those pork sausages from Puddledub Pork & Fifeshire Bacon Co that I used to buy from the Farmers Market

After Chocolats de Pierre we headed to a newish place around the corner, called Clazz (I believe it's supposed to mean a Classy Jazz cafe or something like that), with another friend of mine, Liina, joining us. I hadn't been there before, but they were throwing an end-of-summer-party to attract new people, and they served free wine and fingerfood. It's a basement lounge, and they claim to serve 'the classical European kitchen with the fresh Scandinavian touch and strong smooth tastes of raw materials' (a quote from their promotion leaflet). I don't know about that, as we didn't sample their regular menu, but I liked the vibe of the place and will happily go back. Those of you who know Tallinn and the medieval restaurant Olde Hansa will easily find the place - it's exactly opposite Olde Hansa and has actually the same proprietors. (It's open and serving food until 3am, and the address is Vana turg 2). Tonight they served rolls with salted beef, chicken confit and smoked salmon rolls: For dessert, there were small raspberry parfait cones: Small shot glasses of caramel & pear panna cotta: I managed to pile all desserts onto one plate : I stayed for about an hour and half, and then got a lift home with Kristjan..

I met a friend of mine (called Hille, coincidentally) for a coffee in Old Town (Vanalinn) at 4pm. We went to Chocolats de Pierre, an enchanted little cafe hidden in a courtyard on Vene street. (You can read more about it here and here.) Here's how it looks from outside (this photo is taken last Sunday): The old derelict building on the far back is from the 12th century and is being refurbished at the moment.. Unfortunately I forgot to change the camera setting from landscape to 'normal' when I got to the cafe, so all the pictures I took there today were extremely fuzzy However, I did get some more or less satisfactory snapshots, too. The cafe specialices in chocolates, as its name indicates: The interior is very luscious and decadent - dark heavy textured textiles, old lamp shades, etc taking you back to the beginning of last century. Here are some lovely tea glasses: I had a cup of coffee and shared a chocolate cake with Hille: Not sure where all that garish garnish came from - they've never topped my cake with cocktail cherry there before!? If you're ever in Tallinn, then this is an ideal place to pop for a cup of coffee/tea/hot chocolate and a slice of cake, and spend some time reading a good book.. (Vene street 6, in the courtyard)

