By Viktoria Rajnak
Photos by Viktoria Rajnak
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Seasons change and so does Geneva. Some restaurants shut down, others open, boutiques change their location, new ones appear.
In the heart of Geneva, well-hidden in a gorgeous inner courtyard, Le Baroque Restaurant just opened its doors. Its predecessor, Le Senso had a classic, Italian, conservative decor with white tablecloths.
It has been completely transformed into a contemporary club-like place.
The canapés are deep purple velour, along the wall hang heavy velour curtains, the lobby bar is covered in leather with metallic studs and the big hanging neon violet crowns light up the place and are reflected in the high ceiling. How pretty when the snow sits on the glass roof!
Le Baroque, Geneva
The architecture splits it into two areas, the lobby and the restaurant with its big central bar.
People surround this main bar, where the DJ mixes very well. I had dinner in the lobby, the calmer place of the two.
The main restaurant is a couple of shades darker, the music pumps louder, and you can expect to see people dancing.
The music caters for all tastes and so does the food.
The concept is festive dining, much like La Mangeoire in Courchevel, or Villa Romana in St Tropez.
This is where the pre-party is, and if you’re craving more, dancing continues at Le Baroque Club, just a stone throw away, until the early morning hours.
Le Baroque Restaurant
56, Rue du Rhone
1204 Geneva
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Viktoria Rajnak is a frequent contributor to GenevaLunch
By Viktoria Rajnak
Geneva's summer 2012 Colisseum
Finally, summer has arrived with temperatures making it perfect for lounging outdoors. The heat naturally attracts us closer to the water, and there is a wide choice of different places to have drinks and hang out. I like to enjoy the warm lakeside breeze at the following lounges:
Starting off at rive droite at La Terrasse (web cam), which has a sublime location right by the water. As soon as the summer sun appears, so does this terrace.
This is the perfect stop when walking along the quai at any time of the day. If coming by boat you can refresh yourself with a cold beer, while your boat is being re-fuelled.
After winding your way to the other side of the lake, you will find some well-known places that have been here for years, as well as some newbies.
The Moët floating bar – the Jetlounge – is brand new, decorated entirely in white. It is built on a barge lying between the Neptune boat and the Jet d’eau.
Even though it’s only temporary, they have managed to create a luxurious lounge with a chic feeling. It’s open until the end of July.
If you’re looking for more than a drink, the Geneva Art Festival has cultural programs for all audiences running until 26 August. The exterior is a re-assemby of the Colosseum.
They have performances, live music, entertainment for the kids, and also cinema evenings.
In the same place, but with a separate entrance, sits the Geneva Art café. It occupies two floors with a magnificent terrace overlooking the lake.
Continuing further down the shore of Lake Geneva you will stumble upon a place dedicated to the young and sporty. I’m talking about Tropical Corner (web cam) and its neighbour Wake Sport Center.
They share a stony beach with access to the lake if you wish to take a dip to cool down.
Others prepare their windsurfs for action, or just work on their tan, lying on the big rocks surrounding the beach. Instructors and equipment for most popular kinds of water sports can be booked or rented here.
All of the terraces have music, and there is no doubt the holiday mood is present.
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Viktoria Rajnak is a frequent contributor to GenevaLunch
By Viktoria Rajnak
After-work drinks at L'Evento in Geneva
L'Evento, Geneva
I’m always keeping my eyes open for new places to go to, and this time it was a nice discovery of something that stands out from the ordinary. I find the surroundings of a place as important a part of the experience as the food. L’Evento is an Italian restaurant/lounge/bar that lies a stone’s throw from the city center. After work stops: at 18:00, Monday through Friday.
L’Evento is in a glass veranda with great heights, situated between two buildings.
iPads for the bar at Levento
The bar is at the entrance level, overlooking the restaurant, and when you walk down to the restaurant level, another bar desk is filled with iPads! I’m guessing it’s the entertainment while waiting for placement, or if you drop by alone.
Instead of studying the menu, I studied the design of this place. The enormous lamps are in the shape of jellyfish.
The chairs are Kartell Mademoiselle with Missoni Fabric. The kitchen is framed and visible for us to peek into. On this live painting you see the chefs’ movements.
