National Gallery brings Venetian sun to a grey London

I had one brief weekend in London between holiday travel and getting back to St. Louis to look after my mother. Top of my "to do" list was "Venice: Canaletto and his rivals" at the National Gallery, which was due to close on 16 January.

It was a top priority because I adore both this time period and this genre. I've always been fascinated by the idea of the grand tour, with those 18th century young aristocrats wandering around Italy, drinking in culture (along with alcohol and inappropriate relationships) and buying stuff to cram into their country homes back in England. One of the essential souvenirs on these tours was a scene painting of Venice, by Canaletto or a handful of competitors all working in along the canals of that magical city.

I was intrigued by the show's stated desire to compare and contrast the work of different artists. As a frequent wanderer throughout British stately homes I'm used to seeing these scenes on the walls (indeed, there's a whole dining room full at Woburn Abbey), but they're usually one offs, so you don't get the chance to see them side by side.

And the final reason: We're off to Venice for Valentine's Day, Piers' first visit to the city. A preliminary tour via oil on canvas seemed a fine idea. And so, through gray London to the Sainsbury wing, into the basement, and onto the Grand Canal.

The show delivered on expectations. What's not to like? Sunlight glimmering off canals, magnificent yet slightly crumbling architecture, crowds of people in opulent costume. Who wouldn't want one of these on his wall? My favourite room, unsurprisingly, was the large, central space dedicated to festivals and ceremonies. Vast canvasses depicted arrivals of ambassadors, flotillas of costumed teams on large gondolas or the magnificent Ascension Day ceremony during which the Doge took his golden barge, the Bucintoro, out into the Adriatic to throw a wedding ring into the sea and, by so doing, pair his republic with the seas for another year. These paintings aren't just beautiful, they are windows into another world. Worlds of opulence, colour and unimaginable glamour, each painting must have been the 18th century equivalent of today's special effects-laden film.

But what's special about this show isn't those expected scenes. It is, rather, seeing paintings of similar views by different artists grouped together. In this way you get a real sense of the strengths and weaknesses of each artist. Canaletto's confidence with light and casual disregard for reality (if an architectural feature didn't suit his composition, he just moved it). Belotto's detail. Guardi's almost impressionistic approach. Northern painters like Gaspar van Witte and Johan Richter moved south to cash in on the scene painting rage, and nobody but an expert could differentiate their work from the natives. It gives you a good sense of just how big this market was.

We both agreed that were we touring Venice in 1740, rather than next month, we probably would have returned with a Belotto. (The one at left would do.) Canaletto's nephew, he learned at the master's knee and then added his own touches, including far more respect for the architecture, thicker layers of paint and a much cooler light. He's far less known than his uncle because he worked in Venice such a short time, heading to Dresden just before his 25th birthday to carve out a career free from the older man's dominance.

What I would have loved to return from the show with, but what wasn't on offer, was a small, inexpensive paperback that reproduced the show's paintings against a map of modern Venice. Standing in this gallery comparing one interpretation of the Rialto to another was great fun. Standing in front of the same bridge comparing art to reality would be even better. Guess I'll have to load some jpegs onto the iPhone and do it myself next month.

From homey to high cuisine, Danish food surprises and delights

Almost a year ago, after a particularly memorable meal at La Distillerie in Luxembourg (see 5 February 2010), we asked the award-winning chef where he got his inspiration. Denmark, he replied without hesitation. It was, according to him, the country with the most innovative chefs, setting the latest trends in high cuisine. A few months later, Copenhagen's Noma was named the best restaurant in the world.

Clearly, Danish cuisine featured more than the pickled fish, open-faced sandwiches, beer and snaps to which I'd thus far been introduced. Copenhagen, it seemed, wasn't just going to be about sightseeing and meeting future family, but would be a journey of culinary exploration.

