Food chronicles: Wiener Schnitzel - not a hot dog!

At very nearly every meal with friends, it's pretty funny how the comparison of regional food names never fails to come up.  In larger groups there are more regions of Austria and Germany represented, and this conversation goes on longer.  But I top them all when I say that Wiener Schnitzel in the US is a hot dog.

Thanks to the fast food chain, millions of people, myself included, grow up thinking that a Wiener Schnitzel is a hot dog.  Nobody over here can believe this.  Wiener (Viennese) Schnitzel is actually a boneless cutlet, usually veal but it can be chicken or turkey, breaded and fried.

These things are large; they are pounded flat so they spread out a bit, but sometimes you can't see the plate below your Schnitzel. Squeeze lemon over it and dig in...

This photo is actually of a schnitzel I had in Wien (Vienna) on a different trip.  Impressive, yet not super appealing, right?  It's tastier than it looks, but it is pretty rich.  That's potato salad in the bowl on the side - mmm, tangy.

Sightseeing in Graz: Schlossberg (castle mountain)

I realize that I've been posting about all the other places besides Graz that we've seen, but haven't really put up anything yet on the major sights of Graz. Tsk tsk!

Graz is the second largest city in Austria, but you wouldn't think that from touring the center of town, the Innere Stadt ('inner city') or Altstadt ('old town'), which is very walkable and very charming.  (More on the street view in a different post.)

The major landmark is the Schlossberg ('Schloss' means castle and 'berg' means mountain), a giant rock in the center of the city with a medieval fortress and the famous clock tower on the top.  In the photo to the left, you can see the 260 stairs going up the side - when it's not snowy you can hike up the stairs, otherwise there is an elevator that goes up through the rock, and a funicular that can take you directly to the top.  On the back side of the Berg, there are pathways that switchback through the forest that aren't quite as steep.  These stairs were built/carved by Russian prisoners ('and Austrian pioneers' the sign said, but I'm not sure what that means) from 1914-1918.

Going up the stairs actually feels like going up an elevator, because you rise above the rooftops so quickly.  Not only the climbing up the steps but also the view is just breathtaking.  This next photo is looking down on the place where the first photo was taken.  Notice the long yellow building in both photos, and from the view above you can barely make out the sculpture/fountain with the birds that is in the forefront of the first photo. 

The rooftops of Graz!  Funnily enough, I took the exact same photo last weekend as I did in December!  This is looking southeast.  The photo with snow is the more recent.  (Notice the grey sky and lack of sun)

More views from the clock tower....

The Rathaus, City Hall, in the Hauptplatz, which is the main square.

Graz is a UNSECSO World Heritage Site and was the Cultural Capital of Europe in 2003, recognized primarily for its architecture - a blend of styles from different eras since the middle ages and from the various regions for which Graz is a crossroads: Germanic, Balkan, Mediterranean.


Like in Salzburg, the fortress on the mountain was a pretty important deal; this one started around the 9th century.  Unlike Salzburg, the Graz Schlossberg is not as well preserved as a castle.  Walking around the top there are some towers and remains of structures, but it has largely been turned into a beautiful park.  Apparently, after Napoleon gained control of it (only after the armistice was signed - the fortress withstood the siege) he demolished a lot of it.  And the fortifications built inside the top of the rock aren't open for touring.  But there is still plenty to convey a sense of wonder at the history of the Schlossberg and the feats of engineering, such as the well that was drilled through the entire mountain of rock in 1554.  (Again, can you even imagine?!)

While not so well preserved as a castle, it is a part of modern Graz life - there is a high-end restaurant on top near the clock tower, with a large deck for summer dining with amazing views.  There are a couple of amphitheaters for performances - one sunk into the top of the mountain, the cellar of the original fortress, which is roofless in summer, and one within the mountain at the base.  A whole system of tunnels and shelter space was carved into the mountain during WWII, now re-purposed for cultural activities.

A couple more photographs from the top - the 'Friendly Alien' is the Kunsthaus, or art museum, built in 2003 when Graz was the Cultural Capital of Europe.

And the Mur River, which runs through Graz.  The Kunsthaus is right across the river from the Schlossberg, just out of view in this photo, and the Altstadt (Old Town) is situated right next to the river.  This photo is looking south.

The hills are alive - part 2 (Salzburg!)

 

Villa Trapp!!  We made it to Salzburg, an amazingly beautiful city.  After having read Maria von Trapp's memoir (see 'The hills are alive'... post from last month), it was a particular treat to see the von Trapp family house.  It's actually an Inn now!  You can stay there and really indulge your Sound of Music fantasies.  I have heard lots of good things about the Sound of Music tour, but unfortunately (or fortunately if you are T) we didn't have a chance to do that.

