Bulgaria - Day 2 (Plovdiv)

Before getting on the bus at 8:00 am, I went down to get the breakfast at the hotel. Many vegetables with 7-8 kinds of olives. Despite the variety, there are only two kinds of cheese, yellow and white. Since cheese is a major ingredient in Bulgarian cuisine, I was expecting a bunch of different types of cheeses. The white cheese is like feta and the yellow cheese is like a very mild cheddar cheese. Less salty than cheddar, though.

Also, there weren't that many yogurts. The picture below is plain yogurt with fig jam. Compared to Greek yogurt (I'm not sure if so-called-Greek-yogurt is consumed in Greece or not, though), it contains more water and is not as smooth. I also see the strained version, which resembles Greek yogurt. Bulgarian yogurt is slightly tangier than Greek yogurt.

After breakfast, I left from the central bus station for Plovdiv, which is just 2 hours away. It was pretty foggy so that I couldn't see much from the window. But it seems there wasn't much to see, anyway.

I reserved a wine tasting tour from Bulgaria Wine Tour. There are several wine regions in Bulgaria but this tour takes me to the Thracian Lowland, which is Southern Bulgaria. This tour company is owned by the tour guide and his wife. Our guide has studied in the US and Sweden so he has a certain Western hospitality. Very nice and sincere person.

Wine making once was a major state-run industry in Bulgaria but it declined as Communism collapsed in the late 80s. Because of communism, the wine was mostly mass produced basic quality wine. However in recent years, wine production has re-emerged with better quality.

The first stop is Villa Yustina. The owner of the winery also owns a stainless steel tank business. Therefore, many of their wines are aged in stainless steel tanks (whether partially or entirely).

The sommelier of the winery showed us around. The winery offers monthly wine pairing events with different type of food options.

I tasted 5 kinds of wines. The tasting was accompanied by white/yellow cheeses and salami. The most unique grape varietal in Bulgaria is Mavrud, which is tannic and spicy. This grape is originated from Bulgaria. The grape is pretty dark (Mavro in Greek means "black") thus the wine is pretty dark in color. I tasted an interesting Mavrud / Rubin blend.

The second stop is Todoroff Wine Cellar. Also, the winery owns a restaurant and we decided to have a lunch before wine tasting. The menu is pre-fix with 4 options for each course.

Snezhanka (Similar to Tzatziki but it's much thicker)

Ruska salata - Potato Salad

Grilled trout - very clean taste

Pork dish

It's called Chocolate souffle but it was molten lava cake actually. 

A sort of bread pudding

After the lunch, the winery gave me a tour followed by tastings of 5 wines, including Mavrud, along with a Muscat / Sauvignon Blanc, Cabernet Sauvignon / Shiraz Rose, and two Cabernert Sauvignon variants.

Very nice looking tasting room

After visiting two wineries, the guide gave a short walking city tour of Plovidiv. In Sofia yesterday, I saw quite a few ruins in the city. But Plovidiv is even more unique. They keep discovering more ruins after the commercial facilities are built. This ruin is found in the basement of a shopping mall.

This amphitheater is located right next to a school. It's very funny to find something like this in the middle of the city.

I was lucky to be in the city of Plovidiv in the week of the Bulgarian version of Beaujolais Nouveau. More than 40 wineries in the region brought their new wines and displayed them in booths at various locations, such as private homes and churches. It seems that it's ok to drink in public in Bulgaria. Also, I found many liquor stores are open 24 hours everyday. The guide told me the legal drinking age is 18 years but even that is not very strict in Bulgaria. The guide got me tokens (8 tastings). That was more than enough after visiting 2 wineries.

The wine event was not a part of the tour. So, now we are at the last stop, a wine bar operated by the Bendida winery. Since it's a very small bar, we sat outside. It was pretty chilly but felt very cozy with a blanket. Another selection of 5 wines accompanied by snacks were served here. Again, a wine from the Mavrud grape was served.

All the wines were much better than what I expected. Many wines are a little more tannic and pretty bold for European wines.

Also, I did enjoy the city of Plovdiv a lot more than Sofia because the people are more laid back. Still, the people are not super friendly but they seemed to smile a bit more. I'm glad to know that not all Bulgarians are grumpy.

Burgundy

Again, we left early from Lyon to a hotel in Dijon. As soon as we checked in, we took a local train for Beaune, which is the capitol of the Burgundy wine region. One of the major grape varietals of this region is my favorite, pinot noir. We already booked a wine tasting tour for the afternoon, but decided to check out a wine tasting room within walking distance.

The winery is called Bouchard Aine & Fils.

                                                                       Nice building

     The remodeled cellar is a tour route / tasting room

We tasted 4 wines there. Some of them are way more tannic than what I'm used to. But the last wine, which is 2000 Clos de Vougeot Grand Cru, was something special. I'm not a big fan of French wines in general because they are a little too dry for me. This is also a dry wine, however, it comes with lots of different flavors. It was like I was eating different fruits at the same time. Very impressive.

Before the wine tasting tour we booked, we had some time so that we went to a bistro restaurant. Because it's Sunday today, we didn't have many choices. And this place was pretty packed. The name is Dame Tartine, just by the landmark of Beaune, Hotel Dieu.

The portions of this restaurant were very generous, like Pierre Orsi that we went last night. Is that a French thing??

                                                                  Pork Pate, very good

                                            Brie-like cheese on top of toasted baguette

                          Pork with creamy mustard sauce (of course mustard, it's just by Dijon)

               Chicken breast with creamy sauce. Unfortunately, the chicken was over cooked.....