The town delivered on its promise. From a high end restaurant that ranks as one of my top 5 meals ever, to delicious family-style lunches and great street food, Denmark turned out to be a seriously "foodie" destination. But be warned, come with deep pockets. Even our average meals would be very expensive in London, and the cheapest bottles of wine on a list were rarely under £30. You pay for your pleasures here.

So, let's start with the high end. Vaulting into my Top 5 restaurant list, clearly standing shoulder-to-shoulder with places like The Fat Duck and La Distillerie, is Restaurant Herman within Tivoli's Hotel Nimb. The New York Times skipped the more famous Noma and opted for this one in their luxury guide to the city. (Amusingly ... or maybe not ... headlined Copenhagen on $1000 a day!) The five course tasting menu is 850 kroner, with another 850 for the matching wine flights, plus a few extra drinks. If, like me, you have no brain for numbers, you won't figure out until the next day that's £250 per person, thus deferring the financial pain until you've made your wonderful memory.

Like the Fat Duck, the Herman experience is a combination of exquisite food, theatrical presentation and magnificent service. Though we officially paid for five courses, there were at least three amuse bouches and one pre-dessert, and each "course" was served in two or three stages. So, in reality, we worked through a progression of at least 10 plates of food, each highly original and very flavourful, but none particularly odd. At other chef's table experiences like this I've always had a couple of courses I didn't like; at Herman, while some of the presentation was exotic (for example, chamomile steam billowing from beneath a bowl of shellfish stew), nothing was so bizarre that you thought the chef had overstepped the bounds of culinary common sense.

Favourites amongst this staggering profusion were oysters with a granite of pine, seared foie gras with cherries (no surprise there), and venison with mushrooms and cabbage. The last was elegant, yet filled with the simple goodness of the forest. Piers had dessert ... a three-stage extravaganza featuring artistry with pears and gold leaf ... while I went for the Danish cheeses, selected from a detailed and descriptive menu (displayed in the picture). Each course came with carefully selected wines, all explained with great detail and genial anecdote by one of the best sommeliers I've ever encountered. I really regret not taking notes, but the whole experience was so delightful, I simply lost myself in the joy and never thought of it. Add to this a wonderful room in the Moorish palace that's one of the architectural highlights of Tivoli; the white room looks out expansive Arabic windows at the festive lights of the park.

Our next best meal was just a stone's throw away, at the same hotel's Brasserie Nimb. Architecturally this shares the same windows and views, but the interior is more casual, with simpler place settings, less linen and open kitchens set amongst the tables. We booked here for New Year's Eve, a single price all-inclusive that featured pre-dinner cocktails, a five course meal with wine, cigars, port and whiskey on the terrace after dinner, beautifully timed to take in the impressive fireworks spanning the horizon from midnight, and then upstairs to a ballroom sized bar for a band, dancing and as much as you cared to drink, with snacks to help balance the alcohol. (The next day's general malaise tells me I should have had more snacks, less champagne.)

I'd never been to an all-inclusive New Year's party like this and was a bit skeptical. Even at £200 per person, I figured that there would be some recession-beating cuts on their part to maximise their profit margin. Slowing down drinks service, using cheaper ingredients, etc. Nope. The evening featured copious amounts of everything, at the highest quality, with steady service. Favourite courses included pan fried scallops with Jerusalem artichoke puree and a fabulous white chocolate parfait with pistachio powder, but my favourite memory by far was Piers indulging in an impressively large cigar and a generous snifter of brandy on the terrace at midnight. He really does suit prosperity well.

While painfully expensive, both these meals were actually value for money, and cost roughly the same as equivalent experiences in London. It was when we moved to moderate dining that things were less satisfactory. A deeply average 2-course Italian meal with a bottle of wine at Il Peccato, a casual wine bar affiliated with our hotel, was £60 per person. A 3-course outing in the steak house at the Imperial Hotel with a bottle of red, really not worth writing about, was £80. For those prices you can get a really memorable meal in London. Clearly, it's the moderate meals that kill you here.

