Monthly Archives: November 2024

Croissant Café Kaliningrad it tastes as good as it looks

Just a very nice place to eat, drink and relax in

30 November 2024 ~ Croissant Café Kaliningrad it tastes as good as it looks

Never let it be said, and it seldom is not, that an exorbitant number of my posts have a disproportionate beer focus. I like a drink, and I am partial to the odd atmospheric pub/bar, but I am just as at home ~ well, nearly just as at home ~ in a good restaurant or café, and whilst I feel no need to prove the point, I will let you into the secret of one of my favourite Kaliningrad cafés: Croissant.

Croissant Café Kaliningrad

Croissant Café resides on Alexandra Nevskogo Street, which, in my opinion is an excellent street. Among its many other delights and facilities, there is the Tourist Hotel, a well-stocked Spa supermarket, the legendary Cultura Bottle Shop, a shop selling all kinds of inexpensive household products, including socks, pants, slippers and woolly hats, a special bread kiosk, an arty farty barbers, in fact, everything needed for daily sustenance.

Croissant Café is, of course, an all-year-round establishment, but I am particularly drawn to it in the winter months. I like the way on a cold, damp, frosty or a snow-settled day, the light ~ soft, warm and inviting ~ frames its windows in a cosy glow and then, stealing out into the street, tugs at your lapels. If you feel like a moth drawn to a flame, don’t worry. For a café serving quality food, the prices are quite reasonable. You can open your wallet, and you won’t get burnt.

Croissant Café likens itself in atmosphere and fare to the best in French tradition. It proudly emulates the pastry shops and bakeries from which French gastronomy gets its good name. Certainly, its bread selection, which comes in all shapes and sizes, has enough French sticks and crispy baguettes bristling from its wicker baskets to conjure up boulangerie.

Croissant Café Kaliningrad display counter

Its website speaks in mouthwatering terms of all-day breakfasts and exclusive desserts, and its confidence in its ‘confectionary showcase’ allows it to mention by name its celebrated pastry chef Alexander Dianov.

In an illuminated glass display unit below the bread-laden shelves, a sumptuous banquet of choice awaits for those who have a sweet tooth. There are cakes, tarts, tempting delicacies covered in rich dark chocolate, an enticing array of exciting desserts and countless peerless pastries.

Excuse me, why do they call it Croissant Café?

Even though Croissant Café places great store on its sweet’s selection, and not without good reason, its range of savoury dishes are no less gastronomically adventurous or relegated by aesthetic indifference.

Every picture tells a story, and the café’s glossy booklet-style menus capture every dish using full-colour high-res photographs accompanied by descriptive profiles. The only flaw in the café’s menu, which in fairness is an oversight endemic in Kaliningrad, is that it fails in its savoury dishes to cater sufficiently for vegetarians, a funny lot, I know, among whose number I am one, but a consumer group all the same growing exponentially whose converts await entrepreneurs who can convert their conversion into roubles.

I am frankly quite surprised that no one in Russia’s hospitality industry has identified the vast potential lurking in this untapped resource, brought it on, encouraged it and mined it for all it is worth.

Croissant Café (Kruassan-Kafe) Kaliningrad
There are a number of Croissant Cafés centred in and around Kaliningrad each proudly purveying a tempting range of high quality pastry and confectionary products and unique recipe freshly baked breads. Aromatic coffees and a wide selection of teas, plus hot beverages of an avant garde nature complement the café’s cuisine, or, should you wish to pamper the palate further, you could always go for one of the wines from the café’s European selection.

Other cafés in the Croissant Café family in and around Kaliningrad
пл. Победы, 4
ул. Багратиона, 87
Ленинский пр. 67
пр. Мира, 84
пр. Мира, 23
Zelenogradsk, Lenin St, 3
Светлогорск, ул. Ленина 33

On a menu so extensive that it could have been the work of Tolstoy, I could only find three meat-free meals, and when I went to place an order, two of these I discovered though pictorially on the menu were not really on the menu at all.

Croissant Café Kaliningrad

The advantage of being a simple-food person is that disappointments like these have no earth-shattering consequences, and I was not so very much perturbed by the only option left to me, which was avocado salad. This relatively humble offering, like every other Croissant Café meal, could not be better presented, and with an appetising salad dressing and an assortment of tasty breads, each one freshly baked, I was not unhappy with my lot.

As with its savoury dishes and sweets, the café does not stint on its coffee and tea varieties, which are almost more diverse than the migrant-invaded West. It also caters for those whose approach to beverages is more intrepid, who are open to trying something new, something enticingly different, something overtly exotic.

Excuse me, why do they call it Croissant Café?

Contrary to Western media, Russia is rather sweet (see that picture below). I, on the other hand, am not a sweet man (Sorry, what was that you said? You’ve worked it out already.). However, providing the quality and price is right, I have been known to make exceptions, and nowhere am I more inclined to make exceptions of this kind than when dining at Croissant Café.

