Kojiro, super sushi in Vienna

Vienna is a wonderful city. I loved tramping through its streets, and I found lots of lovely places to eat, sophisticated cafes, super bars and places to hang out. The trouble is, great as it is, once you've had a few schnitzels and sachertortes, you want something a little different, don't you?

During our week in Vienna, we found Viennese food to be very good, but eventually, we found ourselves in need of a change. So we decided to visit what we had heard was the best sushi place in the city. Intriguingly, it was described as a sort of small, "hole in the wall" kind of place near the Naschmarkt.

We really didn't know what to expect, but decided to show up with tummies rumbling and minds open. We were in for a bit of a surprise! Now, you will recall I said it was small, right? Well, when I say this place is small, I mean it. There is one bench which 3 people can sit around, right in the window (the best and most comfortable place at Kojiro), with 5 additional stools for people to perch on, bar style. You could swing the proverbial feline animal here, but only just. And it would be much to the annoyance of staff and clientele alike!

The decor is basic; clean ceramic tiles, with pictures of sushi on the wall. It's rustic and unpretentious. But to be honest, it is not the reason you visit.

Why come here? Because you will find wonderfully fresh fish prepared with the utmost care and love. The fish is crafted into wonderful handmade sushi by quick and deft hands with speed and efficiency. 

Many Viennese have twigged to Kojiro's high quality sushi and phone through their orders. But they miss half the fun; seeing their order made up. I already told you the place was small, didn't I? Well the lovely people who make these morsels of deliciousness work in a tiny little kitchen area in the very corner of the establishment. 

These amazing three guys clearly know and love each other well. They work in close quarters with each other, preparing the sushi with speed and accuracy in between long conversations in rapid Japanese. They joke and laugh and act like they've known each other all their lives, which I suppose they probably have. It's like finding yourself in another corner of the world, you hardly feel like you're in Europe.... until one of the guys takes a telephone order in fluent German!

Kojiro makes great sushi, served beautifully formed at a very reasonable price. I'd visit once you've had your fill of beer, schitzel and heavy patisseries. There is another lovely feature of this great little sushi shop, which is free piping hot green tea which you can refill as you wish.

My only warning is that this little shop is so popular, if you visit at lunch, you might have to stand around waiting for a table for a little while, but you will witness the phone continually ringing as locals ring through their take away orders. And then there will be a constant stream of people coming in to pay and then collect their precious cargo of sushi. Wait patiently, soak up the atmosphere and watch the sushi triumvirate work their unique magic. It's totally worth it!

Kojiro Sushi

Rechte Wienzeile 9

Vienna 1040

+43(1)586 62 33

Monday to Friday open from 11:00am to 18:30 (order by 18:15) 

Saturday open from 10:00am to 14:00 (order by 14:00)

Sunday closed

Snigdha and Him Indoors paid for their sushi. Flipping nice it was too!

Trzesniewski Vienna

Brödchen are an Austrian institution, little open sandwiches topped with all sorts of wonderful things. Not too bready with the eater's attention being directed squarely on the "filling", which to my mind should always be the interesting part. Topped sandwiches don't get the bread/filling balance right for me, so trying brödchen seemed much more like my kind of lunch!

I had heard all about Trzesniewski, a brödchen eatery which is just off the main shopping street in Vienna. It has been serving the Viennese for over 100 years (I had been told it opened in 1900). Apparently, Franz Kafka was a regular customer! But first we had to get there...

We had tried to find it on Sunday, and failed miserably.  The place was closed and without its usual crowds of customers it was easy to walk right past! Shops in Vienna are pretty much all closed on a Sunday, along with many restaurants. If you are spending a Sunday in Vienna, do your homework in advance to find a place to eat which will be open, or you could be roaming around for some time, getting hungrier and hungrier!

Realising our error, we returned during the week. People were happily eating at outdoor tables, making the place easy to spot. 

We found the place was completely packed at lunchtime, humming with activity. Trzesniewski is informal, positively canteen style, with space for very few people to either sit or stand inside to eat their cute little sarnies. Yet still, office and shop workers from the local area will queue out of the door to get their hands on these brödchen.