Fortunately there's street food to stretch your kroner. The Danes have an odd fascination with sausages. There are stands throughout Copenhagen's city centre, dishing up no gourmet varieties, but rather a few versions of the humble hot dog. These come with a bun on the side, a pile of fried onions and serve-yourself vats of ketchup and mustard. Surprisingly delicious and not to be missed.

One of my most memorable culinary experiences in Copenhagen is one that you, unfortunately, will probably not be able to copy. That was being invited into homes of locals for a traditional Danish lunch. These were festive family affairs, similar in spirit to American holiday meals but slightly more formal in the way each new arrival greeted everyone else, existing guests naturally forming a receiving line each time the doorbell rang.

The traditional meal takes place in two courses, the first heavy on cold dishes and fish, the second incorporating more meat, hot options and cheeses. Neither course does much by way of vegetables; this is eating heavy on protein and bread (both white and a lovely dark rye). For a woman who considered pickled fish an unappealing oddity 15 months ago, I'm growing quite fond of the stuff. (See the photo below for an indication of how many varieties are available in stores.) There's a somewhat spicy variety in a red sauce, and a curried version that's my favourite. Danish meatballs are excellent, surprisingly so considering they lack the tomato sauce my Italian roots never considered optional. I was less fond of the soft, hot mound of ground liver pate, but impressed by a range of Danish cheeses, most of which were completely new to me.

All this is accompanied by free flowing Danish beer, which is a light, easy-going lager that complements the fish particularly well. Beside your beer glass is a shot glass filled with snaps (the local aquavit), raised regularly as different guests propose different toasts. It's a pleasant little tradition that brings a pleasing formality and sense of festivity to your basic Sunday lunch.

I left Denmark with a new appreciation for the Danish Food Direct web site, and the suspicion that I'll be trying to recreate one of those classic lunches before the winter is out. While the high-end restaurants were most memorable, it's the traditional fare that's likely to become a regular part of my life.

Copenhagen sightseeing: The best of the rest

Typically, I was carried away with the palaces. But there's a lot more in and around Copenhagen to see, and one of the advantages of such a compact place is that you can cover a lot in a short time. By the end of our five-day visit, I felt we'd ticked off most of the big sights.

A walking tour of the centre of town takes in most of the top attractions without a great deal of effort. Unless, of course, it's the deep of winter after heavy snows. We slipped and slided our way around, fortunate to never end up on our backsides but definitely prone to a few of those comic, arm-windmilling moments of near collapse.

Certainly the most magical snow and ice fields through which we trekked were in Tivoli Gardens. For some reason I had always had the (incorrect) impression of this as formal gardens in the European style, with flowers, parterres and fountains. Nope. It's Disneyland. Quite literally. The legend has it that Walt's visit here is what inspired the original park. It's easy to see the inspiration, with themed areas, loving attention to architecture, careful landscaping and a balance between rides, restaurants and shops. I looked longingly at the roller coasters but, frankly, I was already having difficulty with the sub-zero temperatures. Accelerating the speed of the arctic air didn't seem like a good idea. Instead, we tried a progression of mulled alcohols (wine at one booth, cider at the next ...) and drank quickly before the libations cooled. (Drinks went from boiling to chilled in about 10 minutes.) The whole place is magical at this time of year, kitted out with Christmas lights and featuring a Christmas land where elves play amongst the igloos and romp with polar bears. Go after dark for the best effect.

A comprehensive walking tour of town started on the Strøget, a long, pedestrianised area linking the west and east parts of town. Though recognisable global brands were present, the town seemed to retain more local vendors than the modern average. Royal Copenhagen is, of course, worth a look in, but the most interesting shop is probably Illums Bolighus, a multi-story emporium of kitchenware, furniture and design all with that clean, bright Danish style.

