Mood:  a-ok

Finnish Cuisine recoqnized:

"Helsinki, Finland received a front-page panegyric in the New York Times's Travel section on Sunday. The most northerly capital after Reykjavik is currently enjoying 20 hours of sunlight out of 24.

That leaves plenty of time for R.W. Apple Jr., the Times's Associate Editor, to indulge in a slew of strangely-named berries at the Market Square or Kauppatori ("bilberries, lingonberries, amber-colored cloudberries"), taste the "silky gravlax" at the Kauppahalli, and the "immaculate fish" at E. Eriksson.

R.W. Apple Jr. eats his way through Helsinki with the brio befitting his title of Director of American Institute of Food and Wine. The pigeon stuffed with foie gras prompts Apple to note: "This is the kind of dish you to great restaurants for" though he also writes the place is "shatteringly expensive." At nearby Bellevue, a more typical joint, the borscht is "heartbreakingly authentic," which must be a good thing."