First Impressions of Olomouc // Trip to Brno // Breakfast Recipes

First up, the obligatory plane photos. 

After arriving in Olomouc, I proceeded to take quite a lot of bad photos of Horni Namesti, the main square. This place has pretty fantastic ice cream (Dolce Latte is the best) and it's right beside...

the Trinity Column, a UNESCO World Heritage monument.

Turtles in Horni Namesti!

This is the Astronomical Clock in Olomouc; when the Nazis were retreating through the city in May of 1945, 

they opened fire on the old astronomical clock, leaving only a few pieces (that can now be seen in the local museum). As a result of the serious damage the clock was reconstructed in the style of socialist-realism in the first years of communist rule in Czechoslovakia (1948-early 1950s). The religious and royal figures were replaced with athletes, workers, farmers, scientists and other members of the proletariat, while the glockenspiel was altered to play three pieces of traditional local music.

- thank you, Wikipedia. As a scholar I find it obligatory to condemn the vast majority of Wikipedia usage, but in this case, all of the history sites are in Czech and Google Translate is pretty shit. Sorry.

This is the town hall, pretty cool in comparison to the traditional Classical style of Governmental buildings in Ireland. I'm a big fan of red roofs, but mainly in the sun. Winter's gonna be rough.

Here's the road leading home. The trams are pretty good here, two of them serving my apartment. I've heard from previous students that when it gets very cold, the trams sometimes get replaced my an infrequent bus service, so... yeah. Enjoying them while they last.

This is the interior of one of my faculty buildings, and it's pretty nice! It's called 'Konvikt', and apparently students used to stay there throughout the history of the university, but it's obviously been retrofitted with projectors and elevators and the like, so it's really modernly furnished, but in a grand old building. It's my favourite faculty, and naturally it's the arts faculty. They appreciate good architecture here.

The most important topic: food.

As a student, I have a poorly stocked press and fridge, so it's amazing that I can even make one meal. I have a lot of random shit that I bought with good intentions but don't actually use, but when I've done some proper shopping, I can make nice meals. The first photo (it genuinely looked lovely, but... this looks like meat in blood and berries. Damn it.) is french toast with berries. I found this recipe on YouTube, one of my favourite vloggers Sammi had this amazing video (beautycrush) with four recipes in it, and I instantly fell in love with the french toast recipe.

Here's my version (which is almost identical)

*****

French Toast with Berries

1 egg

2 slices of thick bread 

//preferably dense bread; in the Czech Republic their bread is quite heavy and non-fluffy, and it's perfect for this recipe//

Maple syrup or honey

Fresh berries

//I like raspberries in this as a staple, they're sweet and they infuse the bread with a lovely red colour, but any other berries are great to add in too, such as blackberries or blueberries, even some apple chunks could be nice//

Chia seeds

Olive oil (for frying)

Butter,  if you want to butter your bread before frying

1. Set up your frying pan; throw some olive oil into the pan and turn the heat onto medium.
2. Crack your egg into a bowl and whisk with a fork.
3. Cut your bread and coat it in egg - try to absorb as much of it as you can. I try to use all the egg up, so don't be afraid to get your bread soggy.
4. Throw your eggy bread onto the pan.
5. As it's frying, wash your berries; about a handful or so will do, more if you want.
6. Throw the berries into the pan with the bread. 
7. Drizzle syrup over the berries, this will sweeten them and as they cook, they'll turn into a sort of berry syrup for your toast. 
8. Flip over your toast, if you haven't already, and let the berry juice infuse the toast. 
9. Your french toast should be pinkish if you used raspberries, and when it's cooked well and the berries are nice and soft, place your toast onto a small plate and let the berries and syrup drizzle on top. 
10. Sprinkle some chia seeds over your french toast, and enjoy!
11. Sidenote: don't burn your tongue like I usually do. It's unpleasant.

*****

 Here's my avocado toast:

*cue numerous Ferris Bueller ohhhhhh yeeeaahhhhhs*

 It's really easy to make.