 

There are 22 varieties, all priced at €1.10. All of the brödchen are on rye bread. Meat, eggs, cheese and vegetable toppings are available. I did two years of German classes back at school (which was - AHEM! - some years ago!) where I learnt very little, and retained virtually nothing. So despite the fact that all of the brödchen are clearly labelled, I had very little idea what I was looking at. There was a single list of translations kept on the counter which I and my fellow tourists had to pass between each other to decipher which little sandwich was which. 

I then made my choice of sandwiches, to be confronted with a new choice; what to wash them down with? Hot drinks and juices were all available. After a long morning of tramping around Vienna, however, I was in the mood for something stronger. I was tempted by the exceptionally dinky and sweet eighth of a litre beer stein, called a Pfiff, of lager. But I'm a reluctant beer drinker, and opted for a white wine. After all, Vienna is one of the few capital cities which actually produces its own wine, and in the area more white than red wine is produced. 

The Pfiff was very popular, with the majority of locals enjoying one. It's a perfect little tipple to have if you're having to get back to work after lunch, I guess. 

Here is my selection: 

Tomaten - Tomato

Wilder Paprika - Peppadew pepper, sweet and hot

Pfefferoni scharf - Hot peppers 

Gervais mit Zwiebel - Cream cheese with onion

This is Him Indoors' selection:

Pfefferoni scharf - Hot peppers 

Geflügelleber - Chicken liver

Champignon - Mushroom

Paprika - red pepper

Thunfisch mit ei - Tuna with egg

By some miracle of timing, we managed to receive our plates just as a pair of diners were leaving a table. We bagged it immediately, and were lucky to be able to sit and enjoy our sandwiches. They were very tasty. Because they are nice, small finger sandwiches, you can put together many flavour combinations in your meal. This really appeals to me. I find ordinary sandwiches rather dull and boring, and too much of the same thing. It was a very enjoyable lunch, and because we had a place to sit, could take our time. 

The staff could be described as "unfriendly", but in fairness, they are run ragged. The system by which Trzesniewski is run means that a customer is not served by one member of staff, allowing for perhaps more personal or convivial attention. Your sandwiches are picked out by one member of staff, your drink by another and then you pay yet another member of staff. The Dorotheergasse branch has a very narrow space for the staff to work within, and they literally have to squeeze past each other if, for example, you'd like a paprika brodchen AND a tomato one. I think I'd be stressed and hassled dealing with as many lunchtime customers as I saw on my visit in such a restricted space!

All in all I would recommend Trzesniewski, although I would advise you avoid peak busy periods such as lunchtime. 

There are currently 9 branches, according to the Trzesniewski website. Here is their list of branches https://www.trzesniewski.at/filialen in case you are interested in any of the others!

Trzesniewski

Dorotheergasse 1

1010 Wien

8.30am-7.30pm Monday-Friday

9am-5pm Saturday

Closed Sunday

Him Indoors and I paid for our lunch. 

February 2014 Favourites List

This has been a wet, cold and pretty miserable month, hasn't it? We've had an unbelievable amount of rain. My brolly is cursing me for taking a complete battering! If any of you have suffered over this period of fairly freaky weather, my thoughts are with you.

My working life has been frenetically busy too. Exam marking is a necessary evil of my job and it has taken a lot of time. You can't miss anything. Each student needs to be given full credit for every item which demonstrates their knowledge and understanding. So I've had to concentrate and put the necessary hours into careful and painstaking reading of my students' work. As a result, I've been disorganised, low in focus and have not been cooking as much as I would like.

My students will, at the end of this month, have exactly two months before their big knowledge exams, which are centrally set. That's enough time, if they start now to cover and learn everything they need to pass. 

I was a student once, and not a hugely talented one. I have my lazy streak, and I can be a real procrastinator. As a result, I always suggest a 6-8 week revision period to allow for all those days where your revision goes slow. Or you get distracted by friends or family and get nothing done. Or you spend a day on facebook instead of knuckling down. Or you stare at the page and nothing goes in.

Revision is exactly that: RE-vision. So the first thing a student needs to do is to ensure they have covered the syllabus once before making a start. I know that as a student I had to be honest with myself. I had to look over what I had studied and made notes on and identify the gaps. They had to be filled first. Then I had to ask myself which topics were the ones I had an incomplete understanding of - they were my next target. Then I could safely say I had studied the topics over the first time. Only once this process was complete could the true revision begin. 

