Czech-ing In

I’m more than halfway through my Christmas vacation in Prague and so far it has been wonderful!  We flew in this past Wednesday.  After checking into our hotel, we immediately left for the center of the city to see the Christmas markets.  There are several Christmas markets in Prague and most of them have similar gifts and food.  You can easily find sausages, a Czech version of spatzel, cinnamon and sugar covered dough circles, gingerbread, wine, and grog.  Each tree has a wooden crèche below it, and there are Christmas lights everywhere.  The markets run until January 8, so we can enjoy them for our entire trip.  Christmas in the Czech Republic is celebrated on the 24^th, and families traditionally eat carp for Christmas.  Due to this tradition there were many large plastic pools around the city full of fish for people to buy. 

The Christmas Market in Old Town Square

Our trip also comes at an interesting time because it follows the death of Vaclava Havla (Havel) who was the first post-communism President here.  He is an extremely important to the Czech people and they were in mourning for the first few days of our trip.  Havel’s body was lying in state in Prague castle, so we were unable to visit until Christmas day because it would have been rude to go as a tour group while people were saying their goodbyes.  Friday the 23^rd was the funeral and national day of morning.  We were able to watch some of the funeral at the Globe, an expat hang out in Prague 2, and during that time there was also a national moment of silence.  There are memorials set up all around the city to honor Havel, including homemade signs and billboards put up by the city.  Following the funeral, there was a concert at night to honor Havel, which was projected on a giant screen in Wenceslas Square.   Many people stayed in the square to enjoy the concert and it is obvious that he was very well loved here.

Prague Castle

On a lighter note, the food here is fabulous, and cheap.  We have free breakfast at our hotel, which includes bread, cheese, cold cuts, eggs, and assorted fruits and salads.  We’ve enjoyed bagels TWICE at Bohemia Bagel (the first, and probably last time I’ve been able to have a bagel and Philadelphia cream cheese in Europe), market foods that I described above, Czech fried cheese and bacon dumplings with beer, Svickova (beef tenderloin in a carrot cream sauce with cranberries and dumplings), cheeseburgers, and apple strudel.  In Prague, beer is cheaper than water and my current favorite is a Czech beer called Staropramen.  We also visited a local microbrewery where we tasted eight beers (light, dark, wheat, banana, sour cherry, nettle, vanilla, and coffee).  Finally we had Thai food at a restaurant called the Lemon Leaf and it was delicious!  We are looking forward to more food adventures before we head back to France.

The Astrological Clock in Old Town Square

Stay tuned for more updates from Prague!

Cooking Adventures

We’ve all become more adventurous when it comes to cooking in our kitchen in Guingamp, after a few weeks of using pots as frying pans, and many meals involving instant whole-wheat couscous, I decided I was going to actually cook something.  My roommates had successfully made tarts and quiches so I figured I would give it a shot.  I found a recipe for an herbed ricotta tart and made some modifications…and it turned out great (even though we can’t exactly close the “oven” door with the tart pan inside). 

Our "Harpers February" mug is great for drinking a normal amount of coffee AND for keeping the oven door closed!

I mixed ricotta cheese, crème fraîche, some milk, an egg, leeks, shallots, French bacon, and some herbs together, and put them in a piecrust (you can find pre-made tart/pie crust in any grocery store here).  Not only was it delicious, but super easy, and something different!  Unfortunately I do not have actual measurements for the ingredients because we have no measuring cups.

The final result!

My other new recipe is for pesto pizza.  I used a mix to make the dough and used pesto and the left over crème fraîche as a base.  I then added the French bacon and some shredded cheese and baked it for about 20 minutes.  I was also really happy to have the left-overs on Friday because I had about 15 minutes to eat between my morning classes at the middle school and my afternoon at the elementary school.

Speaking of school… I only worked one day this week because of vacation and my normal days off, but I had a fun day at the elementary school.  I talked about the United States with one group of kids and was asked if I knew Justin Bieber and if I lived in the apartment building shown in a cartoon on one of their worksheets.  I won't get to work with those kids next week because Veteran's Day is also celebrated in France (except the French are specifically celebrating the end of WWI), so I'm already planning some Thanksgiving activities with the kids for the following week.