Ok, time to talk about the market. There are few markets in Tallinn, Kristjan and I shop at Tallinna Keskturg or Tallinn Central Market at least once a week. While still living in Edinburgh, I frequented the farmers' market that took place on Saturday's on Castlehill Terrace. That was a neat little market selling local produce and I loved it. The concept of farmers market is still unknown here in Estonia, and markets tend to sell stuff - both food and non-food - from near and far. A bit chaotic, and bits of it don't appeal to me at all, but I've discovered several wonderful stalls selling great produce, and enjoy our weekly trips a lot. Again, as we've both quite busy this week, and because of Kristjan's work we cannot be sure we'd have time to go to the market this coming weekend, we went to the market last Saturday and took some photos for you. To start with, here's a typical autumnal market stall: Note the jars of home-pickled mushrooms, grated horseradish, and adjika on the left, and containers with salted tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers in the the front. You can choose between 1-day, 2-day, 3-day or very sour cucumbers - I love the 1-day ones, which are still very mildly salted. Pumpkins everywhere: and here: Here's one of my favourite stalls - Uus-Kongo Farm. They sold fresh Estonian asparagus earlier this year, which pleased me enormously. I didn't even know we grew asparagus as a vegetable in Estonia, so I was extra excited. As the market is just 15 minute walk from the University, I asked Kristjan to drop me off at the market instead every other day, and bought a new batch of asparagus It's a highly seasonal stall - asparagus and salad leaves during spring, various wonderfully crisp salad leaves and spinach during summer, and now sauerkraut in various disguises - sour, mild, with apples, with garlic, with horseradish, red and white - you name it. Here's a view of the stall: and here's a close-up of sauerkraut: Their sauerkraut is really popular, and is the sauerkraut of choice for many of Tallinn's restaurants appearently. They definitely have long queues all the time! Here's my other favourite stall - I don't know the name of the lady, but she's Russian, and she speaks very poor Estonian. My Russian isn't good either, but yet we understand each other perfectly. In early spring, she sold me beautiful and fresh morel mushrooms and Ptychoverpa bohemica mushrooms (considered delicious eating mushrooms by Estonian, Finnish, and Swedish mushroom experts, and inedible by US sources. Go figure!) this spring, and wonderful French apricots earlier this summer (yep, the ones I used for Dave Hatfield's apricot tart). But her main secret is her adjika, a spicy Georgian red pepper condiment. There are several stalls selling it at the market, but hers is the best. She often runs out of it, but tends to keep one jar 'under the counter' for us (just like in the good old Soviet days ). Here's me returning the empty adjika jars for her (note the huge porcini mushrooms and yellow chantarelles!): And here's me buying those tiny sweet Kiš-miš grapes from her: Although we prefer forageing for our own wild mushrooms, it's not always an option. 'Our mushroom forests' are about 80 kilometres from Tallinn, and it's not always easy to find the half or full day to venture there. Luckily, there are plenty of stalls selling wild mushrooms at the market, mostly Estonian Russian women (although we use a wide variety of wild mushrooms compared to an 'average' western consumer, then Russians use yet much, much wider variety and are much better mushroom consumers and foragers than Estonians are). I discovered this old Russian lady above few weeks ago - she sells both fresh gypsy mushrooms, as well as extremely delicious salted mushrooms. Here are the salted mushrooms - note the neat Estonian signs: A jar of salted gypsy mushrooms (Rozites caperata) on the left and a jar of salted rufous milkcaps (Lactarius rufus) on the right. I love the gypsy mushrooms - they've got such a distinct mushroom fragrance and flavour, and the salted ones are wonderful just eaten au naturel, or mixed with chopped onion and sour cream as a sakuska. The market is also a great place for buying various wild berries, if you cannot make it to the forests/bogs/fields. I managed to pick wild strawberries, cloudberries, bog bilberries, bilberries and lingonberries myself this summer, but all these would be widely available at the market, too. Last weekend there were plenty of stalls offering lingonberries and really large wild cranberries. Also, astelpajumarjad or sea buckthorn berries are ripe now, and there were several stalls offering them: Here's a picture of a guy selling various local apple varieties. We didn't buy any, as we get way more than we are able to eat from my mum, but we did buy plums, broad beans, and wild bilberries from the guy earlier this year: And finally, here's the bounty we brought back home: On the right you can see some beetroots, carrots and cabbage I used for borsch (Kristjan's dinner last night), some turnips (for tonight's Scottish dinner), and a bottle of 100% pure unsweetened Azerbaijan pomegranate juice. There are also some green tomatoes, as I re-watched the film again recently and am keen to try the famous fried green tomatoes (if anybody has got a good recipe, I'm happy to listen!). In the basket there are some fresh gypsy mushrooms (and underneath are hiding salted ones you saw above), sweet tiny Kiš-miš grapes, fresh parsley & coriander/cilantro, potatoes, garlic, a jar of Georgian adjika condiment, a bag of red sauerkraut (and underneath is a bag of 'usual' sauerkraut), as well as some sea buckthorn berries that I hope to use for a dessert during the week. I'm off to meet a friend in a lovely cafe in the middle of old town now. Nägemiseni! Edited to add that the exchange rates for EEK (Eesti kroon or Estonian crown) are following: 1 USD - 11.3 EEK 1 Canadian dollar - 11.1 EEK 1 GBP - 22.6 EEK 1 EURO - 15.7 EEK

Is it normal for you to have work meetings on what Americans consider the weekend? I've only heard of one such regularly occurring meeting, and that (surprise!) was also in the academic world, and had been happening every Saturday for the last 40 years or so. MelissaH ← Not for me, really But we are about to launch a new research project in October (my first proper research grant ), and we're meeting in a very nice cafe on Saturday afternoon. Saturday was the best option, as one of the researchers is due to return to Scotland on Sunday, another is only arriving from Japan on Thursday night, and third is popping over for the weekend from Paris, where he's seconded at the moment, so we agreed 'somewhere' in the middle.. We may come and go as we want and don't have the 9-5 schedule, but then occasionally we have to work at nights or even weekends However, we've got 6 weeks of summer holiday, so I cannot really complain about an occasional working weekend In any case, we're seven people aged in our 20s/early 30s (3 Estonians, 2 Americans, 1 Romanian, 1 Portuguese), so it's more like a cup of coffee in a cafe on Saturday with some work-related discussions thrown in Kristjan is an entrepreneur in salvaging business, and as they've got a big project going on at the moment, he's had no free weekends throughout August. Luckily the project is about to end, so we'll get our 'normal routine' (i.e. weekends off) soon!

