Normann and Kale

I think I was having one of those right-place-right-time moments last Friday. I happened to be scanning my Facebook feed and noticed that Normann Copenhagen, one of my favourite Danish designers, was having a one night sale at the flagship store between 7-10pm.  I went last night.

Copenhagen’s design aficionados were out in full force.  Young, old- everyone and their mother were at the store to get their hands on some iconic “discounted” Danish design products (they were also selling Acne, Hay and a few other brands).  I arrived at quarter after 7 and there was already a line out the door.

I grabbed a bunch of items as I walked through the narrow sale corridor onto the main floor, only to put three quarters of it back.  If you’ve ever been to a sample sale of any kind, you know the drill– grab what you can get, then edit and delete.  I snapped this picture of the crazy line and posted it on Instagram while I was board of waiting.

The check-out line was the killer.  Why did I attend such a claustrophobic-yet thrilling event? I was on a mission to obtain a dining room light.  My husband and I waited close to 35 minutes in the check out line to get our large Hang Lamp in white.  We also scored a Tablo table in warm grey and a potato peeler (my husband’s wish).  Not too shabby!

I got my design fix for the week and now onto more important matters such as nutrition.  On the weekend I must have opened a dozen or so tabs on kale.  Some of the more standout recipes included the ones from here, here and here.

Nothing was really piquing my interest, so I decided to a mix and match and invent my own dish. I call it “The spicy kale, quinoa, amaranth salad with miso glazed sweet potatoes and pesto.”  If that is not the longest title for a salad, I don’t know what is.  All I know, is that when I ate it, it was really, freaking good.

Here’s what I did:

1 Find yourself a big bunch of kale.  I found a big bag of kale at my local green grocer down the street.  For some reason, I have not seen kale in the major grocery stores.

2.  Wash your big bunch of kale and remove any wilted ends.  I also removed the leaves from the thick, tough spine, because it is rather unpleasant to chew on and then I chopped all the leaves up into strips.

3.  Start making your quinoa/grain mix.  I mixed 3/4 cup quinoa, 1/4 cup amaranth to 2 cups of water.  I also added in a teaspoon of vegetable bullion and a pinch of herbs du provence.  Put your grains and water in a pot, bring the water and grains to a boil, then turn down the heat and let it simmer for 10 minutes.  After the 10 minutes, I killed the heat and let the quinoa/amaranth mix sit for another 5-7 minutes (still covered) to finish cooking.  The grains have to cool down before they become salad, so I transferred them into a big porcelain dish and let them do their thing while I got back to making my spicy kale.

4. Mince some scallions, garlic or onions.  Heat up a frying pan with olive oil, put your scallion, onion or garlic in first until it starts to brown.  Then throw in your big bowl of cut up kale into the frying pan and start to stir the leaves around right away.  The kale will start to turn bright green quite quickly.  Note-you are not trying to wilt the kale in the pan.  You are simply trying to bring out its bright green colour and lightly cook the leaves.  As the kale cooks, I throw in a big pinch of chili pepper flakes and mix it all together. Take the kale off the burner and let it cool.

Next- I mixed the cooled grains and cooled kale together in a big bowl.  I topped the salad with cut up miso glazed sweet potatoes that I made over the weekend (I used this recipe and substituted squash for sweet potatoes and it was good!) followed by two big spoonfuls of almond-basil pesto.

Mix it all together and you get a salad that is sweet, spicy, crunchy, garlicky, pesto-ey, and full of protein and calcium.  This salad is now going to be a staple in my house.

I have made my declaration on the Internet!

The flavour combination was to die for and you can switch it up with whatever you have on hand.  Want more protein, throw in some chickpeas.  Want more crunch, throw in some raw cauliflower, or snap peas.  The options are endless-

Let me know if you try it!

Food Halls, Stalls and Diversity in London

Eating London- I was so impressed by the diversity of food in London on my most recent visit.  It is a city where you truly can find a little bit of everything.  I made a point of visiting several food markets to experience the range of cuisine.

Here were some of my favourite stops.

01 Borough Market– I stopped by the famed, Borough Market on New Years Eve day for some dinner party groceries.   Not all the stalls were present but I still enjoyed perusing and sampling the fare.  This is a great market for a quick snack, lunch or full meal.