We did, however have a chance to take photos.  Lots and lots of photos.  I couldn't stop taking pictures of Salzburg.  So beautiful and visually stimulating.  But maybe also it was seeing so much sun, for the first time really in weeks.  It was a beautiful day.

 How many spires can you count in this photo?  I think that's part of what was so visually interesting - so many spires, in such a small area.  And then a couple of really stunning places - the Dom, and the Berg.

This is looking straight up into the dome that you see in the middle photo. 

This cathedral must have recently been renovated/cleaned - the outside is so white, and inside the colors are so vibrant.  The first cathedral here was in 774.  The dome was destroyed by bombs in 1944, and didn't re-open until 1958.

The other dominating architectural feature of Salzburg is the fortress, the Festung Hohensalzburg, rising out of the rock in the center of the city.

And the view from another side:

Thrilling! This is the real deal - since 1077, whenever there was a siege (which wasn't often, though, apparently) the town would hunker down (well, up) within the fortress walls.  There was a well, drilled down through the entire mountain (can you even imagine starting to dig a well from the top of the highest mountain around?!). 

You can take a funicular to the top, or you can walk up.  We had just finished lunch at Demel (with cake of course - oh, yeah!), and it was crazy cold, so we thought it best to walk.

 So you climb the stairs and the ramp along the rampart walls, up and up and up, then through several gates...

   
 

 

and finally, you get inside the fortress on top, and you find... Gluhwein! 

It's quite a large mountain top, and you could really have a small village up here.  And who knows what's built into the mountain, too (I mean, if they could do a well...?).
Of course,  the views from up there are stunning, stunning.

The Dom (cathedral)

The Salzach River

This fortress was just so impressive.  I'm finding it hard to describe, but the way it just rises out of the rock so gracefully on one side, and then looms long and massive from the other side... and then all the details for optimizing defense - the way the massive doors closed, the towers with slits for arrow-shooting, the sheer walls, the series of gates.  Really, really remarkable.  This is apparently one of the best-preserved castles in Europe, and the largest, and really, you feel like you can almost, almost catch a trace of medieval times.  Thrilling, is the best word I can use to describe it.  Until you can visit it in person (unless you already have!), you can see more photos, video and history here.

As a coda I will leave you with a photo of Mozart's birthplace. Our hotel was around the corner from where Mozart lived, but this is where he was born.  I'm sure when he was there the street wasn't lined with designer chain stores, souvenir shops, and throngs of tourists, nor was the building emblazoned with 'Mozarts Geburtshaus' (but who knows, really).

  Ok, since that's a little anticlimactic after the fortress, how about a photo of the most adorable horses ever.  There are plenty of horse-drawn carriages to clop around the old city in, drawn by small and shaggy adorable horses (ponies?), plus there are those with the thankless job of following them on a cycle equipped with a bucket (second photo).  It takes some of the charm and romance out of the scene, yet preserves the charm for the rest of us on foot, too busy looking up and taking photos to watch where we are stepping...

 

And from behind the painting, two old maps! A real-life mystery

An uncle over 100 years old dies in Marseilles, leaving an extensive art collection.  A niece takes one of the paintings, of a body of water and a figure of a lion, painted in 1791, out of its frame to clean it, only to discover two fragments of maps hidden between the canvas and the frame backing!

"And when I saw the maps, I thought of you," she said, taking a roll of cardboard out of her bag -  the maps!

No, it's not a Nancy Drew.  Nor is it exactly like Agatha Christie's Tommy and Tuppence BBC series episode 1, where the mystery, as well as the fate of Britain, revolves around a secret treaty concealed behind a painting.

But nonetheless, a mystery!  What were these maps?  What were they doing behind the painting?

Here is the first.  (click on the image to see the full-size version). Clearly French.  But Hudson Bay, Treaty of Utrecht, Lac Nepigon?  And the big Lac, whose name is sliced through at the bottom...?  To the Internet! 

In the Treaty of Utrecht, if we all think hard back to 10th grade European history (and consult Wikipedia) we remember that France ceded the Hudson Bay Company's territories to Britain in 1713.  So the yellow and green line, which looks colored by hand (it actually looks slightly like crayon, and faded in places) is marking that boundary, and, knowing that Hudson Bay is in Canada, this appears to be a map of a part of present-day Canada.

 

So, one terminus post quem (an archaeology term!) - the map is later than 1713.

