Bulgarian Pastry

I thought that a Bulgarian pastry was what I had bought at this boulangerie in Sofia, Bulgaria.  What I wanted to get was “banitsa“, a Bulgarian filo pastry. While writing this post, I’ve come to a realization that that may not have been what I got.  They look too different from the banitsas I see on the web…

So the establishment is called “Patiesserie de Provence” and its website implies that it’s all French at least visually to me.  Did I get a French pastry?  I don’t think so.  Pictures of “banitsa” I have found on the web do not look like what I had though.

From the bag I could tell that this was the company that owned and/or ran the boulangerie.

I liked what I had in any event but any clue anyone…

Boyana Church, a World Heritage Site

I took a day trip to visit two of the World Heritage sites close to Sofia, Bulgaria with a tour group.

Our ride for the day. The church is very close to the city and we soon arrived at our first destination although our guide had to first call the church and ask if they would be ready to take a group of eight. It only allows so many people in it at any given time and we were pretty much the limit.

Arriving at the World Heritage site.

What Boyana Church is, is well explained in this video and it is helpful because it shows and explains the church’s interior which visitors are not allowed to capture on camera.

Cats in Sofia!

Thrilled that there were so many of them, I mean cats, in Sofia, Bulgaria, of different kinds and colors, and in abundance especially around my apartment.  I soon found out that it was the work of an old lady next door to me feeding the cats.

It seemed that generally speaking, people were very tolerant of them and were kind to them and one guy even came up to me while I was trying to photograph those behind a fence across from my apartment expressing his, I think, objection at my behavior.

This guy was intensely listening to music.  Really.

The Pretty Russian Church in Sofia

The “Russian Church” or formally the “Church of St. Nicholas the Miracle-Maker” is a pretty little Russian Orthodox church in the heart of Sofia, Bulgaria.

When I visited, the area inside the small church near the front entrance was under renovation/restoration so you had to go around to the back to enter.  Intending to do so and by mistake, I went down to the crypt where there was a shop and quite a few people either deep in prayer or who seemed to be waiting for turns to do something.  I did not know then why there were so many people in a rather confined space but later read that

More popular than the church itself is the crypt, accessed to the left of the main entrance. Here lies the tomb of the former Bishop Serafin, who died in 1950. Locals come here is droves to post hand-written messages into a box, standing to the right of the tomb. Although Serafin was never canonised, he is revered as a saint and believed to make prayers and wishes come true.  (http://www.sofia-guide.com/)

 

To Supermarket! in Sofia

The first place I went to after arriving in Sofia, Bulgaria was this supermarket nearby my apartment.

Open 24 hours, it was a little more than a convenience store, a little less than a supermarket.

A couple of days later, stopped by another shop run by the same peeps to pick up this retro looking can of “sprats” to be garnished with scallions which the Bulgarians seem to use quite a lot.

Another bigger supermarket (had the wrong impression that it was Dutch as I thought I saw many of them in Amsterdam but it is apparently an Austrian chain), in the subway station near my apartment.

I LOVE supermarkets.