More than eight years ago, when brother #2 was visiting, he saw an ad for a new HBO show that got him really excited. It was a TV version of a book series he’d been reading for years, but I’d never heard of. The book series was called A Song Of Ice And Fire. The TV show would be called Game Of Thrones.
It quickly became my favourite show. Not the best, mind you — it was always only high-production-value fantasy escapism — but my favourite. I’d anxiously await new episodes, re-watch every new episode the next day, and consume reviews, critiques, and podcasts about it. I ended up reading the books, and — once the show caught up and passed the books, and diverged from them to a yet-unknown degree — felt the same mild thrill of discovery as everyone else watching.
It ended last night, obviously, with more of a whimper than a bang. The last two seasons, as have been well-documented, felt rushed and absurd, given neither the room to breathe nor the grounding in brute reality afforded the earlier seasons. I still felt compelled to watch, and was engrossed in every second, but it didn’t resonate with me, didn’t affect me the next day. No character was developed in these final two seasons, and ultimately the characters were what drew me in.
That said, if they decide to make a spin-off series about Robert’s Rebellion, I’m cancelling all of my Sunday night plans for three months.
Last night, after a quick drink at Boxcar Social with CBJ, I met Lindsay at The Civic. We hadn’t been back since they switched up their chef, and I was anxious to try it. We demolished the following:
The sommelier picked that bottle, but I’d been eyeing it already. That winery was featured in a book Lindsay got me a while back called Around The World In Eighty Wines (amazon). In it the author talks about Serge Hochar, son of the original winery owner, who produced vintage after vintage even in the face of war and violence in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley. So it was a draw of curiosity for me, but ended up being a goddamn delicious bottle of wine in its own right. Tons of fruit, strong spice. A special wine for sure. Made the dinner, really.
We had a bit of a day yesterday. After a nice lazy morning of movie-watching, we set out for…uh, more movie watching. But a movie this epic deserves more of a day plan.
So yeah, we saw Avengers: Endgame (imdb | rotten tomatoes), like most of the rest of the earth’s population, apparently. First, though, we had lunch at Peter Pan Bistro, which Lindsay knew well but somehow I’d never tried. It was still brunch — barely — so I had the scrambled eggs & lox while Linds had the shakshuka. We were then just enjoying our cocktails when lo and behold, an order of fresh baked Madelaines w/ lavender lemon curd shows up, courtesy of an acquaintance of Lindsay’s who also works there. How sweet. (Delicious too, obviously.)
So, then, the movie: it was as good as I expected, but also more than I expected. By which I mean, they somehow managed to pull together even more threads than I expected. I won’t say much in case you’re like me and struggled to find time to see it, but it was pretty satisfying as a MCU fan.
After the movie (and a quick, awkward drink at the Hilton’s Tundra bar) we walked to our reservation at Momofuku Kojin. It’s been high on my wishlist since before Toronto Life named it their best new restaurant in the city. And when Lindsay said earlier this week she was craving steak, I saw an opportunity, and lucked into an open table. Here’s what we ate:
NB & PEI oysters w/ cucumber & green hot sauces
Griddled corn flatbread made from local K2 Mills cornmeal & hominy, paired with Drew’s grass fed butter & spiced honey
glasses of Baud Crémant du Jura
14oz boneless ribeye, dry-aged minimum 32 days (Lindsay had shaved foie gras added to hers)
Tita’s mash (whipped cheese curds and potatoes topped with crispy Gouda)
Crispy Brussels sprouts
Ridge Estate Cabernet Sauvignon 2013
Ice cream pie made with chocolate, peanut butter, and maple
cappuccino
Everything was amazing. The steak was perfect, the sides were delicious, and that corn flatbread with the butter and honey almost melted my brain.
We’ve just finished watching the film The Death Of Stalin (imdb | rotten tomatoes) by Armando Iannucci. It was as sharp, dark, and hectic as everything he directs. I loved that none of the actors did Russian accents, just their own, so somehow Field Marshal Zhukov sounds like he’s from Yorkshire.
About a week ago we finished Russian Doll (imdb | rotten tomatoes) which was maybe the most enjoyable, inventive (even though it seems like a well-worn plot device), sharply funny series I’ve seen in a while. It’s only eight half-hour episodes so you can blaze through it, but man, is it good. Natasha Lyonne’s incredible, but as a bonus Greta Lee steals every scene she’s in.
