In the past I've visited Cluj on business but this weekend was all pleasure. Cata and I hopped into our classy ride (an old school dacia) and spent a few days roaming the city where he once attended university. If you're visiting from Bucharest I think you'll definitely notice how clean the streets are in Cluj. It is a nice looking city that has old world charm plus new world fun (hello shopping mall). Going to the movies and eating ethnic food were a must for us since Medias doesn't offer such things. Highlights: Cluj Botanical Garden, Cluj Flea Market (awesome!), and Indigo restaurant.

It is more like a park than a garden. It is huge, with several greenhouses and thousands of plants. My new favorite garden this is a must see.

The joy of homemade gem or dulceata was first made known to me after Viorica gave me a jar of her homemade strawberry jam almost two years ago. Everyone's mother or grandmother makes sweet batches of fruit preserve annually; it is a common practice here. The fun part comes in tasting variations in recipes from different households. Some add vanilla, others add lemon, all taste good to me (except for quince). Until today I was convinced jam making was a complicated and difficult process. It has got to take hard work for the result to turn out sooo darn good doesn't it? In short....nope! We bought figs yesterday and today we've got a delicious fig jam. The process took about an hour and a half total. Tomorrow's breakfast menu? Clatite w/jam of course :)

If you'd like to make your own fig jam, we based our recipe off of this one link here.