Avocado Toast
1 avocado
Lime or lemon (fresh, preferably)
Sea salt
Black pepper
Toast (or those awful crispbread things that taste like cardboard)(they're actually ok for this because you can't really taste them)

Scoop your avocado out into a bowl.
Mash it with a fork.
Squeeze in some lime (or lemon).
Mash some more, but don't go mad like.
Throw in some salt and pepper, aka season it, but lightly.
Spread your avocado onto your toast using your fork, I find it's easier than using a knife.
Sprinkle some more pepper and salt on top if you want.
EAT IT

And lastly, here's a really good porridge recipe for mornings, with some protein and nutrients and shit.

Porridge with Protein Powder and Dried Fruit

1 cup porridge oats
1.5 or 2 cups of milk 
Dried fruit (I use Hawaiian Mix with dried banana, coconut cubes, cranberries and some other unidentifiable fruit shit)
Protein powder (I use this green stuff, it has a kind of strange flavour but it's more neutral than chocolate flavour or something. Vanilla would be ideal)

Throw your porridge oats into a pot, followed by your milk (I use 1.5 cups or so because I like to make it thick and then I pour cold milk over the top when it's in the bowl). Heat it up, stirring occasionally, and after a few minutes it should be ready (taste test!). Pour into your bowl, and sprinkle the fruit and powder on top!

*****

Olomouc from up high. You can trek up the very narrow and numerous steps of an old church in the centre of Olomouc, and from there you can see the city. It's better on a clear, sunny day, but because I'm the epitome of Murphy's Law, my visit was not on a clear, sunny day.

Coming back from shopping, I was waiting for my tram and I spotted a hot air balloon! Pretty neat. And it makes for a nice photo, considering the architecture of the city's so beautiful.

When in Olomouc... People have this culture of drinking beer all. the. time. Like, all the time. Whether it's with lunch, dinner, on its own, whenever. It's nice that it's relaxed and not as much of a ridiculous 'let's get pissed' culture over here, it's part of a normal routine so it's more about the social aspect of things rather than the aforemented 'let's get pissed' attitude. But unfortunately this isn't a Pilsner. Sad, non-traditional times.

Two slightly terrifying sketches. I'll get better, but for now I'm breaking in my watercolours and trying to harness skills I haven't used in approx 4 years, when I left secondary school. Left: an awful attempt to copy the amazing Kevin Wada's version of Captain Cold, Right: something I was trying out, an unfinished (and looking at this with the clarity of day, hopefully soon-to-be-destroyed) sketch of William Fichtner in Black Hawk Down for my Uncle's birthday.

 The education faculty at night: 

A game of chess in a coffee shop called Druhy Domov, behind the infamous M3 restaurant/bar. It's such a lovely place, it's got books everywhere (in Czech, sadly) and we discovered a chess set, obviously, so I taught my friend how to play. The best thing - they had a DOG. A motherfucking dog in the café, best day of my life

And last, but not least, some photos from yesterday's trip to Brno. Really nice place, but I think it's more of a live-there kind of place, because there's not too much to do as a tourist. I can imagine studying there though, and finding it really great to do my shopping in, wander around in, just live in in general. 

 First up: we felt like Harry Potter because our train had compartments. Best train ever.

"HARRY DIDJA PUT YER NAME IN THE GOBLET OF FIYAAAA"

#trainphoto

#anothertrainphoto

#stoptakingtrainphotos

#dearGOD

Brno main square, as we looked frantically wistfully around for a way to reach that deadly cathedral/church (spoiler alert, it was up a huge fuckin hill)

Pointless but goddamn cute mini fountains in the main square. There were three, and I loved them.

Artsy building photo

Another artsy building photo with added cathedral. We should have expected the hill, look how fuckin high up it is, Jesus Christ on a Bike

Halfway up the hill of death, stopped to take a scenic photo

Yep, scenic photos abound. Nice tree though, gonna use it as my screensaver

Not even artsy. I was trying to take a photo of that smoke because it looked cool but my camera's just like... nah

The sky really was that blue.

Yep, blue skies, bitch.

#blueskiesbitches

Dat font tho

Fucking finally reached the goddamn church, and it was ok. Literally, just meh. Damn it.

Pretty nice though. The inside was also cool but there was a dude praying so no awkward photos (though I think my friend took a selfie. Blasphemy? Who knows. Or cares.)

And... wine. Not to drink, but because it was a really nice looking shelf of wine with nice labels and shit, right beside our table when we finally sat down in the café, which actually had the most amazing pancakes, but served with grapes that had seeds, but were sliced so it was almost impossible to get the seeds out. Fml.