In downtown Chisinau, there's an Uzbek restaurant called Caravan. We've been there before and I've put pictures of their tables and layout on the blog a couple of months ago, so this time it's just about the food.
We got the appetizer/cheese plate this time, and you can tell it's got a wonderful presentation. The cheese was local stuff, and not bad but not great. Vegetables fresh and tasty. The bread is a typical Uzbek one, and the salads are what you get in eastern Europe - a guess as to what's in it, and rarely dressed. It tasted good. The draw, of course, is pilaf. I am not a huge fan of pilaf, but Andreas loves it and says theirs is excellent. The soup I had was a dumpling soup in a vegetable stock, which was a bit sour. That sour bit is normal in soup here, as everyone puts "bors acru" in their broth. Two kinds of dumplings - steamed and baked. Other than that, they're identical. The steamed ones taste better to me, and both could use some kind of dipping sauce. Finally, my cappucino with a nice little touch of presentation. The restaurant is expensive for Chisinau, but that means we got out for about $50 for the both of us, including drinks.
I am about six weeks behind on this sampler, for the stitchalong. Each bit is HUGE, and although I work on it nearly every day, I can't keep up. At least now I'm working on the middle motif of the last square now.
All this food was for only two people. It was awesome, too! Hot herbal minty tea, cherry crepes, bacon and ham, fried eggs.... bread with four! kinds of homemade jam. Every bit of it was excellent, and we didn't order any of it. It was all included in the price of the room. Breakfast alone is worth staying the night at Hanul lui Hanganu.
When I went to shop for the challenge stitchers, I also bought some stuff for myself. I've got a weakness for ribbon, and the (Russian speaking only) saleslady kept pulling down from her display beautiful bit after beautiful bit. How was I to resist?
All browns this time, with tiny bits of yellow. Slowly, I'm getting this done. There's a -lot- of stitching on this piece, but I think it'll be worth it.
I'm back at a point of a lot of filling in, so at least I complete a few rows each time I do this. It's to the point where I'm getting close to starting the last, short page.
In late April, we stayed overnight at Hanul lui Hanganu, a small resort in the north of Moldova fronting the Nistru (Dniester) River. It's beautiful, even if getting there is an adventure. We needed a break and to rest, and this place was perfect for it. Here is what we had for dinner: zeama - a sour chicken soup, mamaligia - kind of like polenta, pork chunks - not a fan of pork, placinte with dill and cheese and not too salty, and bread. We had kompot to drink. Kompot is made by boiling fresh fruit in water and adding a slight amount of sugar, then chilling it.
The tables are on a covered terrace that has a beautiful view of the river.
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