Cafés can be many things, for example cafés exist in England that bear more than a passing resemblance to the down-at-heel soup kitchens in Chicago’s prohibition era (I kinda like these too!). Croissant, on the other hand, is the very Ritz of cafés. The food is consistently good and presented with such an artistic flair that it would not look exceptionally out of place displayed at the London Tate.

The service, on my most recent visit and on previous occasions, was and has been commendable, scoring top marks for efficiency and ~ now read this café owners and read it in slow motion, since loyal patronage depends on it~ a gold medallion for friendliness. I am not, as some would appear to be, in the habit of frequenting cafés to lord it over the waiters and waitresses. Empathy is good for digestion, and Croissant Café’s friendly staff are a credit to the café’s appeal and to its overall experience.

Now look here and for the last time! Why do they call it Croissant Café?

Because the croissants at Croissant Café are the real, the absolute deal. They are freshly prepared, baked and produced in a seductive variety of flavours and fillings.

People come from near and far to sample and savour the pastries from which Croissant Café takes its name.

Would you care for a tip? Whilst the chocolate croissants should not be passed over, the marzipan ones are marvellous!

The main thing

Croissant Café (Kruassan-Kafe)
Ulitsa Aleksandra Nevskogo, 24-30, Kaliningrad, Kaliningrad Oblast, 236006

Tel: 8 (401) 230-30-40

Opening times:
Monday to Friday 8am to 9pm
Saturday & Sunday 9am to 9pm

Website: Круассан-кафе

Baltika 8 Wheat Beer in Kaliningrad

**Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)**

23 November 2024 ~ Baltika 8 Wheat Beer in Kaliningrad

Article 26: Baltika 8 Wheat Beer

A wheat beer is a wheat beer is a wheat beer. That’s that then! No, not quite. This particular wheat beer, the one I am reviewing at the moment, comes in a nice waisted bottle, with a gold brand-named collar, an embossed medallion and a gold-banded label.

It’s Baltika 8.

It’s billed as wheat beer, smells like wheat beer and has a wheat-beer taste ~ you can’t go wrong with wheat beer.

The first sip is, now, let me see, wheaty ~ as it should be, since the beer is brewed from wheat. The bottle does have ‘Wheat Beer’ written on it, and it also says Baltika 8. I wondered why the ‘8’? Was it because it was brewed from 8 different kinds of wheat? That it took 8 brewers to make it? 8 weeks to brew it? Does 8 pints make you really drunk? Is the 8 supposed to rhyme with something like ‘gate’? ie ‘After 8 pints of Baltika 8, I had considerable difficulty closing the gate’, or ‘8 pints of Baltika 8, left him in a right old state’’.

What the 8 might stand for is 8mm of head, which dissipates in less than 8 seconds, but hey! It’s wheat beer and that’s what wheat beer does!

PS: I’ve been told not to be so stupid. Baltika 8 contains eight nuances of taste.

Normally, wheat beer is good and cloudy but, in Baltika 8’s case it’s good and cloudy, too. The opaqueness of it let’s you in on the secret that the brew is unfiltered, signalling that the beer is rich in protein and other biologically good-for-you substances.

Baltika 8 Wheat Beer in Kaliningrad

I know you can’t wait to say that I added the last bit as it was beginning to become more than apparent from what you’ve read so far that I cannot tell the difference between one wheat beer and the next. My sentiments with regards to this are that if I was mugged by one in London’s Brixton and they put it in a police line-up, I wouldn’t be able to tell you which one it was who did it. They’re all the same to me.

What I can say without fear of calling myself a liar is that the price of Baltika 8 is not daylight robbery, not at 85 roubles a half litre for a yummy beer made from wheat. It’s somehow pleasing to see that the price of Baltika 8 has an ‘8’ in it. (“Innit!” ~ a fan from south London)

It is difficult to say whether Baltika 8 has more wheat in it than other wheat beers and, even if it does, if someone was to place Baltika 8 Wheat Beer in a dark room with seven other wheat beers whether I would know the difference after tripping over one of them. To tell you the truth, I wouldn’t know Jack from Jill. Well, you can’t these days, can you!

If I had to make a definitive statement about the quality of Baltika 8 without recourse to comparison, I would say ‘Bingo!’ ~ Baltika have got this one right! It is a good, tasty brew, with more body than Chicago during the prohibition era. What really endears me to it is that the taste lingers on. If it was a criminal record, it would certainly be a long one.

The best way to enjoy a bottle of Baltika 8 Wheat Beer is to sort the wheat from the chat.

Cheers!

😁TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: Baltika 8 Wheat Beer
Brewer: Baltika Breweries
Where it is brewed: St Petersburg, Russia
Bottle capacity: 0.5 litre
Strength: 5%
Price: It cost me about 85 roubles (0.65 pence)
Appearance: Foggy
Aroma: Wheat with subtle abstracts
Taste: Wheat
Fizz amplitude: 4/10
Label/Marketing: Gold but not too bold
Would you buy it again? No reason not to
Marks out of 10: 8

*Note that the beers that feature in this review series only include bottled beer types that are routinely sold through supermarket outlets and in no way reflect the variety of beer and/or quality available in Kaliningrad from speciality outlets and/or through bars and restaurants.

