Prague Wrap Up - more food, more drinks but we did manage to squeeze in a museum

What's the best way to get people to come to the museum of Czech Cubism? Operate an awesome restaurant in the same building. Grand Cafe Orient sports one of the most breathtaking dining rooms one could have the pleasure of having breakfast in. It's so airy and beautiful that somehow eating a two thousand calorie breakfast seems like a light-hearted affair in there. Perhaps it's because everything in this dining room looks like a Renoir painting and therefore the food must not be real either. It is though and it is delicious.

A breakfast like this is pretty poetic and of course we want a bit of "culture" after our meal so we head to the House of The Black Madonna aka Museum of Czech Cubism which is located in the same building. Note for future travelers - a museum ticket gets you a discount at the cafe so perhaps we were supposed to do the museum first. Silly glutenous baes didn't know any better.

The museum is comprised of mostly furniture which weirdly seems an appropriate type of art to look at for two women stuffed to the brim with whipped cream, crepes and ice cream. Somehow filled with this concoction I feel a bit unworthy of appreciating fine art so furniture will do.

We wonder around inevitably imagining cubist furniture in our apartments and take obligatory art deco staircase pictures.

We leave the museum with a clear intention to take a break from eating but Prague is a tricky city. One unassuming turn and we end up in one of Prague's magical courtyards. This one is particularly quiet and pastel. I kinda feel like maybe we ended up inside one of these old-fashioned hat boxes that are filled with tissue paper and ribbons and have a faint smell of lilacs and lavender. The sounds of the busy tourist-infested city become muffled and time slows down. Everything is quiet and pretty and invites you to take a seat and rest for a bit. 

We order the Czech version of an iced coffee which is basically ice cream and park our tired asses down there for hours. After all, looking at cubist furniture is exhausting! :)

After hours in the cake-like courtyard, it's time to move on. One more visit to Old Town Square is in order where I am reminded that lolo is an amazing photographer.

I wonder if this city is ever not crowded. Prague is one of the top tourist destinations in the world and for great reasons - it's gorgeous, it's delicious, and it's pretty cheap because the currency conversion works in almost everyone's favor. I can definitely see why a ton of Europeans choose Prague as a weekend getaway. The city center is filled with places like this

that somehow make me doubt the "authenticity" of the dining experience. We did manage to find one spot that I am fairly certain was a local gem. Near our hotel was a little wine bar - a store front of some tiny family vineyard -  where one could go and purchase wine by the glass or by the liter if you wanted to take a jug home with you. It's kind of like going to Starbucks with your own tumbler but for wine. This place was a hole in the wall and not a single person there spoke English but the wine was delicious and cost next to nothing. 

lolo is making me giggle because she is upset about having to leave Prague tomorrow. Our next stop is Amsterdam and she has never been. We will trade the city where all buildings look like wedding cakes to a city where all buildings look like gingerbread houses and I can't wait! 

Before we leave we start a new tradition. In the beginning of our trip i got us a couple of Kinder Surprise eggs that came with little toys inside. We decide to leave a little new bae-habitant in each new place we stay.

Oh, the things this little guy will see in the Love Room...

There is only one bad thing about Amsterdam and it is leaving it.

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Joy Orbison b2b Solar at Dekmantel by Night at the Melkweg.

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The Baes are on bikes, baecycling around Amsterdam!

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A meal to remember and cocktails with Anonymous

My relationship with food is not very complex. I eat it, it keeps me alive. That's pretty much it. Don't get me wrong, I have dined at amazing restaurants and appreciated their fare but I don't know if I have ever had a truly time-stopping all emersive dining experience until lolo took us to Le Degustation - one of Prague's three Michelin star rated restaurants where we had an 11 course chef'so meal with wine pairings.



We arrive at 7 sharp and are immediately seated in an intimate and airy dining room. The deco is tasteful and minimal, the tables are polished wood, and the kitchen is part of the dining room.

Lolo immediately makes an observation about the lighting. It's dim everywhere except directly above the tables. The focus of this place will be food and not other bells and whistles.



They start us off with prosecco and bring out amuse-buche - pre-meal snacks.