Revision can be a tedious business, and it is always stressful. I hope you will wish my students well with theirs. If any of you have any advice or suggestions for them, please do get in touch and let me know. 

I am regularly tweeting tips for effective revision and study, which you can find by searching for the hashtags #revisiontips and #studytips. If they are of any use to any of you, I would be delighted.

I started a series of posts all about Vienna. So it is no surprise that this month's pictures are from my trip. Hope you like them!

The iconic Weiner Schnitzel

Blogs Worth Following:

http://vohnmcg.com/ Vohn's Vittles - lots of cooking and recipes

http://www.italiankiwi.com/ Authentic Italian cooking

http://thisisrocksalt.com/ Cooking and eating out - the Rock Salt blog

Recipes:

Jardaloo Ma Murghi – Chicken with apricots by Cyrus Todiwala: http://www.gloucestershireecho.co.uk/Recipe-Cyrus-Todiwala-s-Jardaloo-Ma-Murghi-8211/story-20466962-detail/story.html

The humble Chilli Con Carne gets a makeover with some tempting high quality ingredients: http://metro.co.uk/2014/02/04/how-to-cook-the-ultimate-chilli-con-carne-4288936/

Feeling under the weather? Cold, cough or similar? Time for some Aadha cha - Ginger tea! http://cookingwithsj.com/2013/12/08/ginger-tea/

I really like Dishoom. the Bombay cafe style eateries in London's Covent Garden and Shoreditch. They serve authentic food which is a cut about the rest. Here is their Whisky Sour cocktail recipe.

http://editer.com/food-drink/dishoom/

Making "couscous" out of cauliflower. A sneaky way of getting kids to eat their veg? http://food52.com/recipes/21165-spice-merchant-cauliflower-couscous

Proper posh Valentines' day cooking by Mr Ottolenghi. Forget the steak & Black Forest Gateau! http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2014/feb/07/valentines-day-recipes-yotam-ottolenghi

Vegetarian and vegan easy lentil and veggie soup for cold days: http://www.getmecooking.com/recipe/simple-kitchen-sink-soup

I'm not sure Mozart used a mobile phone...

Yakisoba by Junya Yamasaki, head chef at Koya (a stir-fried noodle dish you can make for less than £5): http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/jan/19/recipes-under-5-yakisoba-noodle

A south Indian style Cashew nut curry, in tribute to Vineet Bhatia Rasoi in London's Chelsea: http://www.thepasadenachef.com/2013/03/cashew-nut-curry-southern-indian.html

A speedy soup supper with the bold flavours of chilli and blue cheese (and broccoli, a superfood): http://metro.co.uk/2014/02/03/how-to-cook-broccoli-chilli-and-blue-cheese-soup-4285743/

My favourite colour is purple. But did you know purple fruit and veg contains anthocyanins which reduce the risk of cancer, heart disease, diabetes and Parkinson’s? Here is a purple salad recipe to make the most of them!  http://familyspice.com/recipes/recipe/?recipe_id=581

I've been asked about what to do with whole Urad dahl. I'd say something very slow cooked. Dahl Makhani is a Punjabi classic. http://www.tarladalal.com/Dal-Makhani-%28-Punjabi-Recipe-%29-30900r
Alternatively, http://chefinyou.com/2012/09/dal-bukhara/ Dahl Bukhara.

Pan roasted cauliflower with some Sicilian influences: http://food52.com/recipes/24372-cavolfiore-palma-a-la-leah-pan-roasted-cauliflower

Articles/Know How:

I've reviewed Brixton Market's Kao Sarn restaurant at Snig's Kitchen. Here is a broader round up on Brixton Market: http://editer.com/food-drink/brixton-village/

French chefs call time on food photography in their restaurants... http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-26189607

Forceful and passionate response to Edwina Currie on food banks by the Trussell Trust's Chair. http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2014/01/edwina-currie-is-wrong-about-food-banks/

Film:

A Separation (Iran)

TV:

When Rock Goes Acoustic (documentary)

Music:

Temples - Sun Structures

Heaven 17 - The Luxury Gap

Warpaint - Warpaint

Led Zeppellin - III

Viennese hot dogs with a hollowed tunnel for the sausage