Just go watch it.
(Warning: once you do, the following song will be stuck in your head forever.)
Something monumental has happened. A seismic shift in my thinking. In my very being. Something I never thought would happen. But it has.
I’m rooting for the Toronto Maple Leafs.
While I’ve lived in Toronto more than half my life, the Leafs have always been my sworn enemy. I’m a Montreal fan, remember, so for me no team is as despised as the Leafs and Bruins, and my annoyance at the deluded nature of Leafs fans these past two decades has — if anything — made the Leafs and Bruins 1 and 1a respectively. Not to mention my dread at how insufferable this city becomes if they win so much as a playoff series. So the Leafs may be the only team I have actively cheered against for most of my life.
But things have changed. At least for this year.
First of all, despite collecting 96 points during the regular season (which would have comfortably earned a playoff spot in the Western conference) the Canadiens missed the playoffs. That Columbus, the team who barely squeaked into the #8 playoff spot, swept the #1-ranked Tampa Bay Lightning in the first round makes it particularly disappointing. Anyway, all today: I don’t really have a dog in this playoff fight.
Second: I would very much like to see a Canadian team win the cup again. It hasn’t happened since Montreal (yay!) won it all in 1993, and of the three Canadian teams who did qualify Toronto seems to have the best chance. Calgary, the #1 seed in the west, has already been knocked out. Winnipeg, certainly the team I’d have loved to see win it all, went into the playoffs cold and got knocked out in six games. Toronto, on the other hand, is leading in their series and — given the sweep of Tampa and the Pittsburgh Penguins — has a real chance to come out of the east.
Third, the Leafs are playing the Bruins in the first round, and the enemy of my enemy is my friend, even if in this case I’m being selective about it.
Fourth, and this is how I can justify the hypocrisy of the previous point: I actually like some of the players on the Leafs. That has not happened in the past — in addition to disliking the team, I disliked many of the players as well. But I like Auston Matthews. I like Patrick Marleau. I like John Tavares. I really like Mitch Marner. And I wouldn’t hate to see them hoist a cup.
So while I don’t like the idea of disrupting the natural order of things — which is that the Leafs should stumble and miss the playoffs and always have the longest Stanley Cup drought forever and ever — the idea of some nice players beating the Bruins and maybe bringing the cup back to Canada makes it at least palatable.
Earlier this week we got back from 10ish days in Europe, with a couple of fun city visits wrapped around a work thing.
THURSDAY / Toronto
We were off to Copenhagen, and had a pretty good flight except when Lindsay’s chair rocketed backward and knocked wine all over the lady sitting behind her. Eep.
FRIDAY / Copenhagen
We landed in Copenhagen early Friday morning, had maybe the easiest customs entry ever, took a short (but expensive! no Uber here) cab ride downtown, and lurked around the bar at the Hotel Danmark until we could get into our AirBnB.
We grabbed a quick lunch at the Brewpub Copenhagen, where we became familiar with the ubiquity of smørrebrød (food piled on a single piece of bread). We had smoked salmon, potato & fried Norwegian lobster, and seasoned lamb. Oh, and their beers which were mostly named after musicians like Van Morrison, Cole Porter (get it?), and Jaco Pastorius.
After a quick nap back at the flat, Tess arrived from Gothenburg. We hung out for a bit, looked up decent places to eat, and settled on Aamanns 1921. We chose well, too, as that might have been the best meal of the whole trip: a tasting menu consisting of a beautiful raw salmon amuse bouche, hake (paired with a local Danish Solaris-based wine), an exquisite steak tartare, pork, lamb, and a lemon dessert. It was all of it fantastic.
SATURDAY / Copenhagen
We decided to go a bit further afield Saturday, catching a train out of town to the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art. It’s in a beautiful green seaside spot, and building is as beautiful as the ground. Their collection was very good, but their special exhibitions were great, especially Liu Xiaodong’s Uummannaq. Only the Pipilotti Rist exhibit disappointed.
