Life Ensurance

Ok, chances are I've written about 5 posts since you last checked... thats because i'm alone in Salzburg and as it's my 4th time here I don't feel the need to do anything but make the most of having that rare WiFi.

I guess what triggered this rant is that I only just discovered that, in my sweltering hot hotel room, there is a bar fridge.
Its extremely well disguised to fit in with the dark oak desk. Actually for some obscure reason I was checking to see if they had a Gideon's bible here because they seem to have them everywhere, but not here. I guess I was curious. Yeah, not much going on here..
I wish I had known about it because then my chocolate would not have melted (completely melted. After 6pm, in total shade, indoors, with the fan on full).

ANYWAY so i discovered this mysterious cupboard, fridge, that had Twix and Manner in it. Manner being a snack that is alllll over Europe and treated like... a treat. http://snaksnak.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/Manner-Vienna-Wafers.jpg

I have seen these in the supermarket and on tv a lot and resisted tempation to try one. But since it was there in my secret cupboard....

Long story short, I am dissappointed, all round, in general, with all European chocolate biscuits and chocolate snacks. I'm not talking about the kind you buy from an expensive chocolatier in Belgium: I'm talking about your average everyday supermarket-shoppers-treat.

TimTams: I have never been the biggest fan because if I'm going to have chocolate, I'll have it by itself, without the unnessesary dry biscuit in the middle. But Europeans, Mein Gott, what would they give for a TimTam!
Why? Because there is nothing like it on their market. Their chocolate biscuits are like Manner: simple wafers with icing in between, dry, disappointing, with a sickly sweet aftertaste and no actual real chocolate. Served up in individually-wrapped packages that make it look like sweet irresistability.
Poor deprived Europeans!!!
They have two pieces of biscuit with some nutella-goo sandwiched in the middle, and they think all their birthdays have comes at once. I think I better post over a box of TimTams and ToffeePops and Hundred's&Thousands and Squiggles.


On that note, COFFEE.
I'm not even a coffee drinker, in the way most people are, but I know my coffees. We always assume coffee is a European invention so it must be better in Europe, right?
WRONG
I havent had one really good coffee or hot chocolate here. The best I've had have been almost-starbucks grade. And any good Wellingtonian knows that Starbucks is a last resort, because every other cafe does much more amazing coffee and service.
Hot chocolate here is chocolate-essence (or milkshake syrup) with warm milk. Sometimes they pile whipped cream on, but the looks are deceptive.

I just want to make it perfectly clear to all the NZers who complain about how small and crap New Zealand is: New Zealand has got it made!
Our cafe culture and cuisine is ABOVE world-class average, I'm sure of it. Our chocolate biscuits rock. Any barista can make 10 different types of coffee, with swirls and presentation to match. Our restaurants serve cheap food that is well-made and presented perfectly on big white plates with dots of sauce in all the right places.
AND you dont have to tip!!!

New Zealand is rad.

I think I called this Life Ensurance because in NZ you can always Ensure your life will be rad. Or something. Anyway I thought it was pretty smart.

...on a second note, I just tried Ben & Jerry's cookie dough in Salzburg - never mind that it had nearly melted before I got it to the table, it was amazing.
Tick that off my bucket list.