3.8.12
The Drought: Broken!
Wow - over 14 months since the last one! Should do this more frequently ... otherwise I'll lose all my followers!
So, we're in the Summer holidays here, and enjoying the relaxing time ... while my wife has to work, the kids & I get to kick back at home.
Still, it's not all lounging about doing nothing! We've also been on a journey to one of the furthest corners of the country (less than three hours by train), gone out for half the day for the national celebration of the anniversary of my birth (with fireworks!), and received a phone call about four in the morning from a friend needing back-up to go in to give birth.
Oh, and Minecraft has updated, which means the multiplayer servers have as well ...
So, our little trip - three days, down in the Swiss National Park. It was wonderful.
The Visitor Centre in Zernez looks like a concrete block from outside (which it is) but inside is a wonderfully-designed layout that has a massive amount of interactive info stations - all explained by the audio guide you can hire from the desk on the ground floor (in the gift shop ...). A variety of languages are available (including English), you proceed at your own pace, and can skip anything you find boring (although I found precious few of those!). Each station has a number, which you enter on the guide, and voila - the info is there (including instructions on what to do at the interactive displays).
We could probably have spent longer there, but thought it best to leave so we could find a place for dinner ... which we did, having wood-fired pizza in a traditional oven that looked like it could be older than I. Better maintained, too.
That night, we slept in straw ...
Breakfast was provided the next morning, once our hosts recognised that we were conscious and moving. Beautiful fresh bread, butter, jams, cheese, cold meat, yoghurt, juice and milk (with chocolate powder of course!). Once we were suitably stuffed, we headed off for the National Park itself - stopping at the Visitor Centre on the way, to pick up the GPS guide we'd booked the previous day.
We caught the bus to the stop at the start of the "Kinderpfad Champlönch", a walk designed for kids - which had several "points of interest" programmed into the GPS, with some stories and info about those spots for the kids. These little gems kept them going, and gave them mini-goals along the route to keep them motivated. Snacks helped, too. Sadly, due to volume issues, we saw a few birds, heaps of butterflies, a handful of insects on the ground ... and deer tracks. The mammals all chose to remain out of sight. Still, the walk was good.
We had lunch on the way, near a wooden bridge that looked fairly new (across what looked like a massive snow-melt run-off river, although you could jump over it the day we visited). At the end of the walk we had ice creams from a hotel/restaurant at the bus stop. The kids were falling asleep on the bus.
Once back in town, we went to the building next to the Visitor Centre - the local pool! While most of it was indoors, there was a small pool outside - made completely of stainless steel, they kept the temperature between 30 & 38 degrees the whole time. Luxury! The springboard inside was fun, it was even more amusing when the local teenage boys tried to impress the girls with their jumps - and were then outdone with ease by a girl who clearly does diving or trampolining fairly regularly. Oh, and #3 discovered water wings ... thanks to his big brother, who spotted a box of them already inflated and available to any pool users. Now we have to buy a set, so he can "float away" on his own.
Dinner was at a different restaurant (the Pizzeria Adriana), where I considered the "S" hamburger too small (although two of the kids had one each) and ordered the "M". What I received was, in fact, simply two hamburgers - leading me to the conclusion that the XL must be three hamburgers, a fact to recall for next visit - since the XL is less than twice the price of the S. Suitably stuffed, we bought ice creams on the walk back to our barn to fill our dessert stomachs. We slept much better that night ... despite another family sharing the straw.
So, breakfast again - this time at a pre-arranged time! After breakfast we paid up (far less than any hotel, even less than most hostels) and shoved our packs in a locker at the train station. We went on the bus to another, shorter walk. Child #3 managed to wait until we got off the bus to spew (but only just - if I hadn't picked him up a second before, he would still have been standing on the step). The walk was nice, crossing another two snow run-off rivers. The boys enjoyed playing with the rocks, building small dams in the creek that ran through the bottom of one river bed (the other was dry). We ate lunch at a different restaurant at the end of that walk, which completed blowing our dining-out budget for the next few months. We scrambled onto the bus back into town, and returned to the pool. We also tested out my new toy, a waterproof digital camera. We got some amazing pics, the clarity both above and below the water is impressive. Oh, and #3 ran straight to the water wings on arrival, so he could "float away" again ...
We finally left the pool with only fifteen minutes to get to the station, on the opposite side of the town! Luckily, we're in Switzerland - we made it with eight minutes to spare, even though we bought more ice creams on the way.
Our train back was an old clunker, similar in vintage to Sydney's red rattlers. Fortunately the windows open far wider, so we could enjoy a cooling breeze for most of the trip. We had to close the windows in the 19km rail tunnel, since it was simply too loud to leave them open. We got home, had dinner, and the kids crashed. Unpacking was half-done that night, and completed the next day.
Oh, and #1 child has been practising her walk to school these holidays - since she will start at the local secondary school when they're done. I think she's going to enjoy getting to school in under ten minutes, rather than over half an hour ... and she'll definitely not miss having to travel with her brother!
30.5.11
Buying a milkshake ...
Bringing the kids home from school on a hot Spring day? Milkshake's the go!!
So, where to buy one? Well, plenty of places sell milkshakes ... for a minimum of 6 francs a pop! For three (me and two kids) that's hitting 20 francs for a small refreshing drink!
So, alternative? Hit the supermarket at the station, on our way home. Denner's the one - 2L UHT milk (2 francs), 2L vanilla ice cream (3.60 Fr), 6 bananas (2 francs) and, because they're on special, 8 bratwurst for tomorrow's dinner (4.45 Fr - were 13.95!).
