Helsinki Face Stuffing

***WARNING - This blog post will contain lots of discussion of, and photos of, FOOD.  If you do not like this, then why are you reading my blog?  This is what I do bitch.***

A couple of months ago, whilst researching gluten free goodies around the world, I noticed that a lot of people were commenting on how 'absolutely freaking super amazing' Finland is for such things.  This planted some little seeds in my mind, a seed for travel and a seed to go forth and stuff my face with as much gluten free food as I could possibly imagine.  So, a couple of weeks ago, I found myself at Tegel airport, waiting to board an Air Berlin flight bound for Helsinki.

I count the airport as part of the trip, it's where I start and therefore it is where my food experience begins, and, with it being still in Berlin offers a little context to why I was travelling.  This is the only thing in the whole of Tegel that I could eat (minus burger king fries).

Basically some badly grilled chicken, around 5 GIANT bell peppers and some smatterings of green things (plus a decidedly average cup o tea).  'Fresh & Healthy' it was not, 'Overpriced & Blandly Wank' it was.

A little later that day (alas for you travel bugs, I'll only be including the food elements of this trip), after arrival in Helsinki and a little pottering around in the decidedly peach coloured Hilton, I ended up at a Kotipizza, ordered, and received this.

You may be thinking, "damn, I wish there was better lighting, the photo makes that pizza looks like a scabby wound".  Well, it wasn't the lighting unfortunately, or the photography.  It was a little odd as a pizza, lacking in flavour and had an overall cheap-ness to it (if you're wondering, that's chicken, pineapple, two types of cheese - one being blue, all on a bed of orange goo).  It wasn't the best pizza I've ever had, and possibly not the worst.  But, I guess, at the end of the day, it was a pizza (a rationale you will be seeing often).

The downside though, was that although it was gluten free, I had quite a reaction to it and was ill for around 2 days, making the rest of the trip quite a struggle.  Yay Koti!

Fortunately the next day it was breakfast at the Peach Hilton, and I'd been assured that they could provide me with gluten free goodies.  Although when I was actually there and after a little perusal of the buffet, I couldn't find any.  A little poke of a nearby staff member and they brought these over to me on a plate (which resulted in every other diner shooting daggers at me, because, WTF! WHY was I being hand served something at a buffet when they, the most important people, were not!!).

They were pretty good.  Quite pleasant to eat, all nice and microwave warmed.

Burger Time

Another of the big pulls of Finland was that their McDonalds and, local chain, Hesburger offered gluten free buns with their shitty fast food meals, woo!  Now, it's not that I particularliy miss eating crappy fast food.  I don't.  One of the advantages of eating gluten free is that I'm about 130% more healthy in my dietary choices.  But, I've not had a burger burger in years, so the novelty factor and the sheer joy at being able to be one of the masses was too much to resist.

First I tried ol' Maccy D's.

I'm not sure why I chose the quarter pounder with cheese and not a big mac.  I'll have to live with that decision for some time.  But, it was a burger, in an actual bun.  Look!

It almost looks real!  Alas, eating it was a combination of remembering how crappy McDonalds is combined with the realisation that the bun was made out of a substance akin to polystyrene.  It compressed, but as it did, only got harder and required a shark like jaw to bite through it.

All in all.  It was awesome doing the "I'm Eating a MotherFucking Burger" thing.  But the burger itself was a little lacking.

Next up, was Hesburger, a chain I've never been to before, but at the end of the day is McDonalds with different menus (albeit a better name He's a Burger!).

After some waiting (it seems it takes 10 minutes to cook a fresh burger in a fast food joint), I was presented with this.

Yes, it does look better.  It has VEGETABLES! OMG!

To be fair, it was better than the Maccy's Turd Sandwich, but, the bread was still made from plastic and rather tough.  Still, it was an enjoyable experience for the most part, if I ignored the taste.

Cakes and Sweeties
You can get gluten free cakes here in Berlin, thankfully, but nowhere near in the numbers that you can in Helsinki.  It seemed like most cafe's had one or two gluten-less cakes, joy!

They were all most pleasant really.  Not much to add, no hilarious quips or anything.

 NOMS

NOMS 

Then I went to here.

And bought this.

I hear you thinking, 'that looks good', and it does.  Alas it didn't have much substance or flavour too it, although there was enough cream in it to kill a small family.

They did, AMAZINGLY, have gluten free treats in the airport.

Other bits n bobs
The rest of the culinary experience wasn't too amazing.  I went to a Spanish place that seemed to offer a lot of gluten free choices, but, it wasn't too good, I was presented with these as Patatas Bravas.

For some reason, I was expecting something other than frozen chips with mayo n ketchup splurged on them, that's positive thinking for ya.

I did get to eat some bambi though, and rather delicious it was indeed (any dish with combines berries and meat is a good dish in my books)

Finally, there was the gluten free bakery I'd been longing to go to (which, after booking the tickets, discovered that in my 3 day journey, it was only open for 1 single hour before I had to leave).

To be honest, I'd expected something of New Yorkian standards, in that they cooked everything themselves, but it was more a stall that sold gluten free products produced by other people/large bakery companies.  Just take a look at the ingredient list on these meat pasties.

Mmmmm, I always love my food with 11 E numbers.  Still, they were quite tasty.

The award for best named place goes to this one.

Alas, I did not have the balls to eat some Beefy Queen.