Welcome Back President Trump to the White House

It turns out that Joe was not such a bad guy after all. He served a useful purpose in keeping Donald’s seat warm for him.

7 November 2024 ~ Welcome Back President Trump to the White House

I don’t often cry Hallelujah, at least not first thing in the morning, but 6th November was an exception. The pseudo-liberal left media on both sides of the pond almost had me believing that all was lost, almost had me believing in their lies, but for all their twists and distortions they had failed to sway the U.S. election: Harris was out of the running; Trump had won the day.

Consequently, what would have been just another grey, dull, overcast morning in damp and soggy England was miraculously transformed into an overwhelming sense of jubilation. The news that barnstormer Trump had, against seemingly insurmountable odds, risen phoenix-like from the ashes of liberal machinations, overcoming conspiracy theories, court cases, investigations, two impeachments, in-party opposition and at least two assassination attempts and then gone on to win the election and make history as only the second president of the United States to serve non-consecutive terms in office is surely a sign from on high that long entrenched liberal-left hegemony can and will be defeated.

Welcome Back President Trump

There are a number of reasons why Trump romped home to victory, but the bedrock of his success is the robust stance he is taking against the greatest liberal-orchestrated evil of our time, engineered mass immigration.

This affirmation by the American people that mass immigration is fundamentally iniquitous and has to be stopped is a cue for the people of Great Britain. If you are going to do it the democratic way, then kick out the Cons and Liebour and, before it is too late, vote in Farage and Reform.

In the aftermath of Trump’s triumph, it is virtually unbelievable that the lefty media are asking questions like why and how did Trump succeed? Are they really that thick? Do they really not get it?

Only pathological liars falling victim to their own psychosis could be bewildered by Trump’s victory. They’ll be asking us to believe next that mass immigration enriches us, rather than admit that it and the wokest drivel by which it is underpinned are the greatest existential threats to Western civilisation since the invention of Tony Blair.

It is reassuring to note that recent political developments show positive indications of the routing of the left: Brexit, Nigel Farage’s accession to Parliament, Viktor Orban’s defiance of EU dictatorship, right-wing political gains in France, anti-immigration riots in the UK and now the Return of Trump.

Trump’s election, his re-election, is undoubtedly one of the most spectacular in U.S. history. That Trump has endured and prevailed against inestimably powerful and pervasive forces of hate, malignancy and corruption, restores faith like nothing else could in a democratic system which, whilst much lauded by posturing liberals, is sadly viewed throughout the world as deeply flawed and bastardised.

Now Trump is back where he should be, there may be hope for the future yet.

All our yesterdays > Is Biden their Last Straw?

Image attribution
Red carpet: https://publicdomainvectors.org/en/free-clipart/Red-carpet-vector-drawing/15058.html

Kaliningrad flea market has moved to a new location

They said it would happen, and it has

4 November 2024 ~ Kaliningrad flea market has moved to a new location

The Kaliningrad flea market that has occupied the pavement area close to the Central Market, and in more recent years spilled over onto a ribbon of disused ground bordering the moat of the Wrangel Tower, has officially moved.

For me, as I dare say for many, the relocation of this sprawling and excitingly chaotic masterpiece of antiques, collectables, curios and junk, marks the end of an era. Not that we did not know that it was coming; plans to move the market on have been in the pipeline for years. Indeed, I wrote about the proposal in a 2022 blog post: What makes Kaliningrad Flea Market a Junk Buyer’s Paradise?

Kaliningrad flea market moves to a new location

We all know that nothing stays the same forever; Königsberg can testify to that. Nevertheless, knowing that change is imminent rarely compensates when it comes to pass.

There will be some, of course, who will breath a sigh of relief that most days, but on a Saturday in particular, they will at last be able to stroll without let or hindrance along the sidewalk next to the Wrangel Tower instead of running a zigzag gauntlet through sandwiched lines of dealers’ stalls agog with curious clutter-buggers.

I, for one, however, will miss the incipient urge whenever I visit the city’s Central Market (food market) to detour to the ‘junk’ stalls to see what they have on offer that I cannot live without, such as an old tin bucket, for example.

Mick Hasrt with his tin bucket bought from Kaliningrad flea market

There have been occasions when travelling by bus on route to somewhere else that I have accidentally alighted at the flea market. Of course, I have only gone to look, not to buy. So imagine how surprised I have been on arriving home to discover that whilst I was only looking a Soviet belt, a Königsberg ashtray, a kitsch ornament and an old German helmet have somehow jumped into my shopping bag.

Kaliningrad flea market has moved

I have not yet had the chance to work out which bus route one should take to get to the market’s new location. Gaidara Street 8 is its new address; a piece of land, I am told, that lies opposite the bridge on the way to Sovetsky Prospekt.

At the time of writing (4 November 2024), the market is not yet functioning. By all accounts, the site is vast, but a great deal needs to be done to bring it up to snuff, to make it seller- and buyer-friendly. News is, however, according to the market organisers, that the site will be ready and the market up and running in a matter of days not weeks.

Now, where did I put my Kaliningrad map? What have I done with my bucket?