Strøget empties into an exceptionally large town square called Kongens Nytorv. Here you'll find the country's most famous department store, Magasin du Nord, and the Hotel d'Angleterre, supposedly the city's grandest hotel (poky, dark lobby and a '70s-feeling coffee room and restaurant across the front; I wasn't impressed), the royal theatre and all manner of grand facades of former palaces surrounding an equestrian statue of Christian V, the "Kongens" for whom it was named. I saw photos of the square in summer in which it looked lovely and gracious. I have to admit that at this time of year it was just a greyish white stretch of tundra with dirty slush around the edges, disfigured by a massive public transport construction project.

While here, we picked up the sound of the royal guard coming down Strøget for their change in front of the current Queen's palace of Amelienborg. Here, Copenhagen beats London, as the ceremony covers a much longer distance and is more interesting at its culmination. The guards march a good half mile, led by an impressive marching band that pulls tourists and natives like a group of pied pipers of Hamlin. When at last they reach the palace, the change takes place four times, because Amelienborg is actually four matching neo-classical palaces, set on corners of an octagonal courtyard, with the massive dome of Frederick's church anchoring your eye out one sightline, and the modern opera house along the other. All this dramatic architecture, designed to be a fluid, monumental whole, makes Amelienborg one of the great architectural set pieces of Europe. Even better when a bunch of nattily dressed guardsmen in bear skin hats are enlivening the scene.

Frederick's Church, more popularly known as the marble church or Marmorkirken, is more impressive on the outside than in. It's the dome of St. Peters, brought north and put atop an imposing classical building. Unfortunately they ran out of money in its construction, delaying its completion for a century, so the deft, light touch of the baroque gave way to heavier, darker 19th century styles. Worth a look, but it's a brooding, somewhat oppressive interior that won't encourage you to linger.

Nearby (in fact, just off Kongens Nytorv) is Nyhavn, the picturesque harbour. A procession of colourfully painted warehouses stand on either side of a channel filled with sailing vessels. Most of the buildings are now restaurants or hotels. It's clearly a hub of nightlife on the tourist scene, but was too far a walk for convenience from our hotel, so we simply walked around at mid-afternoon and took a few photos.

Just beyond Amelienborg in the other direction you can walk along the waterfront until you get to the statue of the little mermaid, for most people certainly the most well known attraction in Denmark. She is, I'm sorry to say, a disappointment. I'd always had the impression of her sitting in the middle of the harbor, framed by water. Instead she's right up on the shore, perched on a rock on a small, pebble strewn beach and surrounded by busloads of tourists. Much more impressive, to my mind, is the monumental statue of Gefion you pass on the way to see her.

Gefion was a minor Norse goddess to whom the King of Sweden offered as much land as she could plough in a day. She used magic to turn her four sons into supernatural oxen, and the quartet was able to circle enough acreage to create what is now the island of Zealand, on which Copenhagen sits. The statue is of a much larger than life Gefion driving the four impressively energetic oxen before her plough, and sits at the top of what, in summer, is a large, cascading fountain. It doesn't take long amongst the Danes to pick up the long-standing, passionate rivalry with the Swedes, so this isn't just an attractive monument, it's a statement of national pride and a reminder of superiority over the northern neighbours.

Within three days we'd ticked off the majority of sites in my Top 10 Copenhagen book, so thought a trip outside the city was in order. A decision reinforced by the fact that few other things were open on New Year's Day. So it was off to Roskilde.

This is an ancient city with deep Viking roots, ranging up a hill above a fjord. There's a good variety of tourist attractions, but the top two are the cathedral and the Viking Ship Museum, the first at the top of the hill and the second below, on the harbourside. (This is worth mentioning (a) because there are so few hills in Denmark and (b) because slipping and sliding our way up and down that hill was one of the most precarious parts of the holiday.)

The cathedral is absolutely fascinating. Unusual in that it's entirely of brick construction, yet light and airy inside due to generous windows and plaster vaults of bright whitewash decorated with vivid medieval designs. I was surprised, in a royal cathedral in a protestant country, to find many ancient catholic touches remaining, from the wall paintings in the chapels to the saint-encrusted tomb of Margaret I to misericords on the bottoms of the choir stalls. Either the reformation was a lot more gentle here than in many other parts of Europe, or they've done a lot of restoration. The main draw of this church, however, is the procession of royal tombs from the legendary Harald Bluetooth to the present day. You can even see the artists' model of the radically modern glass egg that will someday hold the present queen and her consort.