Giacometti, Danish splendor
After returning to Copenhagen we grabbed snacks and waited for our next meal. This time they indulged me and let me lead us to Øl & Brød, Mikkeller’s food outpost. We each got the tasting menu once again:
a plate of cured meats, celeriac, and some cured duck (paired with a double dry hopped IPA)
danish potatoes with parsley & cavolo nero (paired with a witbier)
bread
braised pork shank, hispi cabbage, wild mushrooms & lingonberries (paired with a brown ale)
chocolate mousse, raspberry sorbet & burned chocolate (paired with stouts for Lindsay and I, and a wild ale named William for Tess)
The pork shanks were Flintstone-esque in size, so we slowly walked home, groaning.
SUNDAY / Copenhagen
We scrounged up some breakfast at a nearby place, then went for a (cold, windy) walk around the city. We sat in the quiet park near the royal library (which was closed, sadly) and walked up the river to the colourful Nyhavn.
We crossed the river, grabbed coffee at The Corner, and sat by the Strandgade watching people and dogs. Especially dogs.
We had lunch booked at Barr, which ended up being a real find. They take their beer very seriously there, and the decor (and view) were gorgeous. We ran through most of their food menu:
lumpfish roe w/ grilled belgian waffle and soured cream
hot smoked herring w/pickled plums, salted rhubarb and wild roses
beef tartare w/ ramson and pickles
danish pork meatball w/ lard, nutmeg and lingonberry compote
free-range pork schnitzel w/ horseradish and anchovies
The stars of the show, though, were the beers. Bokkeryeder is a cult figure in the beer world, and Barr is one of the few places that seems to carry his creations. We split a bottle of 2017 “Vlierbloesem” Lambic w/ elderflower, and it was sublime. We finished our meal with a Brekeriet “fruit salad” Berliner weisse.
One hurried walk back to the AirBnB later and Tess left us, bound for home. We spent a lazy afternoon there, recovering from one meal and thinking about the next. We were booked at Bæst, an Italian place in Nørrebro. We started with Negroni and sparkling, then went with the Bæst Experience Menu which came with pickles, the freshest mozzarella I’ve ever eaten, stracciatella with mushrooms, salads, five kinds of charcuterie, and two slices of pizza each. We paired it all with a killer bottle of Sangiovese. After, we ordered some gelato; my hazelnut was tasty, but Lindsay’s fior de latte gelato seemed to achieve the level of religious experience.
MONDAY / Copenhagen -> The Hague
We had to get up early and roll out of the AirBnB, just as the weather was turning nice. A quick ride back to the airport and a bad lunch (we could not find the Mikkeller bar in CPH) later we walked straight onto our flight to Amsterdam.
The flight was short and easy, and we had a cushy ride from the airport to The Hague, where we checked into the Marriott. We hung out there for a bit, grabbing a drink and quick bite in the bar, before eventually heading into the town for dinner at Oogst. The vibe there was a little weird (it was a quiet Monday, I guess?) but the food made up for it.
a great bottle of Rioja that I forgot to write down
five (!) cheeses each for dessert, and glasses of port
some kind of weird peppermint-y sugar thing
All in all, a pretty good start to our brief stay in The Hague.
TUESDAY / The Hague
After some breakfast in the room and an early meeting for me, we departed the hotel to see a bit more of The Hague. We walked this time, stopped at a random Italian place for lunch (good food; crap service), down to the Binnehof, and eventually to the Maritshuis where we took in the stunning building and a lovely collection of paintings, including a couple of rooms of Rembrandts. We also had to fend off crowds of people only there to take a selfie with Vermeer‘s Girl with a Pearl Earring. Which is lovely, don’t get me wrong, but for the love of god people, at least lookat it before you Instagram it.
After that we traveled to another museum, this one just behind our hotel: the Gemeentemuseum. They have a huge collection of De Stijl works, some remarkable modern pieces (including a few by Louise Bourgeois like this beautiful spider couple), and had on a photography exhibition by Erwin Olaf which started strong but tailed off a bit. Still, a more-than-worthwhile visit.
That evening I had a work thing in a fancy alien greenhouse. Lindsay ordered room service. She won.