So, for 12.05, what have I got? Well, making the milkshakes for everyone (including my wife and our third child!) used up about a quarter of the milkshake supplies ... and we're going to have some great sausages with our rice or potatoes (and vegies) tomorrow night! All for just over half of what three milkshakes would've cost ... with the possibility that the kids will choose to make a milkshake for me tomorrow!
So, where to buy one? Well, plenty of places sell milkshakes ... for a minimum of 6 francs a pop! For three (me and two kids) that's hitting 20 francs for a small refreshing drink!
So, alternative? Hit the supermarket at the station, on our way home. Denner's the one - 2L UHT milk (2 francs), 2L vanilla ice cream (3.60 Fr), 6 bananas (2 francs) and, because they're on special, 8 bratwurst for tomorrow's dinner (4.45 Fr - were 13.95!).
So, for 12.05, what have I got? Well, making the milkshakes for everyone (including my wife and our third child!) used up about a quarter of the milkshake supplies ... and we're going to have some great sausages with our rice or potatoes (and vegies) tomorrow night! All for just over half of what three milkshakes would've cost ... with the possibility that the kids will choose to make a milkshake for me tomorrow!
9.1.11
Slithering into the new year ...
Well, after a pretty intense week in Barcelona, we're back home and have 'settled in' ... sorta.
Edmund has been, and still is, pretty sick. At least he takes his medicine without as much fuss now!! Still, I think he only sits still and takes it for the little choccie he gets afterwards ...
Daniel is still building and modifying the Lego he got for Christmas and his birthday - not just the castle Lego Advent calendar, but a giant castle (mostly funded by money from a grandmother & great-grandmother!) and another, 'lesser' set. Not to mention the Lego Atlantis & Hero Factory sets! He's not too big on Lego City ...
Aislinn got a heap of books, which suited her no end! She also had an Advent calendar, but hers was fairy Playmobil ... which has now taken over her dolls' house, despite the issue of scale.
Jessica & I got some nice choccies, and a few other things.
The funniest presents arrived in the mail after we got back from Barcelona - Christmas CDs for each of the kids, mailed from Australia by Pam. We would've received them over a week earlier if she'd just packed them in her luggage, and she would've saved herself a bit of postage (over $5 per letter!).
Barcelona ... an interesting little city, with some lovely, twisty lanes and alleys connecting some fairly broad streets ... La Rambla was great, with the broad walkway down the centre full of shops! Also managed to find a nice little second-hand English bookshop (Hybernian - check it out next time you're in Barcelona!); we bought a couple of books (read: over 20) from their great range ... and the prices were pretty good too.
The meals we had were varied and invariably cheap - instead of 50 francs for two dishes at a Chinese restaurant, we had a full meal for a family of five for under 50 Euro (including drinks!). We even had enough left over to take 'home' in a doggy bag to feed two more people ... went for breakfast.
The apartment in which we stayed was okay, but a little unusual for us - no bathroom window (!), tiny little rooms, tiny windows, narrow corridor winding through it, washing line outside on the wall (with a four-storey drop to the floor of the little unroofed 'courtyard' (about 2m x 4m, with air-conditioning pipes and no clear doorway access I could spot!) ... luckily our washing machine didn't work anyway, so we didn't have to risk using the washing line above the drop. Oh, forgot to mention the lift - squeezed into the centre of the stairwell, a three-person lift, which looked older than Australian Federation. Still, the location was good - on Paral-lel, easy walk down to the sea or over to La Rambla, a nice little supermarket on the next block down and the rubbish bins conveniently located outside the building next door.
New Year's Eve was, for us, in Barcelona. Kym & Sally were feeling sick (oh, did I mention we met the Statons in Barcelona? Well, we did ... sorta. Kym, Pam & John came to Zürich first, to celebrate Christmas with us at home, then we flew separately to Barcelona. Sally & Liam met us all there.).
So, Kym was feeling sick, then Pam & John offered to have a 'quick' dinner then be back by 20:00 so Jessica, Liam, Sally, Lella (a Montessori friend from Italy) & I could go out to party. By the time John & Pam got back (after 21:00 ...) Sally was also feeling sick, so offered to babysit the kids in our apartment. J&P went to sleep, Sally settled in on our lounge, Kym had been asleep for an hour or so already, and we set out: Liam, Lella, Jessica & I. Our mission: dinner.
We wandered over to La Rambla, passing a few back-alley restaurants on the way (in which I would have enjoyed eating, but nobody could really decide what they wanted ...). Looking around, we saw the Ideal Restaurant (literally - that was it's name!). It advertised pizza, among other things, so we finally agreed on that. We got into the place, and discovered they were doing a limited New Year's Eve menu - soup and entree fixed, with a choice of three mains and three desserts. We agreed, waited for our table to be prepared (and were asked four times if there were really four of us!), then sat. A glass being dropped and smashing behind us as we sat down was not the best welcome, but we made the most of it. The football chants from the basement were entertaining, and definitely added atmosphere.
The service staff, I have to say, were amazing: it was amazing people got the meals they'd ordered, even with a limited menu! At one point the chef came up with a paiella, looked around, was ignored by the serving staff and finally took the food back down to the kitchen. We had to order drinks two or three times, and then were only charged for half of those which arrived ... but the food was nice, and the price wasn't too bad.