Abra - we're huge mushroom lovers, too, and eat quite a large variety of wild mushrooms, both in their pickled, salted, dried and fresh state. I picked up some kitsemamplid or gypsy mushrooms (Rozites caperata) at the market last weekend, and will show you pictures on my market posting. During July-August we consumed wild chantarelles several times a week. In 'normal' circumstances we'd go to forage for wild mushrooms coming weekend and share photos with you. However, I've got a work meeting on Saturday and Kristjan is wrapping up a large project at work, too, so his schedule is hectic, and it's unlikely we'll make it to the wilderness. However, I'm happy to introduce you to this lovely Boletus rufus we picked few weeks ago: and show off this wild mushroom basket picked by yours truly last October : (mushroom photos are taken by Kristjan) I guess when you look from further afield, Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian cuisines seem pretty similar, but once you're here, you'll notice the subtle differences. Traditional Estonian cuisine is a mixture of Nordic, Russian and German elements, and the Scandinavian influences in Lithuania would be negligent, whereas Polish influences in Estonia are non-existent. By the way, Adam, I loved your Vilnius food images thread!

Thank you for clarifying this, Monavano! I think I've seen photos of Polish beetroot soup on this lovely foodblog by a Polish girl living in Sweden. Are you familiar with that blog? Thank you, Percy! I'm hoping to have plenty of good eats myself Thank you for reading, Anna N! Oh, the British stag parties. They're everywhere.. Re: the upscale restaurant - I could think of many restaurants located between old town and the harbour that do a tasting menu - Stenhus, Egoist, for example, but I cannot think of any with a nightclub upstairs. Let me think about it, Mr Delicious.. Did you spot the Moomin 'Kärlek/Love' spoon on the breakfast spread photo today, Eden? Re: Vana Tallinn liqueur - it's an acquired taste, and although I didn't like it for ages, I now happily drink it. There is also a cream liqueur version now that I always prefer to the most common cream liqueur (Bailey's that is). I find it has much more character and isn't as cloyingly sweet. Cloudberry jam could be used on toast, it'd be nice with cheese, and there are several desserts you can incorporate it into. I'll show you one soon MarketStEl - you've obviously paid attention in your history class - that's more than many other people I've met! And yes - a dollop of hapukoor or sour cream is a standard soup garnish over here, at least in domestic cooking. You can get three versions in shop nowadays - 10%, 20%, 30% fat content, with 20% one being the 'traditional'. I'll return to your trademark question later on There are many versions of solyanka - it can be made with beef, pork, fish and mushrooms. The Estonian version is somewhat meat-light and onion-heavy, and I love it that way (I've written about it here). I haven't stopped looking for the sprat can skyline proof, so keep your fingers crossed, Mizducky Yes, we do, Jen! I've written about mushroom pierogis - seenepirukad - here, but they can be made with rice, pork, beef, cabbage, etc filling. They're wonderful! And I'll make sure you'll hear and see about them this week Happy to oblige - I'll add it to RecipeGullet during the week and let you know! I'll add the apple cake recipe to RecipeGullet at some point during the week, so you can make it and see how it compares with John's granny's version! And there will be meat, Suzi, I promise!