Christian IV is here, of course, in a gloriously over-the-top mortuary chapel (see right), a private box and the pulpit. Elsewhere are clusters of later 17th century tombs beneath marble canopies, baroque fantasies encrusted with fluttering angels and a room of early 19th coffins that look more like a display of oversized French Empire urns than anything funereal. Our wander triggered a real interest in Danish history, as when I look at a grandiose memorial I want to know more about the person inside. Does the sculpture honestly reflect the majesty of a life, or is it architectural compensation for under achievement? While not sure of her contributions, I was pleased to spot the baroque splendour of Queen Charlotte Amalie's tomb. Any woman who gives her name to a Caribbean capital filled with great duty free shopping and within spitting distance to some of the finest beaches in the world is going to deserve a few extra prayers from me for the gentle repose of her soul.

Down the hill, the Viking Ship Museum is a smaller and far more austere experience. The whole place is built around the carcasses of five early medieval ships that had been scuttled to make a breakwater. Not enough to make a whole museum, you'd think. But from the bones of these vessels the Danes have crafted a rounded experience. First, there are the ships themselves, displayed cleverly, in an austere, featureless hall with a glass wall behind them looking over the fjord, so it's not hard from certain angles to imagine them sailing again. There are exhibits and dioramas about the different kinds of ships, how they were used and why they were sunk. A film showing the voyages of a reconstruction of one of the ships does a fine job of conveying how brave the original sailors must have been to take to the high seas in these things.

At the end of the exhibit you get to a hall with reconstructed sections of ships, decked out with supplies, sails and painted backgrounds. On pegs across the wall are Viking costumes to try on before scrambling aboard. Were I five, or even 15, you couldn't have kept me out of them. Trying to maintain a dignified 40-something I resisted the dress-up-and-take-a-picture game, though I do think I would have looked fetching in one of those fur lined cloaks. Maybe next time.

Coming next: Why Denmark is the world's new culinary capital.

Copenhagen sparkles through the arctic chill

The guidebook says there are only two months not to visit Copenhagen: January and February. Short days, wind whipping in from the Baltic, leaden grey skies and, this year, snow and ice that even the Danes say is exceptional. I think it's safe to say I was introduced to this city at its worst. Even so, I loved it. Imagine how I'll react to a clement June day...

The first half of this momentous holiday didn't go as planned. Snow-disabled Heathrow managed to get me to America, but left Piers in London. We still got engaged, but on a quiet evening at home rather than at some showy holiday occasion. I spent Christmas up to my ears in doctors, drug lists, lift chairs and all the accoutrement required to try to keep a very ill woman in her own home. Back on my original schedule on the 28th, I flew to Chicago, spent a day with my best friend from university, caught the overnight to Amsterdam, then hopped to Copenhagen, to finally be back in my fiance's arms by mid-day. On the agenda: 5 days of magical sightseeing, fine meals, family gatherings and a glittering New Year's Eve event before returning to the reality of work, mother and wedding planning.

So, let's talk sightseeing. Copenhagen is a small, low, flat city. In size it reminded me of Dublin. In its urban architecture, of Amsterdam, and its palaces of London. The ubiquitous hot dog stands and the wind knifing off the water were all Chicago. It's a melange of many other places, yet design elements from its Viking past, the sleek, pale modernity of its interior design and its vowel-laden, unpronounceable language make it clear you're someplace new.

My favourite sights, by far, were the two royal palaces we visited. Both are heavily stamped with the spirit of Christian IV, Denmark's longest-reigning king and one who was fortunate enough to have both the flowering of the Northern Renaissance and military and financial successes under his belt.