Afterwards we wandered for a little, then headed back to the apartment. I didn't mention earlier, but will now, that the Statons & St Pierre's were in the neighbouring apartment ... theirs had a washing machine and heating that worked, as well as an indoor drying rack! They also had a bathroom window ... :/
Won't go into all the stuff we saw in Barcelona, although I may edit this post later to add pics - right now, can't be bothered as I feel pretty tired - Edmund getting me up and down all night, and ensuring that Daniel's had his insulin and breakfast on time, means that now I need to head back to bed ...
... after I mention our new friends!
Somebody posted on an ex-pats forum about being new in our local area, with kids between the ages of ours, and some points they needed clarifying. I replied with a couple of helpful tips, and the information that we also lived in the same area. Various messages were exchanged, and then an invitation to dinner at their place came. We accepted, and met a lovely Scottish family: Mark, Claire, Johnathan & Niamh. They live in a flash townhouse up the hill, and have been there two months now - finding the local school a bit of a challenge for their eldest (Johnathan). Not just due to language, but the student body - which is not very 'Swiss' to start with.
The afternoon chat went well, talking about various things which makes life more comfortable for foreigners with no local support networks, kilts, and wedding parties. The kids (mostly) got on well, although Edmund spent most of his time with the adults (still not feeling well), and dinner was fabulous. Claire had spent a lot of time researching Coeliac (for Daniel) and come up with a lovely meal, with no risk of gluten. Including merangues for dessert (one of his favourites!).
We left in good time to get the bus home, got in about 20:15, and were all in bed by 20:30 ... now, if only Edmund had let us sleep through, Jessica & I would be refreshed and ready to go!!
Edmund has been, and still is, pretty sick. At least he takes his medicine without as much fuss now!! Still, I think he only sits still and takes it for the little choccie he gets afterwards ...
Daniel is still building and modifying the Lego he got for Christmas and his birthday - not just the castle Lego Advent calendar, but a giant castle (mostly funded by money from a grandmother & great-grandmother!) and another, 'lesser' set. Not to mention the Lego Atlantis & Hero Factory sets! He's not too big on Lego City ...
Aislinn got a heap of books, which suited her no end! She also had an Advent calendar, but hers was fairy Playmobil ... which has now taken over her dolls' house, despite the issue of scale.
Jessica & I got some nice choccies, and a few other things.
The funniest presents arrived in the mail after we got back from Barcelona - Christmas CDs for each of the kids, mailed from Australia by Pam. We would've received them over a week earlier if she'd just packed them in her luggage, and she would've saved herself a bit of postage (over $5 per letter!).
Barcelona ... an interesting little city, with some lovely, twisty lanes and alleys connecting some fairly broad streets ... La Rambla was great, with the broad walkway down the centre full of shops! Also managed to find a nice little second-hand English bookshop (Hybernian - check it out next time you're in Barcelona!); we bought a couple of books (read: over 20) from their great range ... and the prices were pretty good too.
The meals we had were varied and invariably cheap - instead of 50 francs for two dishes at a Chinese restaurant, we had a full meal for a family of five for under 50 Euro (including drinks!). We even had enough left over to take 'home' in a doggy bag to feed two more people ... went for breakfast.
The apartment in which we stayed was okay, but a little unusual for us - no bathroom window (!), tiny little rooms, tiny windows, narrow corridor winding through it, washing line outside on the wall (with a four-storey drop to the floor of the little unroofed 'courtyard' (about 2m x 4m, with air-conditioning pipes and no clear doorway access I could spot!) ... luckily our washing machine didn't work anyway, so we didn't have to risk using the washing line above the drop. Oh, forgot to mention the lift - squeezed into the centre of the stairwell, a three-person lift, which looked older than Australian Federation. Still, the location was good - on Paral-lel, easy walk down to the sea or over to La Rambla, a nice little supermarket on the next block down and the rubbish bins conveniently located outside the building next door.
New Year's Eve was, for us, in Barcelona. Kym & Sally were feeling sick (oh, did I mention we met the Statons in Barcelona? Well, we did ... sorta. Kym, Pam & John came to Zürich first, to celebrate Christmas with us at home, then we flew separately to Barcelona. Sally & Liam met us all there.).
So, Kym was feeling sick, then Pam & John offered to have a 'quick' dinner then be back by 20:00 so Jessica, Liam, Sally, Lella (a Montessori friend from Italy) & I could go out to party. By the time John & Pam got back (after 21:00 ...) Sally was also feeling sick, so offered to babysit the kids in our apartment. J&P went to sleep, Sally settled in on our lounge, Kym had been asleep for an hour or so already, and we set out: Liam, Lella, Jessica & I. Our mission: dinner.
We wandered over to La Rambla, passing a few back-alley restaurants on the way (in which I would have enjoyed eating, but nobody could really decide what they wanted ...). Looking around, we saw the Ideal Restaurant (literally - that was it's name!). It advertised pizza, among other things, so we finally agreed on that. We got into the place, and discovered they were doing a limited New Year's Eve menu - soup and entree fixed, with a choice of three mains and three desserts. We agreed, waited for our table to be prepared (and were asked four times if there were really four of us!), then sat. A glass being dropped and smashing behind us as we sat down was not the best welcome, but we made the most of it. The football chants from the basement were entertaining, and definitely added atmosphere.
The service staff, I have to say, were amazing: it was amazing people got the meals they'd ordered, even with a limited menu! At one point the chef came up with a paiella, looked around, was ignored by the serving staff and finally took the food back down to the kitchen. We had to order drinks two or three times, and then were only charged for half of those which arrived ... but the food was nice, and the price wasn't too bad.