A terminus ante quem is Lac Nepigon - Wikipedia tells us that by 1883, the name of the lake appeared on maps as 'Nipigon'.  That's still a pretty big time range, though, 1713 to 1883.  Also, now we know that this lake puts us looking at part of present-day Ontario, with Lake Superior being the large lake at the bottom of the map.

Wonderfully, and pretty amazingly, there are digital libraries of old maps with easily-google-able contents.  We were able to determine that this map looked nearly exactly like a very famous 1755 map by John Mitchell, except for the fact that this one was in French.  A little more googling determined that this map is in fact, the French copy of the Mitchell map made by George Louis Le Rouge in 1756.  View the complete map, from a Library of Congress photo.  There's also some nice metadata about it in the David Rumsey Map Collection.  The full title of the map is:

Amerique Septentrionale avec les Routes, Distances en miles, Limites et Establissements Francois et Anglais. Par le Docteur Mitchel, Traduit de l'Anglois. A Paris, Par le Rouge Ingr. Geographe du Roy rue des Grands Augustins 1756.  

1756!  It is pretty much an exact tracing ('re-engraving') of Mitchell's map, with French text instead of English, and some additional annotations, such as in this photo (click for a full-size view).

Holding it up to the light and photographed from behind, you can see the watermark on the paper.  I can't really make it out, and as such we haven't been able to investigate this further.  It may even be only a part of the whole watermark, since this is only a part of the map.  But, the symbol in it may help in identification, and this would really help in identifying the origins of this specific map. (Anyone want to do a little sleuthing?)

Pretty exciting, huh?!  What's really interesting is to compare this to the present day maps of the same area (like google maps).  From some browsing/digging it appears that maps like this one were based on earlier maps and desccriptions of the area by explorers or trappers (hence some of the invented islands in Lake Superior?).  If I have time some day I might look further into this, but not now when we have a second map to explore.

Ok, on to the next map!

It was a good thing we had started with the Le Rouge map, because the second map was considerably more challenging to find. 

(click on the map to enlarge it)

New York.  And Boston in an inset.  New Hampshire, the Connecticut River.  Mostly in English, but some French notes.

But hey, wait a sec, since when did New Hampshire border New York?

Since before the American Revolution, as it happens.  Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys (militia) established the Vermont Republic in 1777.  (Thank you again, Wikipedia.)
Hey, hey, a terminus ante quem.  Wow - before 1777!

A bit of Googling later, and thanks to David Rumsey and his very impressive Map Collection (and even more impressive digital library with hi res scans), we discovered that the English, original version of this map is, "The Provinces of Massachusetts Bay and New Hampshire. (Northern section)" by Thomas Jefferys, 1776.  View the complete map here.

Long title: "The American Atlas: Or, A Geographical Description Of The Whole Continent Of America ... Engraved On Forty-Eight Copper Plates, By The Late Mr. Thomas Jefferys, Geographer to the King, and Others. London, Printed and Sold by R. Sayer and J. Bennett, Map and Print Sellers, No. 53, Fleet-Street. MDCCLXXVI."

Jefferys was Geographer to His Royal highness the Prince of Wales.  According to David Rumsey's site, this map was part of "one of the most important atlases of the American Revolutionary War period."

However, I have not yet been able to track down what this French version is.  The French mapmaker made the changes of translating the brief history of Boston fires and wards into French, and has added a note under the "Note" about the Connecticut River, paraphrasing "La Riviere de Conecticut fait Limite entre New-York et New-Hampshire".  Not sure why he (assuming a 'he') misspelled CT.

So which map, exactly, this is, remains a mystery, if anyone feels like investigating!

To sum up, what do we know - we have a 1756 and a 1776 map behind this 1791 painting.  Concealed, or used as framing material?  The working hypothesis we have is that whoever framed the painting recycled these old, outdated maps as good framing/backing material.  The least exciting, least imaginative possibility.  More intriguing would be if these particular fragments related to the painting in some way, or meant something to someone besides scrap paper.  What would help is to know something more about 18th century map publishing.  These were both very important maps, according to people in the know, so presumably they would have been the popular maps of the day?  Did lots of ordinary people have maps?  Did map publishers sell old, obsolete stock to framers in early recycling schemes? Did painters frame their own paintings?

In any case, we think they are pretty darn cool!  And we certainly enjoyed the treasure hunt of figuring out what these maps are, and learning some historical geography.

Food chronicles: Krapfen

I have in mind the glimmerings of a series about Austrian food.  Let's start with Krapfen!

