Born in the vibrant city of Singapore with a unique Eurasian blend of Portuguese and Chinese heritage, my journey has taken me from the bustling streets of Singapore to the serene and open landscapes of Sweden. My educational pursuits in Singapore culminated at tertiary level with two separate Master degrees, after which I embarked on a new adventure in 2002, moving to Sweden. In Sweden, I pursued with deep interest, the knowledge field of applied linguistics, particularly corpus linguistics research methods, earning a doctoral degree from one of northern Europe’s largest universities, the University of Gothenburg. I currently work as Project Manager, focusing on EU and international projects, at RISE Research Institutes of Sweden, at the Division of Bioeconomy and Health, Department of Agriculture and Food. My office is located in Mölndal municipality. Mölndal, known also as the Valley of Mills, is located about ten minutes by bus ride from the city center of Gothenburg to the south. If you’re ever traveling south from Gothenburg to Malmö, whether by train or car, you will likely come by Mölndal municipality. In these pages at cmariec.com, you’ll find my lifestyle musings on culinary and travel adventures from Singapore to Sweden, and from when I lived and worked the Arctic City of Tromsø (2018 to mid-2022). SINGAPORE | SWEDEN | NORTHERN NORWAY Life in Singapore Pursued all academic interests in Singapore, of which the post-graduate years were founded in two separate disciplines. In 2000, graduated with two separate Masters Degrees: (i) Master of Science in Information Studies at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore (ii) Master of Arts in the English Language at the National University of Singapore (NUS). In 1999, represented the Republic of Singapore at the Miss Universe Pageant in Trinidad and Tobago. With this came a variety of film, educational TV, media, and ambassadorial work for the Singapore Tourism Board. Life in Sweden In 2002, moved from Singapore to Sweden in order to pursue a PhD in Gothenburg, where a number of international corporate head offices were located that all had a substantial business presence in Singapore and also Asia in general. In 2009, graduated with a PhD in applied critical linguistics from the faculty of humanities at the University of Gothenburg, with a cross-disciplinary thesis entitled, Swedish management in Singapore: a discourse analysis study, looking particularly into the concepts of assimilation, integration and hierarchy, at top management levels of Swedish-Asian corporations in Singapore. 2013, as research fellow at the Centre for International Business Studies (CIBS), School of Business, Economics and Law at the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, researching the future implications of increasing Asian-Swedish cooperation within the field of international business. The project is entitled Gothenburg in Asia, Asia in Gothenburg, funded by the Anna Ahrenberg Foundation. The project is aligned with the 400 years anniversary of the city of Gothenburg in 2021, and falls under the broad category of Kunskap Göteborg 2021 initiated by city representatives of Gothenburg, Göteborg & Co, University of Gothenburg and Chalmers University of Technology. 2015, was granted the Flexit post-doctoral scholarship by Bank of Sweden Tercentennary Foundation (Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, RJ) for a three year project together with the Swedish-Swiss multinational enterprise ABB. From 2015-17, the research will take place at ABB Corporate Research Sweden HQ in Västerås, and at CIBS during 2017-18. The research focus of the project is how new technologies are perceived and accepted by users and customers, using linguistic methods of data analysis. More information can be found at RJ’s website, at Riksbankens Jubileumsfond (RJ) Felxit 2015. Life in Northern Norway (2018-2022) 2018, late summer. I acquired new work as Market Scientist at Nofima. Having moved to the county of Troms in August, I’m currently enjoying myself, exploring the island city of Tromsø. From the 1900s, this city became known as Paris of the North due to how the people of Tromsø were exceptionally stylish and sophisticated in contrast to the fishing village preconception that many might have of a city located in the Arctic Circle. In my years in Sweden, I have known Sweden to be called the land of the midnight sun. During the long summer mights, it was beautiful to sit and watch the sun’s languid pendulation between east and west, touching the horizon out at sea before going up again. Northern Norway takes this languid pendulation of the sun to the extreme. It is not only known as the land of the midnight sun, but it is also the land of polar nights and the northern lights. This is my new adventure. And in these lifestyle blog pages, you’ll find my personal thoughts, insights and musings. Cheryl Marie Cordeiro | PhD MSc MA ACADEMIC REFLECTIONS | CV LIFESTYLE BLOG

The Lamborghini Aventador J, Geneva 2012

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The Lamborghini Aventador J (Photo by GT Spirit) at Geneva 2012.
I could die just looking at it.

