The most promising chef in Europe might have Viking blood and long hair but he is nothing but a sheep in wolf’s clothing. To demonstrate, the 28-year old Magnus Nilsson of restaurant Faviken puts on his furry wolf’s coat before he heads out in the freezing cold of North-Sweden. Temperatures of minus 30C won’t stop this young chef or his kitchen team to go out foraging. Underneath meters of thick snow they look for fresh juniper branches, still green and aromatic and burried under the icy landscape of Jamtland. We’re talking mid-winter when the sun barely is seen above the horizon and subzero temperatures that make you quickly head for a warm place, preferably next to a roaring fire. Read more »

Close your eyes and imagine Empress Dowager Cixi roaming the century old dwellings of the Summer Palace in Beijing, Wurthering Hights style. If you don’t fancy Chinese concubines, then stay anyway at the magical Aman at Summer Palace, one of the most charismatic hotels in Beijing. This 51 rooms hotel occupies the former dwellings of the Summer Palace and offers a secrets door to access this famous World Heritage Site when “normal” (read: ten thousands of gymnastic, eating, singing and partying Chinese) visitors are not allowed to enter the park. Read more »

What is the strangest food you ever ate while traveling? Strange maybe for you but not for the locals who lick their fingers for a glass of brennevin and Icelandic rotten shark or plate of raw octopus just caught right out of the Med and slammed to death on the spiky rocks. For us, it all began with some percebes, or goose barnacles, in an empty restaurant on a beach near Sintra in Portugal. Read more »