Afterwards we wandered for a little, then headed back to the apartment. I didn't mention earlier, but will now, that the Statons & St Pierre's were in the neighbouring apartment ... theirs had a washing machine and heating that worked, as well as an indoor drying rack! They also had a bathroom window ... :/
Won't go into all the stuff we saw in Barcelona, although I may edit this post later to add pics - right now, can't be bothered as I feel pretty tired - Edmund getting me up and down all night, and ensuring that Daniel's had his insulin and breakfast on time, means that now I need to head back to bed ...
... after I mention our new friends!
Somebody posted on an ex-pats forum about being new in our local area, with kids between the ages of ours, and some points they needed clarifying. I replied with a couple of helpful tips, and the information that we also lived in the same area. Various messages were exchanged, and then an invitation to dinner at their place came. We accepted, and met a lovely Scottish family: Mark, Claire, Johnathan & Niamh. They live in a flash townhouse up the hill, and have been there two months now - finding the local school a bit of a challenge for their eldest (Johnathan). Not just due to language, but the student body - which is not very 'Swiss' to start with.
The afternoon chat went well, talking about various things which makes life more comfortable for foreigners with no local support networks, kilts, and wedding parties. The kids (mostly) got on well, although Edmund spent most of his time with the adults (still not feeling well), and dinner was fabulous. Claire had spent a lot of time researching Coeliac (for Daniel) and come up with a lovely meal, with no risk of gluten. Including merangues for dessert (one of his favourites!).
We left in good time to get the bus home, got in about 20:15, and were all in bed by 20:30 ... now, if only Edmund had let us sleep through, Jessica & I would be refreshed and ready to go!!
24.2.10
Speaking to Myself
I've long thought that bloggers are mostly speaking to themselves, despite the fact that anyone with an internet connection can read what they post - it's one of those forms of 'communication' with no guarantees, since you never know if anyone is going to read your post!
Still, sometimes I find it necessary to talk to myself ... and this is a socially-acceptable method of doing so. Still waiting for an answer, though ... should I start worrying now, or when I get an answer?
Still, sometimes I find it necessary to talk to myself ... and this is a socially-acceptable method of doing so. Still waiting for an answer, though ... should I start worrying now, or when I get an answer?
6.2.10
Swiss (& Neighbouring Countries') Beer!
Well, thought I should collect and post these reviews here ... since one of my main missions over here is to rank and review as many available beers as I can before my mate Matty comes to visit! Graciously, he's given me over eighteen months so far and it looks like I'll have until about October to try some more ...
For the rating, I've used what I call the VB Scale. This is where I try the beer, and rank it according to how many times better it is than VB. VB is a beer that pretty much every Australian who drinks beer has tried by the age of fourteen, making it a good "background level" beer. The fact that it tastes pretty crap meant that I felt confident in beginning my quest that I'd never need to rate something below it ... how wrong I was!!
So, without further ado, here come the beers ... not a very impressive list, given I've had eighteen months, but it gives a fairly broad spread of options ...
Denner Export Bier - DO NOT EVEN CONSIDER DRINKING THIS BEER!! I thought I may have found a cheap gem, since it was 85 rappen (Swiss cents) per can... this is a vastly inflated price for such a dog's product, an assessment that even Jessica agreed with! I bought two cans, ended up drinking two sips... the rest went down the drain. 0.1 VBs.
Eichhof Lager - a pale-coloured golden lager, with a decent taste... you can drink it, but it's nothing special. A nice malty flavour to it but, as I said, nothing special. 2.5 VBs.
Trivia - 'Eichhof' translates to 'calibration yard' in my German-English translation widget... :D
Löwen Weisse - a tasty little wheat beer, produced by Löwenbräu... again, nothing exceptional, but nice to drink. Have only had it from bottles (5 dl...), so may be better on tap, but worth drinking. 3 VBs
Andechs Doppelboch dunkel - a very nice dark beer, probably the nicest (and definitely most memorable!) beer that I tried in my short trip to Münich. Strong, too, as I found out from later research... Brewed (& on this occasion consumed) up at Kloster Andechs, very easy to drink... two litres went down even before I'd finished my meal, despite somebody else displaying most of the previous night's consumption... 10.5 VBs
Hürlimann Hammer - apparently a new recipe for an older beer, nice, slightly fruity, and again worth drinking. Comes in a 'practical' six-pack from the supermarket... 4 VBs
Fledschlösschen Hopfenperle - so far the nicest bottled beer that I've found in Zürich. Discovered it while having a ploughman's lunch at The Pie Shop (an event organised by the Cheese Club, which specialises in importing British cheeses to Switzerland). They were out of the beer from a local microbrewery (which happens when you arrive about 14:30 for a lunch event), so tried the Hopfenperle... nice crisp taste, pale colour, in an attractive green bottle... slightly hoppy finish, with only the slightest hint of bitterness. 5.5 VBs
Cooper's Best Extra Stout - only beer I tried when I made the mistake of visiting the Outback Lodge for a drink... I think I was the only Australian in the place, and the only dark beer they had was the Coopers - not even the Dark Ale, or Tooheys Old... the only thing on tap was Fosters... it was okay, not far different from what I drank in Sydney, but I think it may have preceded me to Switzerland by a number of years... 4 VBs
Murphy's Irish Stout - shouldn't really be in this list, but I got a couple of cans to drink over here... nice, nowhere near as good as drinking it on tap in the Harp Hotel in Tempe (when they had it...), but still a stout worth drinking. 4.5 VBs
Guinness - yes, I had to try a few... Jess bought a four-pack, so I had to drink them... again, not as good as on-tap, but still worth drinking. 4 VBs
Appenzeller Schwarzer Kristall - a very drinkable dark beer, with a nice hint of dark chocolate. Allegedly it has 'blue berry issue surprise the beer drunkard' (thank you, online language translation!). Still, it does have a great 'thunderstorm-black' colour, and goes down well... but don't drink it with a meal accompanied by spicy bbq sauce, just doesn't go well together... 6 VBs (yes, has taken the place of 'best bottled beer' so far...)