I'm ready to dash off (I'm taking my time this morning - the joys of working in academia ). Before I go, I'll post you pictures of my 'foodblogger's corner', so you'd know where I'm blogging from . It's in the upstairs lobby (just next to our bedroom), which was empty until last week. Kristjan bought me two high bookshelves to fit all my cookbooks and food magazines (he's a good boyfriend ): And then I also needed a study desk, as it would have been unconvenient to walk upstairs whenever I needed to check something from a cookbook or another (there's a study/home office on the ground floor, too). The desk and chair arrived last week, and they're just across the room from the bookshelves: I love that little corner of mine

Tere hommikust, everyone! I had breakfast on my own this morning, as Kristjan left at some ungodly hour (6am?), and I couldn't possibly be expected to get up so early. Instead I slept till after 8, and had a leisurely breakfast while reading the morning paper. I've also checked my eGullet foodblog, of course - so many exciting questions . Let me just promise you that there will be pictures of pierogi, recipes for sauerkraut soup, information about soup garnishes, and photos of trams - and trolleys. But later.. Today's breakfast was dairy-heavy. I asked Kristjan to bring some yogurt from the supermarket on the way home last night, and he brought a whole selection: The large one on the left is ahjuõunajogurt alias baked apple yogurt with cinnamon. The small tube in the middle is juustumaitseline murakajogurt alias cream cheese and cloudberry jam yogurt. The top round tube is pohla-müslijogurt alias lingonberry and muesli yogurt, and the one on the right is rabarberi-kaerajogurt alias rhubarb and oat yogurt. My breakfast today: a bowl of baked apple yogurt (my absolute favourite), a slice of last night's apple cake, a small bowl of tiny sweet grapes (they're sold as Kiš-miš grapes at the market) and a cup of rooibos tea: Kristjan also brought couple of glasuurkohuke alias chocolate-glazed curd cheese bars last night and insisted I blog about them : These are very popular here, especially among kids (and their parents), come in many different flavours nowadays (I'm quite partial to the ones with cranberry jam inside). I remember eating them as a kid, and still have one every now and then. Here's a close-up: The label says it's 56% curd cheese, 20% chocolate glaze, plus sugar and vanillin. They're quite high in calories - 320kcal/100 grams, but have (apparently) a good ratio of carbs to proteins, so are better for sugar cravings than plain chocolate. I think Anyway. Time to get dressed and head to work. I think I'll skip lunch today, as I'm already meeting a friend for a coffee and a cake or two in a very nice old town cafe at 4pm. Afterwards we'll be checking out a new jazz bar that's throwing an end-of-summer-party with drinks and nibbles between 5-7pm. Dinner tonight will be Scottish

Mmmm. Dumplings. I'm afraid that's more Eastern/Southern European thing. We've got something called pontšikud, which are deep-fried curd cheese 'dumplings', but I doubt I'll be eating them this week. I promise lots of nice looking cakes and pastries, however! I'll blog about the rye bread in a few days. And I'm quite enjoying the cooking class, too. It's heavy stuff, however - 220 hours of various theoretical, practical and internship classes. I won't have any free and relaxing evenings in the near future!!! Ok. Kristjan is back home, and ate his dinner alone, as I realised I was simply too stuffed after all that soup tasting at the cookery school! He ate a large plate of vegetarian borsch (remember the title of Alinka's great food blog from Moscow? ) I had made the soup last weekend, thinking that I'll be too tired to cook tonight after work. Soups like that are life saviours during busy periods, as you can make them in advance and their flavour only improves over the next few days. You'll find a recipe for the soup here earlier today, and I also give you a picture taken during the weekend, as the light is so much better on that photo than on anything I could take at 9.30pm. Hope you don't mind Monovano - is this similar to Polish beet soups at all? I did some baking tonight, however. I thought it would be nice to have something 'cakey' for breakfast tomorrow morning, so I quickly made one of my staple apple cakes. It takes 5 minutes to assemble (plus the time it takes you to core and chop the apples. I never peel the apples from my mum's garden, so it's a quick task). I got so many apples from my mum last weekend that if we'd want, we could eat only apples for the week and still get all the necessary calories!!! Again, I've posted a recipe for this easy and delicious (and typically Estonian) cake on here on my non-eG blog, so I won't reprint it here. I actually made this cake last week, too, to take along to my grandma's 86th birthday party. She loved it It's easy: mix flour, sugar, baking powder and salt (top left corner). Melt the butter, whisk in kefir and eggs, mix with dry ingredients. Fold in the apples, pour into a tin, sprinkle with pearl sugar, bake and cut into chunks. I just had two squares with a cup of herbal infusion, Kristjan had four.. We're not very good in exercising self-restraint Luckily, there's still some left for breakfast..

