Copenhagen - Ché Fè

We have discovered that one of the better restaurants in our neighborhood, Acquamarina has been closed and another one opened in its place. As usual we have researched a little and found out that it is the same team that are behind the new restaurant. The team is famous in Denmark, mainly for their gourmet restaurant Era Ora, which has a certain significance for us. The former restaurant, Acquamarina had a concept of "Fish from heaven and wine from Italy". That certainly appealed to us, but so does the new concept of Ché Fè: Organic Italian food and so it has been just a question of how long the wait would be, before we visited the place. Not very long.
The menu has 4-5 antipasti, 4-5 primi and 4-5 secondi. Whereas we often select the same on this occasion we select as much as possible. For antipasti we select 7 small antipasti, "O Sole Bio", which on this occasion is

• A small ball of crumbed black rice
• Tuna on black bread
• Umbrian ham on toast
• Roastbeef powdered with breaded crumbs and orange zest
• Focaccia with a mild gorgonzola
• Umbrian sausage with fennel
• A small souffle of broccoli and capers

Everything was very nice, well-balanced and tasty.

For primo we ordered Creole which was pumpkin gnocchi with tomato sauce, chilli and basil. The gnocchi were not heavy and the tomato sauce was very good. The other primo was Piemonte proibito. This was a risotto of red and black rice with artichoke and Monteveronese cheese (and some orange zest). This was also very good, but considering the sizes of the dishes it was actually much more than what we could eat. And maybe too big a serving in general for a dish of "just risotto", but we cannot really complain about this as it was very good. With the primi we had a glass (well, actually a glass and a half) of the Verdicchio superiore, which we cannot recall and cannot find on the wine menu, but it was commendable.

We tried to order Perlizie, but that was no longer available, which we suppose is OK, since we arrived very late on a Sunday night. Instead we had the Tagliata di Vitello (veal steak with rosemary potatoes and a salad) and Pesando a domani which was braised veal with porcini. Both courses were good, but the steak was a bit too rare for T and we would have liked the otherwise very polite waiter to have asked how it was to be cooked. The braised veal was both very tender and tasty.

We had a bottle of Umbrian Villa Fidelia Rosso 2005 from Sportoletti. This was a Bordeaux blend of Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc. Very potent nose, but still unmistakably Italian. We were aiming for some Sangiovese, but since the Chardonnay based Villa Fidelia Bianco is one of our long time favorites we had to try the red and we didn't regret it.

The restaurant is a welcome option when the fridge is empty and the shops are closed (or we just need to spoil ourselves a little on Sunday) and we will be back soon.

K's red cabbage salad

Tonight we have been invited by Betty to a wine tasting of South African wine by the Danish importer, Protea wine. The event has many visitors and has a very informal atmosphere where everybody gets to taste what they like and in their own preferred order.
K is naturally sceptic towards everything that is not European, but concedes that she has been swayed on a number of occasions lately.
We are very pleasantly surprised and despite T's ban on buying more wine in 2011 we find ourselves ordering several cases. Here's what we liked:+
2009 Thelema Chardonnay (even though K found it a bit too sweet and almondy – T did not)
2008 Thelema Merlot – very drinkable right now
2009 Springfonteine Pinotage (T doesn't really know how that happened, but we just found it quite nice)
2004 Barcarato Barbera d'Asti Nizza (which of course is sort of Italian). Nicely mature right now.
There were also other nice wines (and some not quite so interesting ones) so all in all we were very happy to have attended.

After this we again need to have a quick and light dinner. As opposed to our latest wine tasting, where we were unprepared, this time we have bought two berberi duck breasts and some bread in advance. The rest K will prepare from what is in the fridge which she announces will be red cabbage salad. This fills T with apprehension as the traditional Danish Christmas dinner is duck and red cabbage. The latter prepared in a way that is very sweet and overwhelming and normally precludes any wine recommendations.
Not unexpectedly K easily overcomes T's worries and makes a salad that earn much praise from both Betty and T. Here's what went into K's red cabbage salad:

Thinly sliced red cabbage (the mandolin, of course)
Thinly sliced leeks
Thinly sliced apple
Zest of orange
Chopped walnuts
Pomegranate
The dressing is a little secret, but T spots at least one of its ingredients. They are
Juice from one orange
a bit of raspberry vinegar
a bit of sesame oil
Soy sauce
Just a tiny sprinkle of fish sauce
a little chili
S/P
We drink a bottle of Santenay 2000 which again is excellent.
For dessert we have 'brunsvigerkage' from Meyers' bakery and coffee. We are very impressed with the bread from the bakery – but the 'brunsviger' was a disappointment! There are some things that the New Nordic kitchen should not mess with. – We will try to make it ourselves soon.