WEDNESDAY / The Hague
My conference took up most of the day, and my introversion demanded a quite dinner with Lindsay versus a fancy work event, so we made our way to Bouzy. We’d spotted it on our way to Oogst earlier in the week, and liked the look of it. It wasn’t our best meal, but it was what I needed.
bruschetta tomato, burrata
risotto, pumpkin, pea
gamba, aioli, crémolata
gravad lax, blinis, crème fraiche
insanely good homemade fries (seriously, that’s what they’re called on the menu)
THURSDAY / The Hague -> Amsterdam
I finished my conference shortly after noon, then Linds and I grabbed lunch at Brasserie Berlage behind the hotel before piling into a car for Amsterdam. We had elected to spend our first night in Amsterdam at the Conservatorium Hotel, where we stayed last fall. It remains in an entirely separate class of hotels in our mind, less a hotel than another world where everything is beautiful and just the right level of service — impeccable without being overbearing. We ordered a bottle of Rioja and unwound in the room.
After a while we roused our lazy selves and walked down the street for dinner at Rijks, the Michelin-starred restaurant attached to the Rijksmuseum. The vibe was a little weird, right from the outset. We couldn’t explain it; everything just felt off. It didn’t help that our server would disappear for great tracts of time. Anyway, we tried to rally.
The amuse (apart from the four small pieces of summer sausage sitting on the table) was a slice of pear dusted with pistachio. We had that, and the first course (scallop w/ radish, codium, and seaweed vinaigrette; cabbage points salad) with glasses of Champagne. The food so far was good, not great.
But then, the next two dishes — a millefeuille of beetroot w/ Tomasu 24-month beurre blanc & parsley oil, and a tartelette Rendang made w/ goat, sprouts, and granny smith apple — were both among the best things I’ve eaten all year. We finished with 400g of dry-aged Simmentaler ribeye, aged 4 weeks, and a bottle of Tuscan red.
I think there might have been dessert, but I don’t quite remember so it must not have been remarkable. So: not quite the experience we were hoping for, but I still dream about those two middle dishes.
FRIDAY / Amsterdam
We had another lie-in, determined to make the most out of our time in the room. Eventually we rolled downstairs to the brasserie in the lobby for their brunch. It’s stupidly expensive, but wow what quality. Superb food, but several awful other customers. Entitled finger-snappers, whiny Russians in luxe tracksuits, demanding table-snatchers…maybe the high price is to pay the staff to put up with it. Anyhoo.
We checked out, left our bags, and made our way to the Rijksmuseum. But then, on the way, we saw the lineup for tickets. Then we started doing some research, and realized that the access to the Rembrandt collection (all on display for the first time, apparently) was sold out for weeks. We decided it wasn’t worth it, and instead visited the Stedelik just down the museumplein, which was very worth it. It was filled with modern art, much of which Lindsay knew, and we spent a grand total of five or six hours (!) there across multiple floors, which a yummy lunch just ’round the corner at Blushing in between.
We grabbed our bags from the hotel and (very painfully) acquired an Uber to drive us a little ways across town to our next hotel: The Hoxton. This one had a beautiful view of the Herengracht.
We didn’t have much time to enjoy it though, as we were off to dinner at Envy. I’ve had my eye on this place since my first visit to Amsterdam 7 years ago, and finally booked it. I’m glad we did too: it beat the pants off the Michelin-starred restaurant the night before in both food and atmosphere, even with the awkward couples on either side of us. We got the six-course tasting menu:
an amuse of liquid beetroot inside white chocolate, which was phenomenal
sausage & bread (not part of the menu; just something we wanted)
spicy beef tartare
mussels w/ bacon, dill
cod w/ chanterelles, pumpkin
lamb shoulder w/ parsnip, parsley
yogurt w/ caramel, blueberry
bread pudding
The walk home, in the warm weather we’ve been missing for months, was almost as good as that meal.
SATURDAY / Amsterdam
Again, we were slow getting out of bed, but you know…vacation. We had some breakfast downstairs at Lotti’s, then set out to see more of the city. After a stop at a coffee shop we started with Dan’s agenda: hitting beer places I’d never been to before. We hit Café Brecht, which started out incredibly well because of the delightfully ramshackle decor, but quickly got insanely busy, so we escaped after a piadina and a brezel and some beers.