Dave - well, that apricot cake was delicious, so it was easy to be kind about it! Estonian & Finnish sauna rituals are pretty much the same. Sitting naked in a hot steamroom, beating oneself with dried & soaked birch branches, then running out of the sauna and jumping into a cold lake/soft snow, depending on the time of the year. The usual, you know As far as crayfish parties are concerned, we're definitely not as nutty. I think that's unique to our Nothern neighbours. And language. Estonian is a Finno-Ugric language, just like Finnish (and Hungarian, though more distantly). It's spoken by about 1 million people. Finnish and Estonian are very similar, though not as similar as, say, Swedish and Danish (I speak the latter and can therefore also read Swedish and Norwegian). People in the Northern Estonia usually understand Finnish easily, but then we were able to watch Finnish television even during the Soviet years. You need to have some contact with the other language and understand how to understand (does that make sense? ) Estonian is a phonetic language, there's no future dense, no grammatic gender (there's only one word to describe she/he - tema), we don't use prepositions*, but we've got 14 cases to compensate for that (you need to use one of the 14 various options for every noun, depending on what you're saying). Estonian Institute has a good article on eesti keel. A difficult, but very melodic language with lots of vowels. * That's the main reason behind my wrong use of prepositions. If you only knew how many times the people I had just met in Scotland would tell me about their love for Arvo Pärt and/or Veljo Tormis!!! I used to sing in a choir when at school & uni, and Veljo Tormis was always such fun to sing! Thank you! I bet he would love that rye bread, Annecros! Mojoman - yep, it's pretty pork heavy, apart from the coastal areas, where fish would be more common. We don't eat much meat at all in our house, but I'll make sure there's a typical pork dish featured somewhere.. Judy - well, I hope to give you plenty of necessary prior information. And yes - Olde Hansa is a must. It may be touristy, and it's definitely not a gourmet place, but it's such a great venue (and yes, I've mentioned it on my other blog on several occasion). I've taken all my visiting friends there, and they've all enjoyed it. Mmm. Let me know if you need a dinner partner, I might be available Jensen - thank you! I'll make sure to include more location shots. Hope you don't mind some shots from the Old Town? It's the best preserved medieval town in Northern Europe, and there's loads of picturesesque views to be taken. Incidentally, I'm meeting a friend in one of my favourite courtyard cafes in the middle of old town tomorrow afternoon

Back home after our first hands-on cooking class, where I made one soup and tried nine different soups! I should have thought of that when making soup for us over the weekend. Kristjan should be at home within an hour or so, and we'll have a light dinner together. Here's the soup I made at the class: Vegetarian sauerkraut soup (sauerkraut, carrots, onion, pearl barley)- very homey and typically Estonian (though a pork version would be more common). The teacher approved My classmates were in charge of making 2 different solyanka soups, a lentil and bacon soup, a farmer's soup (beef, onion, potato, carrot, tomato, sweetcorn, peas, celery), minestrone, cabbage & pork soup, borsch, fish frikadelle soup. It was fun - though I didn't enjoy the fact that we had to clean the whole kitchen spotless afterwards Just to clarify: I don't plan a career change - I'm pretty happy with my job as a sociologist - but I did think a diploma might come handy with some of the plans I have with my Estonian language recipe collection. I've had this site (also called Nami-nami) since 2000, and it currently hosts about 8000 recipes. I'm planning a major redesign there (the design is from 2000, too ) and hence the thrice-weekly evenings at the cookery school.. The woman who was in charge at the kitchen today has been teaching cookery for 46 years, so it's pretty old-school stuff. No nouvelle cuisine whatsoever

Thank you, Domestic Goddess & Markemorse!! I'm glad to hear that you liked my non-eG foodblog I had lunch at one of the university cafes today. The atmosphere is very nice, but the food is nothing spectacular. The choice is limited to salads, cakes, pastries, and the larger cafe also has a soup and a stew every day. I was in the smaller one, and had a salad with smoked chicken, iceberg lettuce, tomato, cucumber, creamy dressing for lunch, accompanied with a coffee. Coffee comes with a nice chocolate truffle (I'm a real chocoholic ). I need to dash off now. I started a cookery diploma course last week at one of the vocational schools here in Tallinn. It'll run until mid-December, so I'm busy every Monday, Wednesday and Thursday from 4pm until 7pm with that course. Today is our first hands-on kitchen practice class, and we'll be making soups. There's soup for dinner tonight as well. Stay tuned! [Edited to add photos]