Grimbergen Blonde - Actually a Belgian beer, iirc from the bottle... an 'abbey' beer, with barley & wheat, but doesn't taste too strongly of the wheat. Nice, nothing special, goes down well... 4.5 VBs.
Grimbergen Double - Not double the 'standard' alcohol content (actually less, 6.5% instead of 6.7%), think it's double fermented... A very smooth taste, only the faintest hint of bitterness. 5 VBs.
Grimbergen Triple - Again, not triple the alcohol - although it is up to 9%... Final fermentation in the bottle, which appears to really bring out the wheat flavour. Is also more bitter than the other two Grimbergens, with a lingering after-taste. 4.7 VBs.
Eichhof Barbara - What I got last night when I asked for a dark beer. The bartender also suggested something else, but from the mangle of my poor German and his slightly-better English, it sounded like the second offering wasn't straight beer... some sort of mix... Anyway, the Barbara was very nice, went down easily (especially with a bit of pizza!), and was very popular last night with the crowd as one of the girls was also called Barbara... 5.8 VBs.
Feldschlösschen Dunkel Perle (bottle) - a very nice dark beer, smooth and only faintly bitter. Comes in a nice 0.5L bottle, too... :D - 6.5 VBs.
Feldschlösschen Original (mini keg) - nice, something you can easily drink anywhere, any time, but nothing special. Crisp taste, perhaps due to coming straight from the mini-keg... - 5.2 VBs.
Eichhof Pony (bottle) - THE MAKER IS PICTURED ON THE LABEL - SERIOUSLY!! Another beer to avoid! Tried this on a ferry across Lake Lucerne, figured a beer brewed at the local brewery would be okay ... big mistake!! It really does taste like I imagine the liquid a pony produces would taste ... another beer I didn't finish. 0.4 VBs
Sagres (bottle) - easy to drink, and cheap as well! At under a franc a bottle, this one tends to be the beer I drink most often at home ... An easy-drinking lager, no surprises. 4.5 VBs.
Tuborg Gold (bottle) - another cheap foreigner from Denner, 11 francs a ten-pack. Nice lager, nothing exciting but definitely not horrible to drink. 4.6 VBs
Gold Ochsen Original (bottle) - "Ulm's Liquid Gold!" I only discovered this one recently, a hoppy little beer that strongly reminds me of KB ... and you can even go out and "grab a cold gold"!! Not too expensive (costs marginally more than Sagres), great flavour, and goes down easily. 4.8 VBs.
Hope this helps ... as you may have worked out, the beers are listed basically in the order in which I tasted them. Watch this space for more, we'll see how I go ... and I'm sure there are others I have tried, which have missed the list since I forgot to record their details.
For the rating, I've used what I call the VB Scale. This is where I try the beer, and rank it according to how many times better it is than VB. VB is a beer that pretty much every Australian who drinks beer has tried by the age of fourteen, making it a good "background level" beer. The fact that it tastes pretty crap meant that I felt confident in beginning my quest that I'd never need to rate something below it ... how wrong I was!!
So, without further ado, here come the beers ... not a very impressive list, given I've had eighteen months, but it gives a fairly broad spread of options ...
Denner Export Bier - DO NOT EVEN CONSIDER DRINKING THIS BEER!! I thought I may have found a cheap gem, since it was 85 rappen (Swiss cents) per can... this is a vastly inflated price for such a dog's product, an assessment that even Jessica agreed with! I bought two cans, ended up drinking two sips... the rest went down the drain. 0.1 VBs.
Eichhof Lager - a pale-coloured golden lager, with a decent taste... you can drink it, but it's nothing special. A nice malty flavour to it but, as I said, nothing special. 2.5 VBs.
Trivia - 'Eichhof' translates to 'calibration yard' in my German-English translation widget... :D
Löwen Weisse - a tasty little wheat beer, produced by Löwenbräu... again, nothing exceptional, but nice to drink. Have only had it from bottles (5 dl...), so may be better on tap, but worth drinking. 3 VBs
Andechs Doppelboch dunkel - a very nice dark beer, probably the nicest (and definitely most memorable!) beer that I tried in my short trip to Münich. Strong, too, as I found out from later research... Brewed (& on this occasion consumed) up at Kloster Andechs, very easy to drink... two litres went down even before I'd finished my meal, despite somebody else displaying most of the previous night's consumption... 10.5 VBs
Hürlimann Hammer - apparently a new recipe for an older beer, nice, slightly fruity, and again worth drinking. Comes in a 'practical' six-pack from the supermarket... 4 VBs
Fledschlösschen Hopfenperle - so far the nicest bottled beer that I've found in Zürich. Discovered it while having a ploughman's lunch at The Pie Shop (an event organised by the Cheese Club, which specialises in importing British cheeses to Switzerland). They were out of the beer from a local microbrewery (which happens when you arrive about 14:30 for a lunch event), so tried the Hopfenperle... nice crisp taste, pale colour, in an attractive green bottle... slightly hoppy finish, with only the slightest hint of bitterness. 5.5 VBs
Cooper's Best Extra Stout - only beer I tried when I made the mistake of visiting the Outback Lodge for a drink... I think I was the only Australian in the place, and the only dark beer they had was the Coopers - not even the Dark Ale, or Tooheys Old... the only thing on tap was Fosters... it was okay, not far different from what I drank in Sydney, but I think it may have preceded me to Switzerland by a number of years... 4 VBs
Murphy's Irish Stout - shouldn't really be in this list, but I got a couple of cans to drink over here... nice, nowhere near as good as drinking it on tap in the Harp Hotel in Tempe (when they had it...), but still a stout worth drinking. 4.5 VBs
Guinness - yes, I had to try a few... Jess bought a four-pack, so I had to drink them... again, not as good as on-tap, but still worth drinking. 4 VBs
Appenzeller Schwarzer Kristall - a very drinkable dark beer, with a nice hint of dark chocolate. Allegedly it has 'blue berry issue surprise the beer drunkard' (thank you, online language translation!). Still, it does have a great 'thunderstorm-black' colour, and goes down well... but don't drink it with a meal accompanied by spicy bbq sauce, just doesn't go well together... 6 VBs (yes, has taken the place of 'best bottled beer' so far...)