The fabulous drinks made a great end to my Monday. They were accompanied by a plate of Italian charcuterie and cheese. After-work was nice, and next time I’ll test lunch, or a late weekend night when there’s a DJ around.
Grazie Mille!
Restaurant L’Evento
50, rue du Stand
1205 Genève
Viktoria Rajnak is a business student at HEC in Geneva, where she has lived since 2003. She writes a blog, Remove Before Flight Blog and she will be contributing occasional guest posts here on a variety of topics including nightlift and shopping in Geneva.
Hold Up Art (photo:Hold Up Art)
By Viktoria Rajnak
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – When I was just a teenager, I used to hang out at with friends at the Carpe Diem Café, in the heart of Geneva. We would meet there in the afternoons, but mostly on weekend nights. There were DJs with fresh and new music, a party mood that was always charged and each time was a great time. A couple of years later, I walk into what has replaced it, Hold Up Art, which recently opened.
Standing at the door: I am filled with nostalgic emotions but curious to see the transformation.
The first impression doesn’t disappoint me. A small terrace at the entrance works perfectly well in wintertime, you can smoke shishas covered up in a blanket if you want to. Inside the music is blasting and the lights blinding. It’s like a mini-club with tables and a bar full of people. Hold Up Art is a bar/art lounge of its own style, inspired by Pop Art and Street Art. Other cities they plan to expand to are Paris, London and Dubai.
The pieces of art on display are for sale and new ones come in every month. The ceiling painting is renewed every six months. The interior is in constant change of decoration, and it’s what makes this place exciting to return to. Hold Up want to promote new talents so the DJs are renewed even more frequently than the pieces of art. Everything about it is original, the cage-like DJ booth, shots in what resembles a rack filled with test tubes and the displays downstairs. The place is also available for private events and catering.
The contemporary art all over the place is closely matched by a contemporary attitude making good use of social media: a nice homepage, a Facebook page and a Twitter account. Finally someone who is going with the mainstream flow!
The spirit as described on the homepage: “Pass by and see for yourself, weekly new DJ’s, saxo’s, shishas, shots and EVERY DAY WE SHUFFLING !!!”
Hold Up Art
Rue du port 4 , 1204 , Geneva
Homepage: http://www.holdupart.org
Twitter: @HoldUpArtLounge
Ed. note: We’ve now moved this post to Jonell Galloway’s food blog on GenevaLunch, “The Rambing Epicure.” You’ll find this and much more on buying, cooking, eating at home and dining out from our food expert! Be sure to visit soon.
Ed. note: We’ve now moved this post to Jonell Galloway’s food blog on GenevaLunch, “The Rambling Epicure.” (note, 2011: now the blog Savouring Switzerland) You’ll find this and much more on buying, cooking, eating at home and dining out from our food expert! Be sure to visit soon.
Ed. note: We’ve now moved this post to Jonell Galloway’s food blog on GenevaLunch, “The Rambing Epicure.” You’ll find this and much more on buying, cooking, eating at home and dining out from our food expert! Be sure to visit soon.
It all began innocently enough, my addiction to the confections of Tristan, the maitre chocolatier of the minuscule village of Bougy-Villars, in the hills above Rolle, just next to Signal de Bougy.
After all, who on this earth doesn’t love chocolate? And isn’t one of the prime pleasures of living in – or in my case, near – Switzerland that you get to indulge in some of the world’s finest, anywhere, anytime you please? It’s the rare place in the world where you can get your fix in, of course, the finest boutiques in big cities like Geneva, but also on supermarket shelves, in tiny-but-luxurious shops, even in the gas station.
A considerate friend left a little white shopping bag very discreetly on my doorknob one day last December when I was out. I thought all the usual appreciative platitudes: It was my birthday, she remembered, how sweet …
Until I opened the bag, saw the three innocent-looking chocolate bars, wrapped very plainly in see-through cellophane, and nonchalantly began to munch.
What revelation was there!
What my friend had chosen for me was three of Tristan’s thick, plain, unadorned plaques, studded with big chunks of nut. You can choose from caramelized pistachios, hazelnuts, or walnuts, and you can take your pick of dark chocolate, milk chocolate, or white chocolate. As always with chocolate, I am embarrassed to say that I vastly prefer the milk to any other type.