Time for some feedback, I think That's exciting, Peter-the-eater! Kihelkonna is on Saaremaa/Ösel, the biggest island of Estonia (you can see it on the map above). Too bad I'm not able to trace down the statue for your great-great grandfather! Yes, there will be a cloudberry photo - though not taken this week, as the season is over - and I'll be making at least one cloudberry dessert during the week, so stay tuned! I'll do my best, Shelby! I don't know much about Latvian cuisine, though I suspect it's quite similar to ours, as the cultural influences have been more or less the same (at least re: Russian and German influences). I imagine Scandinavian/Nordic elements are more prominent in Estonian cuisine.. Re: exotic meats - that's a tricky one. I don't think pork, beef and wild boar count as exotic at all I could go for some bear meat at Olde Hansa medieval restaurant, but not sure I'll have time during the week I will try, however, to use some little known fish in my cooking this week. And I'll get back to the topic on Scots food soon. Tomorrow, probably.. Thanks There will be a fridge shot, but as we've got no pets, then none of those. Unless I can snap a photo of one of those numerous cats that pass through our garden during their hunting trips - I saw 2 different cats with freshly caught mice over the weekend!?! Abra - I'll be checking out your French foodblog with great interest. Kristjan and I had our first proper date in France (Paris, obviously), and we're thinking of spending a week or so in Souther France later this autumn, time permitting..

Tere hommikust! Thank you for all your kind welcoming words! I thought I'll share some typical breakfasts with you over the week. I'm sure lots of Estonians have cornflakes or other cereal for breakfast, but it's not typical. We've got Kellogs K Red Berries in the house, which we sprinkle on yogurt every now and then. Having a hot cereal for breakfast (alias porridge) is much more traditional, and this morning Kristjan made a semolina porridge - mannapuder. We have it about once a week, I think. It's a real childhood porridge - my mum used to make it often. It's not as nutritious as oatmeal or mixed cereal porridges, so we try not to have it too often. For two portions, he heated some butter in a small heavy-bottomed saucepan, added 500 ml milk and brought it almost to the boil. Then he added 50 ml (alias 3 heaped Tbsp) of semolina (known as Cream of Wheat in the US, I believe), stirring all the time with a wooden spoon. After 10 minutes, he added an egg yolk whisked with 2 tsp of sugar and a pinch of salt. Stirred, until combined. Here's today's breakfast table: There's no table in the kitchen, so this is our dining table both for weekday and festive occasions. There's a bowl of apple slices on the left - that's our snack bowl these days - we get lots of apples from my mum. Our cafetiere is a basic Bodum one, mugs are Moomin mugs - I love them both The small jar of red jam is wild strawberry one, the stripy bowl of yellowish jam is an apple and flowering quince jam (NOT quince jam). We drink Finnish Paulig President coffee as our regular coffee. It's 100% Arabica, quite light roast and acidic mixture of Kenian and Ethiopian mocca beans (no, I don't know this by heart, just read it on Paulig's website) Behind the cafetiere are some small jars and pots we keep on the table for easy access. There's Maldon sea salt, demerara sugar, sugar crystals, pot of honey, and a tiny jar of flowering quince extract for sweetening teas (you can see it on the photo below). The brown cookie tin contains various crispbreads. Here's a closeup of my porridge - served with a generous dollop of wild strawberry fridge jam (you can read more about the jam here): We left house 8.15am this morning. Kristjan drops me off at work in the mornings, and it's usually a 20-minute drive to the city centre. As as we ended up in a traffic jam, it took us 35 minutes. The route is very scenic - we drive along the coast a lot of the time, and the teaser photo of Tallinn skyline is taken on the way. We both have quite flexible schedules, so we usually leave home a bit later, around 9ish, to avoid being stuck in traffic. Now, work. I'm a sociologist by training, specialising in multiculturalism and national identitites. Both my BA and PhD are in Sociology, with MSc is in Nationalism Studies. I work as a research fellow at Tallinn University, and my office is in on the sixth floor of this newish building from 2005 (ignore the unsightly and unofficial parking area in the foreground): The university is a ten-minute walk from the city centre. There are quite a few reasonably priced nice cafes in the neighbourhood, so having a decent lunch is easy. I'll try to have lunch in different place every day, so as not to bore you