                                                         Apple tart and crème anglais

                                 Cassis sorbet. Cassis is a specialty of this region, nicely tangy


After lunch, we did the wine tasting tour. We drove quite far. On the way, we saw huge vineyards. I thought I was used to see pretty big vineyards in Napa and Sonoma. But it seemed these continued on forever. The guide stopped by at the vineyard for a specific wine, Romanee-Conti. The grapes here must be super premium. Because they had a sign, we took a picture (sorry, it's not very clear).

Even after that, the guide kept driving. Where are we going? Are we tasting any wine??

Finally we arrived at Domain Gerard Quivy. In Bordeaux, the winery's name begins from Chateaux but it's Domaine in the Burgundy region. The winery is located in a small very cute village, called Gevrey-Chambertin.

                                                                         This is inside

We tasted 4 kinds of red burgundy wines. Like the guide mentioned, this is not the sort of winery that a tourist can find out about easily. So, I feel like we had a special experience.



After the tasting, we came back to Dijon. I was looking for a restaurant that serves traditional burgundy dishes. Unfortunately, all the nice restaurants are closed on Sunday. The only reasonably traditional restaurant that we could find was Le Gril Raure. It's a kind of between a traditional restaurant and family restaurant. Anyway, I was determined to have escargot and beef bourguignon in Dijon. I found escargot cassoulet but not beef bourguignon at this restaurant...

                        This is escargot cassoulet. It was very mushroomy. But nice and creamy.

                 Another type of pork pate. I like the one I had in Beaune in the afternoon, though.

                                                          Sautéed pork in tomato sauce

Simple steak. The way French people prepare steak is different from what a normal American would expect. I would say at least 1 degrees (sometimes 2 degrees) different. If you want medium rare, ask for medium. French medium rare is pretty much American rare....

                                                            Citrus mousse, very tangy

                                          Crème brulee. Why not, we are in France!


Tomorrow, we are moving to San Sebastian, Spain. I wish we had planned a bit more time in the Burgundy region because I really enjoyed the foods here. Even though the food appears rustic and simple, I could taste that quite a bit of effort went into its preparation. I'm planning to spend a few days in Paris at the end of this trip. Hope I can have this type of food there.

Wine day

Today is the wine day. Just on the way to Bologna, we happened to find out that Antinori, which is one of the major Chianti producers, just built a brand new headquarters and is offering tours and tastings. Unlike many major wineries in Napa and Sonoma, most wineries in Europe won't take walk-ins. So, we made an appointment online (with 20 Euro admission per person).

So, we drove about 1.5 hour to Chianti region. The new building was very interesting. They've covered the new building with grass and vines. The point is to blend into the scenery. They're trying not to be a flashy landmark. After the tour, we tasted 1 white and 2 Chianti classico. The second of the chianti was Riserva and it was pretty good. Some Chianti is a bit too dry for my taste but this one had good balance of acid, residual sugar and tannin. Later we bought a bottle.

Then, we headed to lunch. Enoteca Fuoripiazza Morandini at Greve in Chianti was very cozy place. For the primi, we had gorgonzola saffron risotto and bean and pasta soup. The gorgonzola in the risotto was subtle. The flavor was good but it seemed it needed a bit more salt. Perfectly al dente, though. The bean and pasta soup was very good. It had an amazing Tuscan flavor. The beans were well cooked and became a half puree. Very nice.
  

The secondi were rather disappointing: Cod in tomato sauce and their special pork dish, accompanied by unseasoned beans. The server brought salt, pepper and olive oil to season the beans. Unfortunately, I didn't taste anything flavorful. Perhaps this is authentic peasant food?

The desserts were tiramisu and tangerine sorbet. This was my first Tiramisu in this trip. It wasn't too sweet and pretty good. I found it's fluffier than ones in the US. Maybe more whipped cream? A very light tiramisu. The sorbet was good too. I thought the citrus flavor was similar to Yuzu.

After the lunch, we went to a wine shop with wine tasting by automatic dispenser. First we purchased the card with some credit. Then we inserted the card to the dispenser and select the wine we wanted. The price of the wine (mostly between 0.50 to 3.00 Euro) is deducted from the card. There were at least 100 to choose from.

We purchased 10 Euro credit and tasted about 10 different varieties. Unfortunately, I didn't find anything I liked. So many to choose from that I didn't know which one to pick...

After the tasting, we went to Pisa to see the tower, then headed back to Bologna. Because of the traffic, we decided to take local streets. It was a bad choice.... On the map, the road looked like a reasonably wide street but in fact, it was very narrow winding road. Because it was getting so late, we decided to drop by at a roadside restaurant on the way to Bologna. Yes, it's risky. It can be amazing or horrible. Did our risk pay off? Well.....

Two appetizers were octopus salad and langoustine salad.

The octopus salad was pretty good. But the langoustine salad.... What's this?? 2/3 of the dish was the thousand island dressing - like sauce. It wasn't as strongly seasoned as thousand island dressing. Perhaps it had a sour cream base or mascarpone? Anyway, it was an overwhelming amount of sauce. And the shrimp inside the sauce were way over cooked. I know we were just unlucky this time, though.

The good thing about this restaurant was the pizza. We had Sicilian pizza, which came with tomato sauce, olives, and anchovies. No cheese. The crust was very thin and crispy. Not bad.

We arrived at the hotel after 11:00pm. Tomorrow is the first day of the cooking class. It was supposed to be from 9:00am but it was changed to 3:00pm at the last minute. Well, I'm in Italy, so what can I say? I should be happy that the class wasn't canceled... Anyway, we can take a rest tomorrow morning because of this change.