Co Jedla Jsem Dnes (nebo Proc Nebudu Moct Jit Nekde)

The title means “What I ate today (or Why I will never be able to eat again ever)”

Muzu pist a neprocovat nebo necist protoze pisu cesky.

I should have saved the food entry for after today, because today was mind-blowing as far as food goes. I went downstairs at about 9 and was immediately served a pile of small sections of palacinky (pancakes) covered in sugar with blueberries on top. Myum. Then I went to Ikea with Elena (it was towards the city limits, in a section with many other huge stores. I felt very much like I was at home). On our way, she made me eat a banana and this Czech pastry which was a sort of gingerbread cake with a thick layer of apricot jam in the middle, all covered in chocolate.

This afternoon, I was at a café studying with some friends and I decided to order a bagel with cream cheese. I should have known better. “Cream cheese” is apparently a euphenism or at least a terrible misnomer for something that was definitely both cheesy and creamy but also had the characteristics of an egg salad with unidentifiable chuncks. There was about a kilogram of the stuff on my bagel, and after one bite I decided that wouldn’t do, so most of it remained on my plate. The taste was okay, but it was thick thick stuff. I would venture to guess that it was at least 50% mayonnaise.

I got back to the house before the rest of my host family. Elena had told that they would be home late, so I should eat some soup and more palacinky and more of the chocolate pudding/custard thing she made for last night. Well, I had some of the homemade soup (delicious- potatoes and beans and meat and cheese and onions and other delicious things) and some palacinky, though I decided to hold off on the pudding. Good thing I did, because an hour later Elena was home and cooking again. She made potato dumplings, a family favorite, and insisted that I eat at least one. I haven’t had quite this variety of dumpling before, and these things bear description. Each “dumpling” is the size and shape of a large orange, and probably weighs about three times the amound of an average orange. Inside of it is a golf-ball-sized quantity of some meat/onion concoction. The outside layer is almost all potato, as far as I can tell, but somehow it is actually denser than the potato itself. I have no idea how this is accomplished, but it is certainly true (and now in my stomach). I declined saurkraut as a sidedish, but Elena persisted and told me I needed something else, so she offered pickled beets, which I also said no to, so she made me up a special plate of homemade pickles. They were good but holy makeral I’m full. And I only ate one of these dumplings- Jan had six and I’m not exaggerating. There’s no way that you are comprehending how much food that is.

For dessert (because of course there was dessert), Elena had prepared a sort of homemade wafer cookie candy bar by taking plate-sized wafer cookies and layering them after putting a hefty portion of nutella between each layer. Nutella is this beautiful hazlenut chocolate spread, and if this is the first time you’re hearing about it, get thee to a grocery store now (you can buy it in the US, but it’s a lot more expensive than here).

So I feasted and now I am too tired to study. Exams this week, which might mean no postings, but more likely means a lot of postings as I delay studying.