Tere õhtust (that’s „Good evening“ in Estonian)! I’m very, very, very excited to be doing my first ever eGullet foodblog. Foodblogging as such is not new to me – I’ve been blogging over at Nami-nami since June 2005, and am enjoying it enormously. But this eGullet blog is very different in format, and I hope I can ’deliver’. There have been so many exciting and great food blogs over the years that I've admired, so the standard is intimidatingly high! Also, as I’m the first one ever blogging from Estonia, I feel there’s a certain added responsibility to ’represent’ my tiny country A few words about me: my name is Pille, I’m 33, work in academia and live with my boyfriend Kristjan in a house in Viimsi, a suburb just outside Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. I was born and schooled in Tallinn until I was 18. Since then I've spent a year in Denmark as an exchange student, four years studing in Tartu (a university town 180 km south), two years working in Tallinn and seven years studying and working in Edinburgh, the bonnie & cosmopolitan capital of Scotland. All this has influenced my food repertoire to a certain degree, I'm sure. I moved back home to Estonia exactly 11 months and 1 day ago, to live with Kristjan, and I haven't regretted that decision once Edinburgh is an amazing place to live, and I've been back to Scotland twice since returning, but I have come to realise that Tallinn is even nicer than Edinburgh I won’t be officially starting my foodblog until tomorrow (it’s midnight here and I’m off to bed), but I thought I’ll re-post the teaser photos for those of you who missed them in the 'Upcoming Attractions' section. There were two of them. One was a photo of Tallinn skyline as seen from the sea (well, from across the bay in this case): This is known as kilukarbivaade or sprat can skyline A canned fish product, sprats (small Baltic herrings in a spicy marinade) used to have a label depicting this picturesque skyline. I looked in vain for it in the supermarket the other day, but sadly couldn’t find one - must have been replaced with a sleek & modern label. So you must trust my word on this sprat can skyline view The second photo depicted a loaf of our delicious rye bread, rukkileib. As Snowangel already said, it’s naturally leavened sour 100% rye bread, and I’ll be showing you step-by-step instructions for making it later during the week. It was fun seeing your replies to Snowangel’s teaser photos. All of you got the continent straight away, and I was pleased to say that most of you got the region right, too (that's Northern Europe then). Peter Green’s guess Moscow was furthest away – the capital of Russia is 865 km south-east from here (unfortunately I've never had a chance to visit that town, but at least I've been to St Petersburgh couple of times). Copenhagen is a wee bit closer with 836 km, Stockholm much closer with 386 km. Dave Hatfield (whose rural French foodblog earlier this year I followed with great interest, and whose rustic apricot tart was a huge hit in our household) was much closer with Helsinki, which is just 82 km across the sea to the north. The ships you can see on the photo are all commuting between Helsinki and Tallinn (there’s an overnight ferry connection to Stockholm, too). Rona Y & Tracey guessed the right answer Dave – that house isn’t a sauna, but a granary (now used to 'store' various guests) - good guess, however! Sauna was across the courtyard, and looks pretty much the same, just with a chimney The picture is taken in July on Kassari in Hiiumaa/Dagö, one of the islands on the west coast. Saunas in Estonia are as essential part of our life – and lifestyle – as they are in Finland. Throwing a sauna party would guarantee a good turnout of friends any time Finally, a map of Northern Europe, so you’d know exactly where I’m located: Head ööd! [Good night!] I'm off to bed now, but will be back soon. And of course, if there are any questions, however specific or general, then 'll do my best trying to answer them!

I LOVE that oatmeal (and its tin ) - that's one of my favourites, too!

Great shot of pickles! I buy mine from the market here in Tallinn, too, but the choice is somewhat different. The basic recipe is the same (give or take the addition of garlic maybe), but you can choose between 1-day pickles, 2-day pickles, 3-day pickles, or really sour ones (anything longer). My favourites are the 1-day ones