I cannot wax more lyrical than Sam Smith who wrote in 2011 about his driving experience with what he called a “hellfire sexplosion” of a car that is the Lamborghini Gallardo in his article at Exhaust Notes.

And this year in Geneva 2012, the Lamborghini Aventador J was unveiled.

Lamborghini Aventador J, back.

At 6.5L with 700 horsepower and its V-12 engine untouched from the Aventador LP700-4 – this piece of blinding passion and desire embodied in a deep glowing lava of metal takes creativity in luxury sports cars to completely unchallenged dimensions that makes the future passé.

The Aventador J is a multi-layered construct of contradictions in practicality and design. Open air and without a hard top, the insides of this superfine piece of engineered art is exposed purposefully to all natural elements and an untold number of bugs, as if in challenge to the Gods themselves, since there is also no windshield to its 217-mph top speed. Thus embodied in its very design, the Aventador J literally forces you to live in all out Italian extreme – all or nothing!

As a metaphor for good leadership, I was once told, “It isn’t enough that you own a Lamborghini. You need to know how to drive it!”, the thoughts resonating with Lamboghini’s own “Every weapon needs a Master!”

Indeed.

Small things make a big difference.
In conversation with Giorgio Lanfranchi, GM of the luxurious Millennium Doha, Qatar.

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Giorgio Lanfranchi (second from Right), General Manager of the Millennium Hotel Doha, with his team receiving the HACCP international food standards certificate in early February 2012.

Giorgio Lanfranchi has had more than thirty years of international experience in the Tourism and Hospitality Industry. Born in Italy, his career had taken him across 5 continents working at international 5-star destination companies such as the InterContinental Hotels Group, Kempinski and Four Seasons, that had operations in countries from Switzerland, United Kingdom, Oman, Philippines, India, Egypt and Eritrea. He has been General Manager of the Millennium Hotel Doha since 2008. Millennium Hotel Doha is part of Millennium & Copthorne Hotels, one of the world’s largest hotel companies with more than 120 owned and managed hotels across 20 countries. In 2006, he was Knighted for his social and economic commitment in the Tourism Industry by the Italian President Giorgio Napolitano with the honour – Cavaliere della Repubblica Italiana.

Text and Photo © JE Nilsson, Giorgio Lanfranchi and CM Cordeiro 2012

Sitting back with coffee in hand, staring out through large glass windows that offer a perfect view of a clear blue sky over an amazing skyline, it is surreal to be in conversation with Giorgio Lanfranchi, General Manager of the Millennium Hotel Doha who sits in the heart of Qatar.

As GM of the luxurious Millennium Doha, Giorgio oversees most every aspect and detail of its daily operations, though perhaps one could say that being Italian and having his family background in food and beverage, it is there that his heart is well placed.

With more than about three hundred staff, and even more so guests walking into the Millennium Doha each month, I asked how it is that he was able to ensure the experience of luxury and exclusivity of each guest to the hotel?
Continue reading “Small things make a big difference.
In conversation with Giorgio Lanfranchi, GM of the luxurious Millennium Doha, Qatar.” →

El Pedregal Porcelana Venezuela, chocolate ganache muffins

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To oblige your senses – a batch of El Pedregal Porcelana Venezuela chocolate ganache muffins.
Text and Photo © CM Cordeiro 2012

It was meant to be a rudimentary mid-week chocolate fix, where this batch of chocolate ganache filled chocolate muffins were made from what I had in my kitchen pantry for chocolate.

But as the kitchen filled with the aroma of the fruit tones of the melting Porcelana chocolate and the swirled spices of cinnamon and cardamom, I soon realized not all chocolate muffins are created equal.