02 Brixton Market  Have you heard of this place?  It was a new find for me thanks to my friends who I was staying with.  Brixton market is basically two separate enclosed buildings that offers an incredibly diverse food spread both in shop format and stall format.  For dinner, we wandered both sections of the market and settled on the Bukowski Charcol Grill for a meat filled dinner.  Pre-dinner we stopped at the taco stand for a quick taco.

03 A scone and porridge at the Albion – Mind the stereotypes of British cuisine- What trip to London is complete without a scone and some porridge?  I had mine at the Albion in Shoreditch.  This has to be one of my favourite restaurant interiors for breakfast.  It is set on the ground floor of the Boundary building, a Victorian warehouse that has been fully converted to a mixed use property.  The restaurant is decorated with cool industrial lighting fixtures, old wood floors, white subway tiles that line the exposed kitchen and lots of natural light pouring into the room thanks to the abundance of windows that line the building. While you are waiting in line for your table like we did, it is fun to watch all the chefs/sous chefs and bakers busy at work cooking up dishes. The other great thing about this spot is that the Albion is part food store, part bakery and part restaurant.  So you can eat, shop, sample and eat some more.

04 Brick Lane Food Stalls-  Brick Lane, the hub of all delicious Indian and Pakistani food.  On a recent visit and wander down Brick Lane, we discovered two separate buildings with tons of food stalls.  I can’t begin to count how many incredible smelling food stalls were housed in this place.  Curries, wraps, dumplings, noodles, rices, sauces, spices, meats and juices.  This was a mini UN of food.  I am not sure if the stalls are present on Brick Lane as a weekly occurrence or whether it was something special over the holidays-

Visiting these food stalls and markets reminded me how important food is as a medium to bring people together and share in other cultures.  There were people from all different backgrounds, countries, ages and demographic backgrounds, eating and socializing together.

Cities should be proud of their diverse populations and culturally diverse food markets/stalls seems to be an excellent way to expose/educate and promote acceptance of different cultures that co-habitate and co-exist in a society.   City planners and community leaders, take note.

Date Night: Hache

The year started with lunch…. no wait.  My year started with chicken shawarma and spicy hot chocolate. Welcome to 2013.  I have now been living in Copenhagen for just over two weeks.

What can I say about Copenhagen?  Minus the changeable weather (from rain, to fog, to cloud, to sun, to snow and back again), this city has it all.  The quality, availability and selection of food/ingredients is incredible, the design (interiors, furniture/tableware/architecture) is incredible and the fashion is incredible.

For now, I am slowly making my way around the city and exploring the various neighbourhoods on foot but I will get a bike in the spring for efficiency sake.  It seems that nothing is more than a 20 minute walk away.

Back to the part about food-I decided, this year I am going to attempt to make a dent in the city’s food scene and actively dine at different restaurants each week on a sort of-date night/date brunch with my husband.  I started building a (growing) list of restaurants that I want to visit and have washi tapped them to my office wall.

During our moving week, we were busy setting up, unpacking, making trips to Ikea and the like.  I asked him what food he was craving most that we could not get living in Prague to which my non-beef eating husband replied- a “good” burger.

Restaurant #1: Hache, is a gourmet burger restaurant across the street from Torvehallerne market in the centre of the city.  It was packed when we arrived on a Friday night in December.  Thankfully we had a reservation or else we would have been out of luck.  The interior of Hache is minimalist and cosy.  The ceiling is scattered with exposed pendant lights to illuminate its bare walls.  Like all good restaurants in the city, you dine by candlelight here.

Out of the 15 or so burgers on the menu, I ordered the Greek burger (lamb) and he tried the chili burger which comes with a chili pepper tooth-picked atop the bun.

Photo Source: Hache

The burgers are monstrous at Hache and require a fork and knife to eat them.  At least that is how everyone else in this packed restaurant was eating their sandwiches- fork and knife in hand.

The burger comes solo but there are different sides and salads to add to the meal.  We tested some olives, a salad and some fries.  We were utterly stuffed from this meal but it was incredible.

I saw another gourmet burger restaurant in Copenhagen called Halifax that I may test out for comparison sake, but if Hache was my only option in the city, I would be satisfied.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

I wish you all the best in 2013 and I hope it is full of great design, great food and great travel.

Photo Sources:  Pinterest 1, 2, 3, 4

Thank you again for supporting and reading Lamb411.  I look forward to sharing more great design inspired travel finds with you again this year.