Being the sarcastic bitch that I am, I make fun of the rocks they use as serving platters and try to tell lolo about @wewantplates twitter but my yapping trails off as I put that piece of fish in my mouth. The first thing you notice is not the taste but the texture. It's smooth at first like a very polished piece of jade, and then it's soft yet dense as you sink your teeth into it and then it just kind of disappears in your mouth, probably by osmosis since it seems like a crime to actually swallow something so beautiful. The taste kind of hits you everywhere in your body and it goes in waves. Pretty sure I felt this herring in my knees.

The menu arrives in a beautiful envelope like a letter from the chef and lists the meals and the wine pairings. We opt for the full experience in all of its 11 course glory.

The sommelier brings out the first wine - a Riesling that is so forgiving that lolo and I would gladly give up water forever and just drink that. And then comes the first course.

I don't know they managed to do this to the tomatoes but it's kind of like they intensified everything about them. They looked like regular tomatoes but tasted like tomatoes times infinity. Somehow all the sauces and juices and the wine and even the mustard seeds work towards just making these tomatoes more tomato-ee.

The next wine is completely different and smells like vibrant vegetable garden on a hot summer day. I realize that I am now getting poetic when talking about food and it's a new feeling for me. Then comes an impossible egg yolk with flowers and some kind of foam that I am pretty sure is made of clouds.

More wine and food follow. 

I can't remember the exact moment that we become intensely focused on how well the wines are paired with the meals. It's almost like the meal would not be complete without it. The wines are served first so based on them you anticipate what the meal would be like and then are amazed nonetheless.

The feeling of euphoria sets in. I am reduced to just basic bodily senses. All of my essence is focused on what starts in my mouth and my nose. We are incapable of having a conversation that isn't about what we are eating and drinking at this moment. It's almost like the rest of the world took a step back and we are incapsulated in this perfect moment of pure unadulterated hedonism.

Towards the end of the meal I realize that the 11 courses in a way had the same progression as seasons. We started in the tomato-ee summer, edulged in a bountiful fall with duck, went through a savage beef heart winter and finished in the late berry-full spring. Perhaps it is a sign that we need to come back and live through this cornucopua of sensations again next year.

We left La Degustation fully satiated but not ready to call it a night so we made our way to the Anonymous Bar for some late night cocktails.

It's tucked away in one of these perfect Prague secret alleyways. It's dark and unmarked on the outside but cozy and sexy on the inside. The menus have white pages that you have to shine a black light on to see the writing. The bartenders are cute and friendly and put on a bit of a spectacle when serving drinks. lolo's drink is served with a side of a toy gun andn my Negroni comes in a blood bag.

The way this place manages to capitalize on an anarchist organization is giving me a bit of cognitive dissonance or maybe it's the drinks talking.

We go back to the hotel and amuse ourselves for another hour by the kinky items in our "Love room". What a perfect finish to our first full day but tomorrow's hangover is gonna be a doozy.

Prague Reflections

 

On our first morning in Prague, Polar and I required sustenance. Caffeine. Protein. Carbs. Everything. Something. And now, please. We walked to Café Louvre, known historical hangout of Kafka and Einstein, and proceeded to breakfast and shake off our jet lag.

 

Polar's Czech Breakfast came with all the bells and whistles, or just the basics, depending on how you look at it. Cheese, meat, egg, pickle, which as far as I can tell are the four basic food groups in the Czech Republic. Not pictured: huge cake slice. Okay, so there are five food groups. The cake was inhaled before I could snap a photo.

As our blood sugar began to rise and caffeine levels returned to acceptable levels, the feeling of being in Prague began to sink in. This city makes baes happy.

 

It was a rainy day, but not uncomfortable. We walked around in the drizzle and came upon an awesome motorized Kafka head, and of course stopped to take photos in its reflection. It reminds me of the Bean/Cloud Gate in Chicago. Only, you know, it's Kafka. In Prague. And motorized. Well, they are both big and metal and shiny, anyway.  

 

It started to rain a bit harder so we began pondering indoor activities. We walked passed a place that looked a little hokey, yet also quite charming, called the Imaginarium. $4 admission? Sold.

 

The inside had an old-timey amusement park/circus/carnival feel to it, but it wasn't overly impressive. At first. 

