Baltic States Tour - Riga, Latvia 2
In a light rain we walked to Mīkla (dough in Latvian), a bakery/cafe for breakfast that was located in so-called Central District, outside of the Old Town.
According to their website, sourdough bread is Mīkla's specialty. When we arrived at the bakery/cafe, two bakers were shaping dough and I assumed that those were their signature sourdough bread. The cakes and pastries on the counter looked nice although there were several empty rows. Apparently some items were not ready yet. I ordered a cardamon bun and J grabbed a ham and cheese sourdough sandwich.
The cardamon bun was still warm and tasted lovely. I think that J's savory sandwich was good, too.
Semla is a Swedish cream bun, which is a small wheat flour bun, flavored with cardamom and filled with marzipan (almond paste) and whipped cream, dusted with power sugar. It's a Swedish tradition to eat Semla around Fat Tuesday before the Christian fasting period of Lent. I have had Selma from Baltzersen's Bakery in Harrogate, England a couple of years ago and I liked it very much. I was so excited to find Semla on this trip. This Semla was wonderful. I had no problem to finish it up even right after the whole cardamon bun.
We walked around the outside of the Old Town for a while while looking up at the city’s Art Nouveau-styled buildings, well, at least I thought so they were.
The Corner House was not just another Art Nouveau building but also the former KGB, or ‘Cheka’, headquarters in Riga. Today the building is open for a guided tour and visitors can see jail cells and dungeons as well as an exhibition on the institution’s operation in Latvia. It was before the building's opening hours when we were there and we didn't come back there during our time in Riga. Maybe next time.
We kept walking on the streets and the rain became heavier. We headed to the Riga Art Nouveau Center, the only museum in the Baltic States dedicated to the Art Nouveau heritage.
The building of the Riga Art Nouveau Center was built in 1903 as a private house of the famous Latvian architect Konstantīns Pēkšēns who designed it together with Eižens Laube, another Latvian architect.
The first thing we saw in the building was the marvelous spiral staircase, which is said one of the most magnificent masterpieces not only in Riga, but also in Europe.
The museum consisted of two parts. One was the basement where you can educate yourself about the Art Nouveau architecture, design and art of Riga through a video and digital tools. There was an interactive digital screen that displays the picture and location of the Art Nouveau architecture in the city, categorized by architect, including Konstantīns Pēkšēns, of course. It was a great database and in fact helped us identify Riga's historical Art Nouveau buildings as we explored the town the next day.
The other part was the re-created authentic interior of an Art Nouveau apartment on the ground floor. The rooms were decorated with the original wall and ceiling paintings and displayed furniture, tableware, artworks, clocks, clothing, embroidery and other items used in Riga in the early 20th century.
Soon after we started walking toward the Old Town, I saw a lot of tea boxes of Mariage Frères, our favorite French tea company in a shop. We popped in to check it out and escape from rain and wind.
The small space was full of foods that looked fancy. Above all, they sell various Mariage Frères tea. That made me feel this place must be my "cup of tea".
M’archers was a deli-bakery-shop-restaurant. We asked them if we could have a tea at the dining room but they told us they won't serve just a tea. Tea could be served along with their breakfast/lunch dishes. It was just before noon, which means they were not serving lunch yet but still breakfast. Instead going back to the bad weather, we had the second breakfast there.
Their menu was written in Latvian. Google translation told us that one of them was cheese scone. We expected it would be English style savory cheese scone and we both were going to order it. However our waiter (the deli’s owner?) told us it wasn’t cheese scone. It was a traditional dish made with cottage cheese, which would be sweet and look like pancakes. Google tricked us. With a second thought, J had a classic Quiche Lorraine. It looked nice.
I tried the mystery cottage cheese pancakes. The pancakes were warm, delicate, moist and sweet. The three toppings - cherry compote, sour cream and condensed milk came along. The pancakes were lovely and it was enjoyable to try a different combination of the toppings. This could be one of my favorite breakfast.
We came back to the Old Town and visited the House of the Black Heads, the same medieval guild that had another house in Tallinn.
The building faced to the market square, where we found a stone marker of where the first Christmas (New Year) tree was placed in Riga in 1510. This was the spot!
The original House of the Black Heads was built in 1334 and fully rebuilt in 1999 after it was destroyed during the WW2. The building is currently a venue for exhibitions, concerts and other events. We did the house tour to see the exhibitions.
The cellars are the only part of the original building that have survived to the present day in the medieval form.
The historical cabinets have been set up in the 19th century-style interior. The work offices of the president of Latvia were located there from 2012 to 2016.
The collection of silver plats and old snuffbox were neatly displayed.
The Celebration Hall with the royal portraits on the wall and the fresco "Apotheosis of Saint Maurice" on the ceiling have welcomed renowned musicians.
There was a photo of former Emperor of Japan Akihito and former Empress of Japan Michio with former President of Latvia Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga with her husband, taken in the Lübeck hall on May 25th, 2007. This was the hall!
The composers' gallery was filled with several portrait busts of Latvian and foreign composers, such as Brahms and Beethoven, which express the love the blackheads shared for art and the music played in the Celebration Hall.
The next to the House of the Black Heads was the Museum of the Occupation of Latvia. We educated ourselves about what happened to the Latvia state, its land and people during the Soviet and German National Socialist regimes from 1940 to 1991.
Then we visited the Riga Cathedral. The construction of the building began in 1211 and it was the central cathedral of Livonia until the collapse of the historical region in 1561. The current appearance was the result of the renovation in the 19th century, which combines Romanesque, early Gothic, Baroque, and Art Nouveau feature.
The covered walkway around the cloister looked like or a antique gallery a messy attic...
The rain has stopped sometime in the afternoon. We strolled in the Old Town for a while.
When we were passing by the Powder Tower, one of medieval Riga's fortification wall towers, built in 1330, I remembered that it housed the Latvian War Museum. I expected it would be a small museum because the admission fee was free. We casually stopped by the museum.
I was wrong. The museum was huge and extensive. The museum’s aim is "to reveal to the public the complex military and political history of Latvia, with particular emphasis on the 20th century, during which the Latvian nation had to fight for its independence twice."
The exhibitions starts "Soldiers and the Art of War 9th - 16th Centuries" in the ground floor, followed by "Latvia and Latvian soldiers in the 17th - 18th centuries" and then "Latvians listening to the war in the 19th century. until the 20th century for the beginning." There were already so many things and information before the 20th century. Exhibitions about the 20th century were so much more. I felt the museum was endless.
Nevertheless, we left the museum at some point and we had a dinner at Dom, an intimate and cozy restaurant near the Riga Cathedral.
We weren't fully hungry probably because we had breakfast twice. We both had a main dish, skipping starters. I had Halibut fillet with mashed pumpkin, chanterelles, white wine sauce. It was nice. I saved the half and exchanged it with the half of J's main dish.
J chose Pike dumplings with boiled potatoes, crayfish tails, spinach and crayfish sauce. The dish didn't look like dumplings. In fact our waitress described the dish something like scallop mousse. Anyway it was delicate, creamy and tasty.
To be continued...