Next up was Café de Spuyt where drank some excellent beers, chatted with the bartender, and listened to some excellent music. After some time there we walked on to Beer Loves Food, which is owned by the same people as past-visit-favs Beertemple and Craft & Draft. Again, we hit it just before it got really busy, and managed to have some interesting and challenging beers, plus some crazy petatje rendang (fries covered in spicy beef) to fill our soggy bellies.
We walked home the long way, seeing just enough of the Centraal / De Wallen area for Lindsay to know she wanted to get away from the crowds, and home we went. We’d had quite a day so we just went to the room, did some packing, ordered room service burgers and champagne, and called it a night. We were done in.
SUNDAY / Amsterdam -> Toronto
Blah same blah: pack, airport, flight (I watched Widows and then worked for five hours), and then: home. We were gone less than 10 days, but it felt like three weeks.
We’re just back from Amsterdam (and The Hague before that, and Copenhagen before that) and a little tired. Fulsome blog post coming later. Possibly much later.
.:.
Cover photo by Martijn de Valk, used under Creative Commons license
Last weekend we flew to Washington, DC. Lindsay was speaking at a conference. I tagged along.
THURSDAY
We got an early Porter flight out, arrived at Dulles airport, and Uber’d through a severe rainstorm to the Gaylord National Resort in National Harbor, MD. That town is just down the Potomac River from DC and seemed like some kind of weird manufactured resort town. Literally within sight of downtown. Anyway.
We desperately needed lunch, and walked around the corner to Succotash for some…well, maybe not southern, but southern-inspired food. We had cocktails (Lindsay: mint julep; me: Succotash / Maker’s Mark private select bourbon), oysters, crispy fried okra, hush puppies, a dirty chicken Cobb salad (her), and fried chicken sandwich (me). I also found a tasty Troegs Brewing “Javahead” stout on the bottle list.
Thus sated, we walked back to the hotel, watched some March Madness, and did a bunch of work. With some napping added in.
Eventually we needed dinner, and walked downstairs to Old Hickory, the steakhouse in the resort. We weren’t expecting much, but we were pretty pleasantly surprised. We had some champagne, followed by Lindsay’s lobster bisque w/ sherry reduction, citrus crème, crostini and my butternut squash soup w/ cinnamon & black pepper meringue, paired with a couple of California chards. Our mains came out much more quickly than we expected, so we didn’t quite have room for the 7oz waygu center cut sirloin and 22oz (!) cowboy ribeye we ordered (along with french fries and asparagus), and the bottle of 2015 Trefethen Family cab sauv we ordered barely had time to breathe. Aside: I met the Trefethen family nearly six years ago, while on safari in Botswana. Was never able to try their wine until now.
Mostly work, day two was, within Linds prepping for or at her conference talk, and I working or calling into meetings. As soon as we were done we left that weird little village and took an Uber into DC proper, driving through a crazy rain/sleet storm along the way. Eventually we arrived at our home for the next two nights: The Line DC.
Hotels don’t often blow me away, but this one did. It’s built in a century-old church (which resembled a temple, to my eyes), has style coming out its eaves, and attracted huge crowds of diners and hangers-out. They broadcast/podcast content from their lobby. Their rooms are gorgeous. Their dining options are all superhotspots. Even their coffee shop was killer.
After checking in we had snacks (french fries w/ yuzu aioli, nori; burrata w/ shishito peppers, persimmons) and some cocktails at Brothers & Sisters in the lobby while we waited for Lindsay’s friend Shannon to arrive. Once she got there we had drinks in our room and caught up until it was time for dinner (downstairs, again) at their main restaurant, A Rake’s Progress.
We ate potato gnocchi w/ braised rabbit, glazed roots, shiitake, and winter herbs; lobster tagliatelle w/ shiitake and lobster butter; kilt greens w/ crisped ham, spelt crumb, egg, and hot bacon mustard dressing; an enormous pork blade steak (chopped up) w/ steamed buns and pickled ingredients…basically a bunch of bao ingredients; and a bottle of 2016 Lioco “Estero” Chardonnay from the Russian River valley.
Our server, by the way, was a phenomenon. She guided our choices, she was an utter delight in terms of fun and demeanor, and it actually felt like she took such care of/with us. The three of us told her that our dinner felt like therapy. Anyway, I’m gutted that I can’t remember her name, because she was a goddamn treasure.
From there, Shannon stumbled into an Uber, and we stumbled upstairs to bed.