His magnificent crown, on display in the treasury at Rosenborg Castle in the centre of Copenhagen, screams of confidence, power and a fondness for complex opulence. It is an example of the apogee of the jeweler's art. For my money, this single piece of regalia beats the British crown jewels hands down. As does the viewing experience: on this late December day we were almost alone in a treasury filled with magnificent jewels and works of art, able to take our time and linger over details. A far cry from the Tower of London's treasure room, so overwhelmed with crowds that you're now compelled to float by the bling on a moving walkway.

The castle above the treasury is small and surprisingly intimate for royal lodgings, with the unusual layout of monarchs' sitting and bedrooms on the ground floor, while the public space of the throne room is in a long gallery two flights up. The style here is what the English would call Jacobean: intricately carved walls and plaster ceilings, both heavy with strapwork, grotesques, pinnacles and obelisks, black and white chequered marble floors, intricate marquetry furniture. There's a fine collection of solid silver furniture and the silver, life-sized lions that go along with the Danish throne, a couple of eye-popping baroque rooms encrusted with curving shelves filled with china and a rather spine chilling collection of wax figures of former monarchs sitting inside glass booths, like nothing so much as those carnival fortune tellers who move and spit out a card with your future upon it when you pump in a coin. These are relics of a Germanic tradition of private museums of curiousities, which ... amongst other ephemera ... could include life-like wax models of your monarchs, friends and heroes.

The most remarkable room to my eyes, however, was a chamber with mirrors not only on walls and ceiling, but laid in an oval on the floor. When you looked down, you were gazing into an pool that went down forever. Still an amazing effect in the 21st century, it must have been astonishing in the 18th.

About an hour outside of Copenhagen, on the edge of the small town of Hillerød, is the much larger Frederiksborg Castle. A fairy tale cluster of towers on an island on the edge of a lake, its dreamy quality is enhanced by the fact that much of it is a 19th century reconstruction. After a devastating fire, the wealthy industrialist behind the Carlsberg brewery contributed the cash to rebuild the place to its former glory. It then became a museum of Danish history, much of the story told in portraiture.

There are a handful of jaw-dropping rooms, most on a much larger scale than the town palace, and a few mostly original. The royal chapel is perhaps the most magnificent and the most authentic, with lavish decorations on the ceilings and walls so ornate you'd swear it was Christian IVs remarkable crown writ large. Similar to St. George's Chapel at Windsor, this is home to Denmark's highest order of chivalry (the elephant) and the window embrasures are decorated with the shields of current and former holders, a veritable roll call of the world's monarchies and heads of state.

Also of note is the vast great hall, with gleaming marble floors and ornate gilt plasterwork, lined with monumental portraits of past monarchs; a knight's hall called "the rose" (supposedly after the Roman concept of "sub rosa", a place where you can speak confidentially), darkly Germanic with its wooden paneling and lifelike freizes of deer and stags made more realistic by the insertion of real antlers; and an audience chamber with a domed ceiling down a long, window-lined passage, all white, Baroque and encrusted with floating putti.

Admission comes with an iPod-based commentary. It goes into great detail and reveals plenty of drama in the history of Denmark, but you'll realise about an hour into your visit that you've hardly seen a fifth of the rooms, and if you listen to everything you'll need two days to get through. With early closing hours in the winter we certainly had to pick up our pace by the time we reached the mid eighteenth century, and a procession of lovely rooms from the Napoleonic and Victorian eras, including a re-construction of Hans Christian Andersen's study, flew by. Up under the eaves is a 20th century collection, heavy on heroic stories of the Danish resistance and rescue of Jews in the second World War.

Outside, beneath the thick blanket of snow, we could see the outlines of the magnificent Baroque garden across the lake, reconstructed in the 1990s. Even had the weather been mild, I'm not sure I would have had the energy to explore, as the scale of Frederiksborg is so massive that by the end of the tourist route both my feet and my brain were near collapse. Like any great museum or palace, this is a place that needs more than one visit to appreciate its diversity. I look forward to a return.

Coming in the next entry ... the best of the rest of the sightseeing.