Grimbergen Blonde - Actually a Belgian beer, iirc from the bottle... an 'abbey' beer, with barley & wheat, but doesn't taste too strongly of the wheat. Nice, nothing special, goes down well... 4.5 VBs.
Grimbergen Double - Not double the 'standard' alcohol content (actually less, 6.5% instead of 6.7%), think it's double fermented... A very smooth taste, only the faintest hint of bitterness. 5 VBs.
Grimbergen Triple - Again, not triple the alcohol - although it is up to 9%... Final fermentation in the bottle, which appears to really bring out the wheat flavour. Is also more bitter than the other two Grimbergens, with a lingering after-taste. 4.7 VBs.
Eichhof Barbara - What I got last night when I asked for a dark beer. The bartender also suggested something else, but from the mangle of my poor German and his slightly-better English, it sounded like the second offering wasn't straight beer... some sort of mix... Anyway, the Barbara was very nice, went down easily (especially with a bit of pizza!), and was very popular last night with the crowd as one of the girls was also called Barbara... 5.8 VBs.
Feldschlösschen Dunkel Perle (bottle) - a very nice dark beer, smooth and only faintly bitter. Comes in a nice 0.5L bottle, too... :D - 6.5 VBs.
Feldschlösschen Original (mini keg) - nice, something you can easily drink anywhere, any time, but nothing special. Crisp taste, perhaps due to coming straight from the mini-keg... - 5.2 VBs.
Eichhof Pony (bottle) - THE MAKER IS PICTURED ON THE LABEL - SERIOUSLY!! Another beer to avoid! Tried this on a ferry across Lake Lucerne, figured a beer brewed at the local brewery would be okay ... big mistake!! It really does taste like I imagine the liquid a pony produces would taste ... another beer I didn't finish. 0.4 VBs
Sagres (bottle) - easy to drink, and cheap as well! At under a franc a bottle, this one tends to be the beer I drink most often at home ... An easy-drinking lager, no surprises. 4.5 VBs.
Tuborg Gold (bottle) - another cheap foreigner from Denner, 11 francs a ten-pack. Nice lager, nothing exciting but definitely not horrible to drink. 4.6 VBs
Gold Ochsen Original (bottle) - "Ulm's Liquid Gold!" I only discovered this one recently, a hoppy little beer that strongly reminds me of KB ... and you can even go out and "grab a cold gold"!! Not too expensive (costs marginally more than Sagres), great flavour, and goes down easily. 4.8 VBs.
Hope this helps ... as you may have worked out, the beers are listed basically in the order in which I tasted them. Watch this space for more, we'll see how I go ... and I'm sure there are others I have tried, which have missed the list since I forgot to record their details.
14.1.10
Tim Tam Love!!
Ahh!!! The joy of eating Tim Tams ... a pleasure I've not experienced (until now!) since leaving Australia 18 months ago ...
For those unfortunate enough to have never eaten a Tim Tam, the pleasure cannot truly be described ... but Tim Tams are the greatest chocolate biscuit ever created. Pity the bastards over here want to charge over four francs a pack!! I refuse to pay double for anything, but that means that sadly I've been without Tim Tams for far too long ... :/
Anyway, getting back to the joy: my mother-in-law arrived a coupla days back, with a pack of Tim Tams for me!! I have shared one with my Swiss son, much to his great delight, but other than that the whole pack is mine!!! To ensure this, it has been concealed in what I believe to be the perfect hiding place ... and to ensure it remains secret, I shall not mention the location here!! Spies & informers are everywhere, you know ...
What I really need now, though, is a good hot chocolate ... since while Tim Tams are fantastic alone, they need a hot caffeinated beverage to bring them to their full glory! I'm sure some of you are familiar with the concept: take a Tim Tam, bite off each end, dip one end into the drink, and then suck. It's a race to see how much you drink before you have to shove the molten remains of the biscuit into your mouth - and letting it collapse into sludge in your drink is just not done! Do that, and no more Tim Tams for you!
Bizarre, really, how even surrounded by all of the wonderful chocolate produced in Switzerland, I still find Tim Tams to be the greatest ... or it would be, if Tim Tams were not such fantastic things!! Just make sure they're fresh, though ... old & mistreated Tim Tams are nasty, and should be eaten only as an absolute last resort. Of course, this holds true of all chocolate snacks - although Tim Tams may be the only chocolate biscuit that is actually enhanced by being refrigerated, to give it a bit more crunch. Somehow, the chocolate is not adversely affected by such storage, provided it is not for more than a week - which is not a problem I've ever encountered at my house, anyway.