SATURDAY
We had pre-ordered room service, and it was the best hotel breakfast we’ve had since Champagne. That fit nicely with our leisurely morning, just enjoying the room, until we eventually scooted downtown. We decided to see what was on at the Hirshhorn. Lots of good stuff, as it turned out, including the latest in Rafael Lozano-Hemmer‘s Pulse series. Much of that was lovely, but the experience was ruined for us when two huge families had a get-together followed by a fucking proposal. This they did while whooping and hollering and illuminating the scene with their phones, all in a room where the very exhibit calls for quiet and darkness. What utter trash. Pull it together, morons.
Anyway.
After that (and the rest of the museum, which was all pretty impressive) we grabbed a late lunch at The Partisan, the only nearby place which my beer research had flagged. It’s attached to a butcher shop, so all the meat we had was spot-on. I had a chicken that had been brined, rotisseried, and then deep fried in beef fat; Lindsay had an Italian sandwich the size of her head. We each sampled deeply from their excellent beer list.
Luckily, the National Portrait Gallery is right around the corner, so we had enough energy left to do that. We saw some good work there, like a statue of Gertrude Stein or a brain-breakingly photo-realistic painting of Maya Angelou. We also saw so many more morons…the kind of people who wait in line to take a picture of themselves in front of the presidential portrait of Barack Obama, without ever actually looking at it. Or, more egregiously, the Instagram couple who kept striking poses in front of Nam June Paik‘s Electronic Superhighway (link) to the point where you couldn’t even get close to Florida or Georgia. Picture this type of pose, but much much cheesier and worse:
Back to the hotel, then. Shannon joined us for dinner again, this time meeting us at a used bookstore around the corner, and we decided to try our restaurant — Tail Up Goat — early in case they could seat us.
On the walk there we passed Malcolm Gladwell and a friend. I pointed that out to Shannon and Lindsay, and we proceeded to shit-talk his writing methods. I mean, he’s entertaining, and I love his podcasts, but the way he extrapolates trends out of anecdotes drives me nuts. Lindsay and Shannon had other criticisms. Anyway, we walk around the corner and into the restaurant. I held the door for the people who’d been walking behind us and realize…it’s Malcolm Gladwell. They’d been looking for the same restaurant, and walked behind us for the last hundred feet or so. And, presumably, heard all our comments. Cool. Cool. Ugh.
Sadly, or luckily, they did not have our table ready. Michelin-starred restaurants don’t have much vacancy; who knew? We walked back to our room, drank a little wine, and eventually returned to find our table waiting. And about ten feet from our fellow Canadian. We shook it off, and focused on dinner.
Which. Was. AWESOME, by the way. We started with cocktails (I don’t know what my companions got, but mine was called the Alright Alright Alright and I must have said it twelve times. Anyhoo. Here’s what we ate & drank:
berbere sausage w/ apple mostarda, puffed flax seed
a bottle of Chablis; I don’t remember exactly which, but we bugged the sommelier for some time before arriving on it, and I tried to change her mind about Gewurztraminer by telling her about the Klipfel Clos Zisser Grand Cru.
for dessert Shannon had tea, Lindsay had Madeira, and I had something I’d never tried before: a glass of Keo St. John Commandaria from Cyprus
We closed the joint down. Mercifully, Gladwell was already gone. We stumbled home and tried to watch a bedtime Jeopardy but I was asleep before Johnny had finished welcoming Alex.
I killed more of their beer list until it was time to Uber back to The Line, grab our luggage, get one last coffee at The Cup We All Race 4 in the lobby, call another Uber, pick up Lindsay, and head to the airport. We had a bite and some wine at the Vino Volo there (the first I’d ever seen), found our gate, endured the short-but-felt-long flight home, and crashed into bed.
In short: we like DC. Not National Harbor so much, but definitely DC. Adams-Morgan (where our hotel was) was a strange beast of a neighbourhood, but the city has a lot of green space and great restaurants and sights to see. And a good friend.
Little rest in store for us weary travelers though — we’ll be over the Atlantic by midnight Thursday.
.:.
Cover photo taken inside Rafael Lozano-Hemmer‘s Pulse exhibit at the Hirshhorn. And no, I did not use flash.
Skirl | Dan Dickinson 