I say "embarrassed" because among choco-cognoscenti, chocolat noir is supposed to be the thing, the top, the crème de la crème. Call me foolish, call me unsophisticated, but it’s not for me. However, if it’s for you, Tristan’s got plenty to make you happy, with a choice of 50% chocolat noir and 83% chocolat noir (the latter for those who like their drugs extremely strong!).
What else does his tiny gem of a shop have to offer? There are elegant tablets of chocolate, studded with crunchy cocoa nibs, and slender batons of chocolate, plus gorgeous, artful packages and baskets for holidays such as Christmas and Mother’s Day, and truffes in a multiplicity of flavors ranging from the traditional (coffee, caramel, rum, champagne) to the cutting edge of the chocolatier’s art (green tea, whisky, even the eau-de-vie marc) The color of the green tea truffes alone is enough to let you know that you’re in no ordinary chocolate shop.
Best of all, small tasting samples of nearly everything are scattered in little dishes around the shop, so you can be an informed consumer, spending your francs and your calories wisely. Since a single hyper-addictive nut-studded plaque runs CHF10, a stop at Tristan’s can quickly add up. But although your bank balance and your hips may suffer, it’s well worth it, for a visit to Tristan’s is a little stopover in choco-heaven.
Tristan, Artisan-Chocolatier, Bougy-Villars, Switzerland; 021 807 21 25; www.chocolatier-tristan.ch
If you have a favorite market, shop, product, café, bar, or restaurant, or if you’re looking for a favorite item and can’t find it, let me know.
When I first moved here, in among the discoveries of the joys of lait cru cheese and good wine available for a song, was a completely unexpected revelation: tuna mayonnaise.
You’ve probably passed it right by on the supermarket shelf: those shelves of Thomy tubes full of mayonnaise, mustard, tomato purée, and even chicken liver paté. But the star of this particular show, as far as I’m concerned, is the tuna mayo. It might sound suspicious at first, but give it a try.
Just take a piece of dark bread, squinch a little squiggle out onto the bread, throw on a slice of Comté or Gruyere or some other hard cheese, maybe top it all off with a slice of cucumber, and voilà. Fast food, but very far from the MacDo idea of speed!
If you work at home, as I do, or simply have an office fridge and not much time, this is a culinary lifesaver. Some may balk at the idea, and when I smuggled a tube to a US friend, she confessed to have tried it, let it linger in her refrigerator for some months, and then eventually chucked it. But another friend, when she heard of my impending summer visit, was quick to say: "Oh lord, don’t forget the tuna mayo. What’s in that stuff, anyway? Crack?"
And thus was born our new nickname for our favorite product: Crack Mayo.
I’m not sure Thomy would approve, but I’m addicted.
If you have a favorite market, shop, product, café, bar, or restaurant, or if you’re looking for a favorite item and can’t find it, give me a shout.
Photo, courtesy Nestlé
More chocolate festival photos in the GenevaLunch “Versoix, Switzerland Chocolate Festival” photo album.
“Go on, only a few hundred calories!”
Paradise if you love the stuff and don’t have to worry about your weight, but purgatory if you do.
Everywhere you turn in this annual festival there are stall holders offering their wares, tempting visitors with plates of little squares of chocolate, all too good to resist.
There are also vendors with chocolate fish, chocolate rabbits, chocolate fountains, chocolate for children, dark rich chocolate for adults sold in dark, rich sophisticated boxes. Cakes with chocolate, ice cream with chocolate, chocolate covered apricots, chocolate in boxes from every cocoa bean producing country in the world. A chocoholics delight.
This annual chocfest in Versoix is very popular, so it is also very busy. The queue for the free visit to the Faverger chocolate factory was so long I couldn’t be bothered to wait. Maybe I missed the sight of Oompa Loompas operating the machinery or sailing on rivers of chocolate, but never mind.
There are other attractions laid on for visitors such as a “choco” train, balloons, food stands, and the obligatory Swiss band to entertain the crowds. This is a good day out for a family albeit a bit of a chaotic one. The chocolate tents can get quite squashed at peak times, so I would advise next year go early to enjoy it at its best. This way you can try all the varieties on offer in peace, even if you have to live off salad for the following few days.