As a crowning sensation of the senses, this batch of muffins were filled with Valrhona El Pedregal Porcelana for chocolate ganache.
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Kokaihop Lounge, Passion för Mat 2012

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Cheryl Marie Cordeiro with Anders Jacobsson of Mat.se and Kokaihop.se, the lounge at Passion för Mat 2012.

In as much fun and excitement any trade fair entails, there comes a time in the hours spent when you’d rather find yourself away from the masses, gathered to your own, if even for just a moment.

This year at Passion för Mat 2012, that place would be the Kokaihop Lounge at Hotel 11 that is just across the street from Erikbergshallen where the main fair is ongoing.

Set in a different premise altogether, this private lounge area is a relief of quiet and serenity from the humid and crowded indoors of Erikbergshallen, especially at mid-day.
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Passion för Mat 2012 – Highlights

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L-R: Ronny Spetz, Team Leader of the Gothenburg Culinary Team that took home the Silver Medal for Sweden in the Culinary World Cup 2010 (ref i and ii); Dan Berntsson (ref i and ii), Sweden’s leading expert on Potatoes; Leo Sieradzki, Publicity Consultant for Passion för Mat and Cheryl Marie Cordeiro.
Text and Photo © JE Nilsson and CM Cordeiro 2012

It’s hard to tell what I like the most with Passion för Mat 2012 (Passion for Food) at Eriksbergshallen in Gothenburg, but is has certainly made its way into my calendar as one of those must do events of the year.

Perhaps ultimately it is the socializing and meeting with all these people who love what they do, that cumulates in the air to a warmth and electric feeling of warmth and happiness that you rarely experience otherwise.
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All out Italian passion at Passion för Mat 2012, Gothenburg, Sweden

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The Burrata experience from Aldardo in Gothenburg, at Passion för Mat 2012.
Text and Photo © JE Nilsson and CM Cordeiro 2012

There are no words to describe the sensuous experience of cutting into the buttery softness of a genuine Italian burrata cheese – seemingly made in heaven on earth, that is Andria in Murgia in southern Italy.

Made from cow’s milk, rennet and cream, the burrata was first made in the early 1900s. After a hundred years of finding its way around the globe outside of southern Italy, it is still considered an artisan cheese because of its contradictory status of being a popular rarity that it is best consumed within 24 hours after its production. Something that adds to its air of an exclusive invitations only experience.

After having tried it in Singapore for the first time, just about two years ago with the Iannone family (ref. La Braceria i and ii), I have personally in vain searched for the burrata in Sweden. In Singapore, the popularity of the burrata has increased considerably. The fine dining restaurant No Menu for example sells 40 kgs of it a week.

And while Singapore has Giorgio Ferrari to thank for bringing in the first import of burrata (together of course with other Italian fineries of food and wine) into a country with an utmost challenging climate nonetheless, Gothenburg now finally has Aldardo.
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Gothenburg Food Capital of Sweden 2012

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Spices such as these that are a staple in Swedish homecooking today, were once brought back to Sweden from the Far East on the Swedish East Indiaman Gotheborg III during the 1700s that sailed from Gothenburg to Canton, China.
Text and Photo © Ted Olsson, JE Nilsson and CM Cordeiro 2012

In the past five years, the height of the food scene in Gothenburg Sweden, apart from the more glamour filled annual prize giving ceremony and gala dinners held by the Western Swedish Academy of Gastronomy (2010, 2008) is the Passion for Food (Passion för Mat) tradefair held in the city at Erikbergshallen, that is right next to the docks of the Swedish East Indiaman Gotheborg III.
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Soon summer along the Swedish west coast

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A little Southeast-Asia in Sweden – Swedish sampans in winter adjourn.
Text and Photo © JE Nilsson and CM Cordeiro 2012

In as many times as I have mentioned that I would love to be in a warmer climate…have I told too, that Sweden can be beautiful?

