Day 1, Helsinki
We flew into Helsinki via Amsterdam and were checked into our hotel, Klaus K, by 3. We managed to get some sleep on the plane, but gave in to jet lag and took a little nap before we headed out to find dinner. Right off the bat we noticed we were surrounded by tall blonde people. I remember learning about the Vikings back in school but never did I picture them as tall blonde warriors. Seeing as Scandinavians were the former Vikings I can’t help but now picture them all as Brad Pitt from the movie Troy, tall warriors with beautiful long blonde hair…might be a bit far fetched?
Back to finding dinner. As we walked the streets of Helsinki we stumbled upon a restaurant called Kynsilaukka Ruokia omassa keittiossa valmistettuja, meaning Kynsilaukka dishes made in your kitchen. Couldn’t figure out what that first word means, but it must have something to do with garlic. I feel pretty certain every dish here involved garlic, at least every one that we ordered, and it was all delicious. As soon as we were seated we were greeted with bread and butter garlic, something we, Jerry and I, strongly feel all restaurants should do, greet you with bread and butter/olive oil. Each table also had this assortment of garlicky spreads that were very tasty. There was plain ole pickled garlic, a lot tastier than one would imagine, the red spread tasted like a cabbage and pepper garlic spread and the green one tasted like it was a combination of herbs and garlic. These were all very good on bread.
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| Goat Cheese Salad |
For dinner we shared 4 dishes. A salad with goat cheese that seemed to have some sort of a garlicky poppy-seed dressing. The second dish we had was blinis with reindeer. Yes, we ate reindeer. The blinis were fried, not very healthy but oh so tasty, and topped with reindeer and lingonberries. These berries seem to be very popular in Finnish cuisine. We also enjoyed a seafood melon salad that was filled with mussels, crab, and octopus and a spicy shrimp stew that tasted very homey and hit the spot.
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| Reindeer on Blini |
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| Melon Seafood Salad |
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| Spicy Shrimp Stew |
The weather here in Helsinki, at least at this time of the year, is my absolute favorite. It’s in the low to mid 60s all day making it easy to tour the city without sweating buckets. We continued our stroll around the city after dinner looking for a cafe where we could indulge in some dessert and ended up at the coast where we saw a pier with hundreds of sail boats. Every thing looked so pretty as the sun was setting. We ended up having dessert at a Russian restaurant called “Shashlik” which translates to Kabob. The minute we walked in I smelled the roasted cabbage. At home I never really cook Ukrainian or Russian dishes so when I smelled that cabbage I told Jerry we are going to have dinner there the following day. We enjoyed a cranberry sorbet with hot caramel for dessert. Jerry had an amaretto with that and I had some hot tea.
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| A KOM theater & restaurant! |
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| Enjoying hot tea on a cold night at the Russian restaurant. |
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| Dessert |
Since Finland is so far north the sun comes out very early here and stays out late in the northern hemisphere summer. It must have been well past 9 when we got to the Russian restaurant and still somewhat light outside. We enjoyed the crisp walk back to the hotel after our dessert.
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| It wasn’t my idea… |
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Back to finding dinner. As we walked the streets of Helsinki we stumbled upon a restaurant called Kynsilaukka Ruokia omassa keittiossa valmistettuja, meaning Kynsilaukka dishes made in your kitchen. Couldn’t figure out what that first word means, but it must have something to do with garlic. I feel pretty certain every dish here involved garlic, at least every one that we ordered, and it was all delicious. As soon as we were seated we were greeted with bread and butter garlic, something we, Jerry and I, strongly feel all restaurants should do, greet you with bread and butter/olive oil. Each table also had this assortment of garlicky spreads that were very tasty. There was plain ole pickled garlic, a lot tastier than one would imagine, the red spread tasted like a cabbage and pepper garlic spread and the green one tasted like it was a combination of herbs and garlic. These were all very good on bread.
The weather here in Helsinki, at least at this time of the year, is my absolute favorite. It’s in the low to mid 60s all day making it easy to tour the city without sweating buckets. We continued our stroll around the city after dinner looking for a cafe where we could indulge in some dessert and ended up at the coast where we saw a pier with hundreds of sail boats. Every thing looked so pretty as the sun was setting. We ended up having dessert at a Russian restaurant called “Shashlik” which translates to Kabob. The minute we walked in I smelled the roasted cabbage. At home I never really cook Ukrainian or Russian dishes so when I smelled that cabbage I told Jerry we are going to have dinner there the following day. We enjoyed a cranberry sorbet with hot caramel for dessert. Jerry had an amaretto with that and I had some hot tea.
Perullo Press 