One year and 14 weeks - Alsace, California, and Milan

Yes, we have been delinquent bloggers.  No good excuses really.

Breakfast on the patio in Huningue

Shortly after our trip to Ireland, we made our way up to Huningue, France again to see Mike and Christina before they left Europe.  After a year assignment, they were headed back to California.  We drove up Saturday night, and then we went wine tasting in Alsace on Sunday.  Just about every place we stopped was closed, but the people were so friendly that when we asked they said to come in anyway.  We drove up the Wine Road to Barr and then worked our way back south.  At one winery we stopped at in Dambach-la-Ville, we had a show on top of a tasting.  The proprietors were this really old Alsatian couple.  The elderly lady was running the tasting room.  She wound up pouring wine all over the table either due to not being to see the small tasting glasses or having lost some hand eye coordination.  We decided to buy a couple of bottles, so we followed her to the small warehouse behind their house, where first there was a search for the key to open the warehouse, and then once it was open, there was a treasure hunt to find the bottles of wine we had just paid for.  Quite fun!  After a few wineries, we finished with a big lunch in Ribeauvillé.  We had planned to cover a lot more ground, but we ran out of time.  Along the way, we tried Gewurztraminer, Riesling, Edelzwicker, Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc, Sylvaner and Auxerrois.  It was an enjoyable day in wine country.

We did host another apero in early May with some rhubarb pie that K baked, some home brew, and savory snacks.  The middle of May was consumed by M's support of an FDA audit going on at a sister plant in Israel; she remained in Neuchâtel.  This support included a Sunday at work since the Israeli work week runs from Sunday to Thursday.  Therefore, her weekend was cut short.

A day after the audit ended, we packed up some Swiss chocolates and headed to Northern California for a week.  The purpose of the trip to California was two-fold: 1) visit with old friends and 2) allow M to finally take the Culinary Institute of America's (CIA's) Baking and Pastry Arts Career Discovery class.  On point 1, we certainly succeeded.  After 28+ hours of travel from Switzerland, we spent the first half of the trip at Mary and Jack's goat farm in the Capay valley.  Sunday, the day after we arrived, Mary and Jack hosted a barbecue with some of our old coworkers from Alza.  We enjoyed corn on the cob, grilled tofu/tri-tip, and plenty of great conversation and catching-up.

Monday, arising before Bjorn the rooster could muster a cock-a-doodle-doo, M drove from the farm to St. Helena in Napa Valley for class at the CIA's Greystone campus.  Class ran from 7 am to 1:30 pm, Monday to Friday and consisted of a relatively short lecture followed by hands on baking and pâtisserie-ing.  It also included breakfast and lunch, composed of items prepared and cooked by the short-term and long-term students at the CIA; the food was awesome, and it was difficult not be completely stuffed after lunch.  The class itself was taught by Chef Brown, an instructor at the school, who was obviously going much easier on this short term class than the long term students, but who also gave plenty of constructive feedback.  For the class, we were split into pairs; each pair had one or two "products" to make each day.  Over the course of the week, M and her partner made walnut shortbread, lemon meringue pie, currant scones, rosemary and olive bread, orange pannetone, pretzels, and orange coconut truffles (all in commercial quantities...think 20ish loaves of rosemary and olive bread).  Additionally, she got to cook naan in a tandoori oven and watch a half dozen other demos on various baked goods/sweets.

M's creations during the week (minus the rosemary bread)

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...K busied himself with shopping ("alright! $20 slacks!"), eating mexican food, drinking beer (a big thank you to all our friends that remembered Brother Thelonius is K's favorite beer), and relaxing.  He met up with several work friends for lunch and stopped by the old plant to say hi.  He also managed to take a nap in the Northern California sun and get a sunburn on his feet; now that's a sign of a relaxing vacation!

Towards the end of the week, the Boltons moved from the farm to the small town of Winters to stay with Steph, Matt, and Andy.  It was our first chance to meet Andy in person, who was born a couple of months after we moved from California.  He was a cute, happy one-year-old!  We hung out with Matt and Steph and watched the toddler toddle about for entertainment.  Friday night, we went out for a Thai dinner and Czech dessert in Davis.  Saturday, M had a stomach bug and was pretty much confined to bed; K went out with Matt and Steph to the Davis Farmer's Market and then had pizza for lunch.  Sunday, we went to Kim and Blake's house in Davis for a cookout they were hosting in our honor.  (What awesome friends!)  As always at their home, we had totally awesome food and Blake's now world-famous margaritas (at least famous in the Bolton Swiss household).  It was an excellent way to close out our California trip.

Early Monday morning, we drove back to San Francisco airport to start our travels back to Switzerland.  We arrived mid Tuesday morning in Zurich.  After we got home, hugged the cats, cleaned up after the cats, and did some errands, we tried to keep ourselves awake. We managed not to fall asleep until 8:30.

Since Thursday was the Ascension and Friday was an extra day off, we only had one day at the office this week, Wednesday.  Thursday, M slept in and K spent the morning decoding our 2010 Swiss tax documents; the rest of the day was spent lazing about and giving our kitties much needed attention.