Tim Tams. Yum.
For those unfortunate enough to have never eaten a Tim Tam, the pleasure cannot truly be described ... but Tim Tams are the greatest chocolate biscuit ever created. Pity the bastards over here want to charge over four francs a pack!! I refuse to pay double for anything, but that means that sadly I've been without Tim Tams for far too long ... :/
Anyway, getting back to the joy: my mother-in-law arrived a coupla days back, with a pack of Tim Tams for me!! I have shared one with my Swiss son, much to his great delight, but other than that the whole pack is mine!!! To ensure this, it has been concealed in what I believe to be the perfect hiding place ... and to ensure it remains secret, I shall not mention the location here!! Spies & informers are everywhere, you know ...
What I really need now, though, is a good hot chocolate ... since while Tim Tams are fantastic alone, they need a hot caffeinated beverage to bring them to their full glory! I'm sure some of you are familiar with the concept: take a Tim Tam, bite off each end, dip one end into the drink, and then suck. It's a race to see how much you drink before you have to shove the molten remains of the biscuit into your mouth - and letting it collapse into sludge in your drink is just not done! Do that, and no more Tim Tams for you!
Bizarre, really, how even surrounded by all of the wonderful chocolate produced in Switzerland, I still find Tim Tams to be the greatest ... or it would be, if Tim Tams were not such fantastic things!! Just make sure they're fresh, though ... old & mistreated Tim Tams are nasty, and should be eaten only as an absolute last resort. Of course, this holds true of all chocolate snacks - although Tim Tams may be the only chocolate biscuit that is actually enhanced by being refrigerated, to give it a bit more crunch. Somehow, the chocolate is not adversely affected by such storage, provided it is not for more than a week - which is not a problem I've ever encountered at my house, anyway.
Tim Tams. Yum.
11.1.10
The Concept of Home ...
Well, another new week at school, another interesting lunchtime chat ...
I was chatting with (North American) English-speaking staff about holidays, trips, and catching up with family & friends ... and I got around to mentioning to one woman who has a lot of people coming over summer that I know of a reasonably large apartment that will be vacant around that time as the residents will be traveling overseas. Of course she asked if it was mine, and that in turn dribbled around to the fact that I will be visiting Australia around that time to catch up with people.
Now, the other member of the conversation (let's call her Arwen, just for fun) chimed in with, "Oh, so you're going home then!".
Without thinking, I replied, "No, back to Australia for a holiday.".
"Isn't that home?" Arwen asked.
"No, Zürich's home," I answered, honestly.
Arwen appeared confused, as if I was being deliberately obtuse, and asked, "Home is where you were born, where you grew up, isn't it?"
I let the assertion slide, and she wandered off to another conversation. Got me thinking, though, about where 'home' really is ...
For me, I feel at home in whatever place I am now. Growing up, home was the only house in which I'd ever lived. I lived there for 21 years, in the same bedroom, without thinking about any other place as being home.
After my Dad remarried, I moved to Mum's house - and that was home. I established myself in a different room, with a few different bits of furniture, and really settled in. This was now home, not the house in which I'd lived for 21 years.
Then, a few years later, I got married. Moved in to a flat with my new wife, and now that flat was home (with a bizarre landlord, who unfailingly mowed the moss around the block each Wednesday. Yes, it was moss (well, 70% anyway!), but he mowed it anyway! He also must have had at least fifty spares for everything in the block tucked away somewhere, as whenever some ancient fitting broke, out came a perfect match - even to the age!
We soon had a child on the way, and felt it best to move away from our unbalanced landlord, so moved into a nice little flat (next to a huge park!) owned by my Dad ... and that was home, double-length garage that never had space for a car (thanks to my wife's hoarding of furniture) and all! Our daughter was born, it was a slightly messier home ... our son was born, and it was a slightly crowded even messier home ... but it was home.
After some years of that home, we had to move to avoid a hostile landlord take-over ... so we managed to rent a house that backed onto the in-laws' side fence. Gave my father-in-law a new perspective on the external plumbing for the upstairs bathroom ... "That sticks out like a sore thumb!". Oh, and he installed the gate through the fence left-handed (natural, given his inclination) ... which meant we had to pass the gate, then open it, in order to visit. Also, for some reason known only to himself, he made the gate less than 700mm wide. Still, once my mother-in-law put a curtain on the kitchen window, we got on reasonably well. My father-in-law swiftly went from half a dozen easily-cared-for reptiles to about a score, including some which required fresh live food daily, once he knew somebody who was not afraid to grab a handful of cockroaches lived next door and could be trusted with a set of keys. That was home, bizarre feeding habits and all ... with the added bonus of emergency babysitting on various evenings when we were suddenly called out to dinner or a movie. Oh, and the landlord living two doors up the road was not a problem ... at least, not as much as his attitude to any broken-down air conditioners or shattered windows ... Yes, home, with an unusable pool that proved to be a perfect breeding ground for goldfish.
Said landlord wanted to let his brother use the house, and gave us the minimum notice to move out. Rather generous of him, since it meant that the moving date was about two weeks after our third child's due date, and our kids are all born late ... truly a great man!
So, second son born in the back room of a house we had to vacate less than a week later (which worked remarkably smoothly, thanks to a friend and her Korean removalists! Lucky them, they could pretend they didn't understand the annoying landlord who tried to give orders as to how things should be moved to avoid damage to his house ... that's what the bond & insurance are for, git!). That home was left with few regrets (I loved watching the goldfish, we had a few big ones in there, and a variety of interesting colours!), and we moved to a flash townhouse near the kids' school.