In this winter’s coda with the high pressure and cold, Scandinavia brings with it, azure skies clear as far as the eye brings you into the horizon. The deep blue-green gem coloured Nordic waters, undulating as music through time are now frosted with ice, broken into beautiful patterns by the hourly ploughing of the hull of the ferries that run to the minute on schedule in rhythm with the waters underneath.
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Be still, my beating heart!

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Literature from the period of Restoration England and their unsentimental comedies of the heart ironically hold one of my favourite quotations of all time. The expression of ‘beating hearts’ has had for centuries, since the late 1600s with the works of John Dryden in his The works of Virgil, been associated with the excitement and rush of adrenaline that comes with the seeing of and the taking of contact with the object of one’s amorous affections. William Mountfort’s Zelmane in 1705 contained the earliest citation for “be still my beating heart”.

About two centuries later, the expression was delivered in a comic manner in the fantastic fourth collaborative work of Gilbert and Sullivan’s opera HMS Pinafore, 1878, when a lowly sailor Ralph, falls in love with the Captain’s daughter, Josephine.

Ralph:
Aye, even though Jove’s armoury were launched at the head of the audacious mortal whose lips, unhallowed by relationship, dared to breathe that precious word, yet would I breathe it once, and then perchance be silent vermore. Josephine, in one brief breath I will concentrate the hopes, the doubts, the anxious fears of six weary months. Josephine, I am a British sailor, and I love you!

Jospehine:
Sir, this audacity!
(Aside.) Oh, my heart, my beating heart!
(Aloud.) This unwarrantable presumption on the part of a common sailor!

The story turns dramatic when the Captain’s daughter in her due social rank is promised by her Captain father to a Cabinet Minister, Sir Joseph.

But as with most Gilbert and Sullivan stories, where “nothing is as it seems” and “love levels all ranks”, a twist by the end of the story lends a happy ending to all.

Closely intertwined with the romancing of hearts and souls this Valentine’s Day is the idea of a warm candlelit dinner in the heart of some place cozy…

Here, in celebration of friendship and love…a St. Valentine’s menu suggestion.

Happy Valentine’s Day to All!

A lifetime of romance in its old cut facets

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An old cut diamond weighing ca. 1.90 ct, Top Cape, VS set in white gold with 18 modern brilliant cut diamonds set halfway down each side of the shank.
Text and Photo © JE Nilsson and CM Cordeiro 2012

I love old cut diamonds. There’s a depth of warmth about them that comes through even in dimly lit rooms compared to their flashier modern counterparts. It’s the way the cutting interacts with the light. A softer, calmer sparkle and glow rather than the hard busy flashes of the modern cuts.

Distinctive of old cut diamonds are the larger culet as you can see in the picture, where modern brilliants will have a very small or no culet at all. Most of them are also cut cushion shaped and not perfectly round, as they were not computer assisted cuts but rather, fashioned from the cutter’s understanding of the nature and shape of the stone. Original cutters of diamonds and jewels needed to a large extent have the eye of an artist who envisioned the polished stone in its finished state in all its dazzling glory. A skill that perhaps not many cutters of today possess since computers and mathematical formulae now distinguish the ideal cuts for a rough, rending stones that while may be full of sparkle, lacks in my view, a certain individual spirit and personality.

If you own an old cut stone, chances are, you will recognize it in any light as your own just by looking at it – the colour, the cutting, even by its inclusions. Luxury comes these days not in terms of how much you spend but also in terms of exclusivity that includes peculiarities and imperfections that in old cut diamonds, make them striking to behold. And diamonds with natural inclusions that mark them, giving them their own ID instead of a laser printed number are certainly unique by nature. So if you have an old cut diamond for example, a family heirloom of sorts, and have it resent into a new design, chances are even without loop in hand you won’t be fooled by any replacements, you’ll know it’s yours by eye.

Old cut diamonds also tend not to be as white as the modern brilliants, most of them having I, J, K, L colours or Top Cape, Cape colours. A feature that I have today, come to love.

This old cut diamond, acquired from Sotheby’s in Paris, has decades of narratives to tell, embodying romances across several lifetimes, reflected in its open cut and open flanked face.

All you need to do is pick it up,and read it.