"Bae, I want to do the mirror maze!" 

"Okay but we have to put on these plastic gloves apparently." 

A few moments later we were suited up and headed into the maze.

 

It's hard to describe how disorienting and fun this maze is. Mirrors are aligned at angles, and kept clean thanks to the gloves, so that you can't tell if the path in front of you is a reflection or the true way forward. There is a lot of awkward bumping around and confused noises coming from both you and the other people in the maze. Kids were running around. People were cursing. One guy had a beer. 

Once you get used to the disorientation, the giggles set in. And then you create the MultiBae.

 

The Imaginarium is FULL of very entertaining, good, clean family fun. All of the concepts are simple and straightforward, but really succeed in getting you out of your normal brainspace - you start to play around and enjoy things the same way you did as a kid. Like this face collage contraption; it is just a series of mirror slats. Put your bae on the other side from you and you get Blend-a-Bae.

 

There is a huge interactive musical contraption that allows you to change a live track by starting and stopping loops of sound, playing on a keyboard, changing echos and beats. It sounded as amazing as it looks. 

 

The Visual Echo room consists of a large flat screen tv that displays video of whatever is in the room (i.e. you) with crazy delay trails.

Thoroughly satisfied, we walked back out into the rain and did what may actually be our favorite activity here: sitting at a cafe or restaurant, relaxing, and drinking beer. Even I drink beer here. And the beer is good. 

 

We sat and stared at the people and at the buildings (that all look like petite fours by the way. This city is beautiful and I want to eat it.) and geared up for dinner. The Dinner. The one I've been waiting for for weeks. I couldn't wait. 

 

Of jet lag, carbs and German abs

The first day is abroad is always a bit bizarre because of jet lag. At this point in time lolo and I are awake for about 20 hours and it's vital that we stay up for at least another 4 to get on the local cycle. Our cab driver wouldn't stop talking about some outdoor beer garden in the park which seems like a perfect idea. We couldn't remember the name of it so we ventured to the hotel reception desk for help. "The outdoor beer garden? Oh, it's closed now because it's Saturday. It's only open Monday through Friday from 9 and until 5." - says the consierge. I contemplate for a second this odd schedule for a beer garden and wonder if anyone in this city works. Luckily Prague does not suffer from the shortage of eating and drinking establishments so we venture out to find a spot.

We sit at some random eatery and order our first beers. lolo is a hater when it comes to beer but she decided to give it a shot since we are in beer haven. We talk about how we don't feel at all tired.

 

And the beers come and they are glorious. I drank half of mine in one continuous gulp. And then the food arrives and after eating suddenly jet lag kicks in. lolo's voice brings me back to reality and I am aware that I was staring into space for the past 30 seconds. I am so full of food and beer. "You do remember that you ordered us dessert, right?" - asks lolo. Oh, shit... no, I didn't.

We leave the restaurant filled with carbs and embark on a post-gluteneauos walk of shame - it's a walk that allows you to burn 30 of the 3000 calories you just consumed because lying down would literally make you feel like a snake that ate an elephant.

We stroll on Charles Bridge and attempt to climb the hill to the castle but give up. Maybe if we had bikes... and obviously 2 seconds later we see this.

The dude who worked there seemed pretty happy to see us

We finally make it to the main square in Old Town. As we stop to gawk at the Astronomical Clock, we are faced with a group of young dudes who are taking a photo. They are drunk and happy and one of them pulls up his shirt to reveal the most ridiculous washboard abs. Of course we end up talking with them. They are German and a total hot mess. They are still coherent but one drink away from being completely obnoxious. The dude with the abs is the equivalent of a Pokémon Go lure. They set him off and then just wait for women to appear. "You wanna touch it?" -he asks jokingly pointing at his midsection. I think he was surprised when I said "hell, yeah!" and proceeded to grope him. We chatted with them for awhile and somehow managed to objectify them more than they did us. They invited us to continue the evening with them at a nearby drinking establishment but we disappeared into the night. They have had way too many drinks to be useful.

We managed to make it to midnight on the day of arrival but we are beat. We spot this dog on the way to the hotel.

Oh, little buddy, we are so with you... And thus we end our first day in Prague.