This was soon home, but for some reason it didn't feel as permanent as the others. I was settled, but the wife & kids seemed not so ... This was due to the fact that, unknown to us at the time, we were going to leave there less than twelve months later (which suited our landlord, whose relationship with his new girlfriend was working well, and he could sell the place vacant shortly after our lease expired).
Zürich was our destination, and an apartment scheduled for demolition within eight months. It felt like home straight away, despite a decided lack of furniture.
Eight? Did I say eight? Sorry, make that fourteen ... nah, stuff it, why not 26! That's a far more reasonable short-term lease ... don't mind the surveying markers, they'll last two years without getting lost - they're about five metres high!
So, home ... perhaps the concept of 'home' is so flexible to me, since I don't really see any place in this world as where I'll really settle. My home is not in this world, but I can be content in a whole heap of places while I'm waiting to get there ...
I was chatting with (North American) English-speaking staff about holidays, trips, and catching up with family & friends ... and I got around to mentioning to one woman who has a lot of people coming over summer that I know of a reasonably large apartment that will be vacant around that time as the residents will be traveling overseas. Of course she asked if it was mine, and that in turn dribbled around to the fact that I will be visiting Australia around that time to catch up with people.
Now, the other member of the conversation (let's call her Arwen, just for fun) chimed in with, "Oh, so you're going home then!".
Without thinking, I replied, "No, back to Australia for a holiday.".
"Isn't that home?" Arwen asked.
"No, Zürich's home," I answered, honestly.
Arwen appeared confused, as if I was being deliberately obtuse, and asked, "Home is where you were born, where you grew up, isn't it?"
I let the assertion slide, and she wandered off to another conversation. Got me thinking, though, about where 'home' really is ...
For me, I feel at home in whatever place I am now. Growing up, home was the only house in which I'd ever lived. I lived there for 21 years, in the same bedroom, without thinking about any other place as being home.
After my Dad remarried, I moved to Mum's house - and that was home. I established myself in a different room, with a few different bits of furniture, and really settled in. This was now home, not the house in which I'd lived for 21 years.
Then, a few years later, I got married. Moved in to a flat with my new wife, and now that flat was home (with a bizarre landlord, who unfailingly mowed the moss around the block each Wednesday. Yes, it was moss (well, 70% anyway!), but he mowed it anyway! He also must have had at least fifty spares for everything in the block tucked away somewhere, as whenever some ancient fitting broke, out came a perfect match - even to the age!
We soon had a child on the way, and felt it best to move away from our unbalanced landlord, so moved into a nice little flat (next to a huge park!) owned by my Dad ... and that was home, double-length garage that never had space for a car (thanks to my wife's hoarding of furniture) and all! Our daughter was born, it was a slightly messier home ... our son was born, and it was a slightly crowded even messier home ... but it was home.
After some years of that home, we had to move to avoid a hostile landlord take-over ... so we managed to rent a house that backed onto the in-laws' side fence. Gave my father-in-law a new perspective on the external plumbing for the upstairs bathroom ... "That sticks out like a sore thumb!". Oh, and he installed the gate through the fence left-handed (natural, given his inclination) ... which meant we had to pass the gate, then open it, in order to visit. Also, for some reason known only to himself, he made the gate less than 700mm wide. Still, once my mother-in-law put a curtain on the kitchen window, we got on reasonably well. My father-in-law swiftly went from half a dozen easily-cared-for reptiles to about a score, including some which required fresh live food daily, once he knew somebody who was not afraid to grab a handful of cockroaches lived next door and could be trusted with a set of keys. That was home, bizarre feeding habits and all ... with the added bonus of emergency babysitting on various evenings when we were suddenly called out to dinner or a movie. Oh, and the landlord living two doors up the road was not a problem ... at least, not as much as his attitude to any broken-down air conditioners or shattered windows ... Yes, home, with an unusable pool that proved to be a perfect breeding ground for goldfish.
Said landlord wanted to let his brother use the house, and gave us the minimum notice to move out. Rather generous of him, since it meant that the moving date was about two weeks after our third child's due date, and our kids are all born late ... truly a great man!
So, second son born in the back room of a house we had to vacate less than a week later (which worked remarkably smoothly, thanks to a friend and her Korean removalists! Lucky them, they could pretend they didn't understand the annoying landlord who tried to give orders as to how things should be moved to avoid damage to his house ... that's what the bond & insurance are for, git!). That home was left with few regrets (I loved watching the goldfish, we had a few big ones in there, and a variety of interesting colours!), and we moved to a flash townhouse near the kids' school.
This was soon home, but for some reason it didn't feel as permanent as the others. I was settled, but the wife & kids seemed not so ... This was due to the fact that, unknown to us at the time, we were going to leave there less than twelve months later (which suited our landlord, whose relationship with his new girlfriend was working well, and he could sell the place vacant shortly after our lease expired).
Zürich was our destination, and an apartment scheduled for demolition within eight months. It felt like home straight away, despite a decided lack of furniture.
Eight? Did I say eight? Sorry, make that fourteen ... nah, stuff it, why not 26! That's a far more reasonable short-term lease ... don't mind the surveying markers, they'll last two years without getting lost - they're about five metres high!
So, home ... perhaps the concept of 'home' is so flexible to me, since I don't really see any place in this world as where I'll really settle. My home is not in this world, but I can be content in a whole heap of places while I'm waiting to get there ...
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