Pizza in Lugano

Friday morning, we were off again, this time headed for Milan.  Milan is about a 4 hour drive from Neuchatel, through the Swiss Italian canton of Ticino.  Pretty much as soon as we exited the 17-km long Gotthard tunnel (Gottardo), the signage all switched from German to Italian.  The area was really beautiful with grapes growing on the sides of mountains, long, skinny waterfalls, and several lakes.  We had lunch in Lugano on the edge of Lake Lugano- pizza of course!  Then we took a very brief walk around town and got a scoop of gelato.  The town was so cute, and M is anxious to come back to Ticino for a weekend.  After our leisurely lunch, we headed back to the highway to complete the last hour to Milan.    We found our hotel on the outskirts with little difficulty and parked the car on the sidewalk as the locals do.  After a short nap, we took the tram into Milano city center.

Duomo di Milano

We started our early evening walk at the Duomo, the cathedral that is the symbol of Milan.  Construction on this decorative cathedral began in the late 1300s; it is the fourth largest cathedral in the world and is known as Italy's most important gothic cathedral.  The inticate facade is really breath-taking.  And although the cathedral has no bell tower, it does have the gilded Madonnina (the city's protector) atop one of its spires.  Next door to the Duomo is the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II, a sort of upscale, open air Italian mall built in the late 1800s.  It was one of the first structures of its kind built with glass and cast iron, and it is famous for the murals and mosaics in the center of the building, as well as the shops and cafes inside and around the perimeter.  An interesting and unfortunate fact is that the architect of the building, Mengoni, fell to his death from the glass dome just prior to the building's completion. 

Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II

After leaving the mall, we found the smaller than expected La Scala opera house, behind the galleria and then strolled around various streets, getting in some window shopping.  We had dinner at a foodie restaurant (Pane e Vino) that had both a classic menu and a modern menu.  We split a salad of raw artichoke hearts, fava beans and pine nuts.  For dinner, M had chestnut gnocchi with pumpkin soup and amaretti, and K had lobster linguine.  The food was ok, but it was fun to be a little adventurous.  A Müller-Thurgau wine from the next region over complimented the meal.

Top of the Duomo di Milano

Top of Duomo di Milano

Saturday morning, we headed back to the Piazza del Duomo, and decided to walk up the steps to the top of the Duomo.  On the roof, we were afforded not only excellent views of the piazza and the rest of the city, but also had the opportunity to see the flying buttresses, pinnacles, and spires up close.  It was amazing the level of detail on the spires, but also the walls, where no one would ever see it other than pigeons and foreign tourists hundreds of years later.  After descending from the top of the Duomo, we headed west to the Castello Sforzesco to peak around its courtyards and stroll through the Parco Sempione behind it.

Interior of Castello Sforzesco

At the Castello, we caught a bite to eat next to the fountain while we watched the street vendors and living statutes.  Then we tailed it over to Brera to visit the Pinecoteca di Brera, one of Milan's top art galleries.  In the pinectoteca, we saw Rembrandt, Carvaggio, Hayes, and Titian.  Our favorite painting was Carvaggio's Cena in Emmaus, which exhibited a high skill of capturing light.  From the gallery, we crossed town in search of the Navigli area, known for its bars and cafes, which had been recommended to M by a Milanese coworker.  We did eventually find the area but not before we both had been almost completely broken by the walk.  (M's feet and K's ankles had both been in better condition.)  We had a rejuvenating gelato and beer before we headed back toward the city center.

We decided to have dinner in the Brera district in which we had seen numerous shops, cafes and restaurants.  M ordered risotto alla milanese (saffron risotto) and spinaci (spinach); K ordered penne all'arrabiata and lamb chops.  We got the risotto and penne pretty fast, and it was delicious, but then we seemed to wait and wait for the rest of the food.  Finally, one of the waiters came by and asked us if we wanted dessert, and we said that we wanted the rest of what we had ordered; the food then came out in about 10 minutes.  The food was worth the wait, as it was yummy spinach, and K couldn't stop raving about the chops.  Then, however, we needed to get the bill.  Again we waited and waited and tried to get our waiter's attention to ask for "Il conto, per favore?," but we couldn't seem to flag him down.  After half an hour, he finally understood we wanted the bill and brought us one...but not ours.  Che comedia!  Eventually, we were able to flag down another waiter who brought us the right bill, and then offered us a plate of biscotti and limoncello on the house.  We were happy to accept the recompense and were in excellent spirits as we caught the tram back to the hotel.

Sunday morning, we drove back to Neuchâtel.  We got caught in traffic at the Gotthard tunnel, which added an additional 45 minutes to our drive, but nothing terrible.

Lessons learned:

1) I haven't been whipping my egg whites long enough!
2) On the way back from Milan, I got to wondering where we could go by traveling in the car so I made a map to demonstrate travel time and places from Neuchatel. Each "circle" of color indicates another hour in the car. The markers don't necessarily indicate where we've traveled, only to where we could travel.

View Neuchâtel Travel Map in a larger map
3) If you're planning on shopping in the US, take more than one empty suitcase.
4) Enough said...