Look familiar?  A jelly doughnut!  Yum!  But with apricot jam inside.  Apricot is 'Marille' (pronounced 'marilla').  Krapfen are found all over the place - in the nearest grocery store to us, Billa, they're the first thing you see when you walk in, and typically if it's toward the end of the day, only the 6-packs are left, if even those.  The dough is not overly sweet, a little bit dense, and the apricot has a little bit of a floral tinge, which can verge on perfumey and be a little startling.  Also, the jam can be  elusive, in a large glob at one edge.  You have to do some planning to balance out the filling with the dough, so that you don't end up with a mouthful of just jam at the end.

You can see how that's the case with the one in this photo.  This was maybe our second day in Graz.  You understand I waste no time in diving into food culture, especially where there are sweets involved! You'll notice in the photo that this is a 3-pack.  I was late to the store, and there were no more singles left.  Of course, you can get them singly at a bakery, of which there are tons around the city.  The best best Krapfen I have had yet was at breakfast at the famous Cafe Tomaselli (since 1705) in Salzburg.

Now here's the slightly complicated (and amusing) part about food names when you start to move around.  You know what a jelly doughnut is called in Germany, right, after Pres. Kennedy called himself one in a speech in Berlin? ("Ich bin ein Berliner!") But in Berlin, a jelly doughnut is not called a Berliner, it's Pfannkuchen.  But Pfannkuchen, in the rest of Germany, means pancakes.  Confusing? Yes.

What's even more amusing to me is how at every meal we have had with friends, this whole what-is-this-food-called-where topic never fails to come up.  Everyone tends to be from somewhere different (mostly in Germany and Austria), and this regionality of names is so pervasive.  And while my language understanding is getting better and better, at the start of a new conversation topic I usually need some time to catch the drift.  Well, when I start recognizing various names for the same thing going around the table, I know it's the what-do-you-call-it-where-you're-from name game.

Candles burning on a tree

As I begin this post about Christmas, Weihnachten, I realize that, following the new year's post, this could be a series called 'Potentially Dangerous Cultural Traditions Involving Fire'.  In the US, like the fireworks thing, I believe it is illegal to burn real candles on your Christmas tree.  Not so in Europe.  And oh, there is nothing so beautiful as a tree lit with candles.  A fleeting moment you have to capture in your memory (cognitive and digital) for, once the candles burn down and out, that's it for tree illumination.

We had an incredibly beautiful tree in Berlin, bought & decorated Christmas Eve day as is the tradition in T's family.  The candles were lit and we sang to the tree... 
(as always, you can click on a photo to see it larger)

 

 

Interestingly, to the several people we talked to about this over holidays, Santa's reindeer are virtually unknown.  And more typically it is the Christkind, the Christ child, who brings & decorates the tree, and bring the presents, on Christmas Eve.  Or alternatively, Father Christmas or an angel of the Christ child brings the presents in person. (St. Nikolas comes on Dec. 6, and leaves sweets and other goodies in the shoes of good children.) Christmas itself is 3 days long - there is Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and then the day after Christmas, St. Stephen's Day (or, 'second Christmas' as I call it).  Because the holidays started on a Thursday this year, shops (including grocery stores!) were closed for 5 days in a row.  No last minute running out for whatever you forgot for the Christmas feast!

New Year's Eve Fireworks!

Since I have a lot to catch up on, the next series of posts are not going to necessarily be in chronological order.   Just so you know.

Ok - I gave you a teaser yesterday for the most exciting New Year's Eve fireworks ever, and after successfully grappling with technology I'm proud to present my first-ever YouTube video!  But first, an introduction to the video.  Unlike in CA and many US states, fireworks are legal in Berlin on new year's eve (and only then, as far as I understand).  So, starting well before midnight and continuing to who knows how long in the morning, people all over the city are setting these things off.  There are the bottle rockets, on sticks, that you stick into an empty champagne bottle (implications there, yes) to get it pointed at the sky and light; it zooms up and then explodes (there's a close up of one of these in the video), then there's the 'Batterie Feuerwerk', a square or cylinder block with a number of fireworks packed side-by-side; you light the fuse, stand back, and then in rapid succession each one explodes up and bursts into beautiful colors - this is the type we had, that you can see at the very end of the video.  I think ours had 40 rockets in it.  There was also a type that was quite a bit more dangerous, once lit it whirred around and up like a tiny pyrotechnic UFO.  The problem was that after whirling up a little, it whirred back down and around in unpredictable ways.  We watched one that had just sputtered out at the time it hit someone on the head (or maybe his shoulder).  I don't have any of those on the video.  Needless to say, there is quite a bit of trust in your fellow humans on a new year's eve like this... and I won't go into details because it makes me a little nervous to think about it.

But Teufelsberg really was the best place for this.  T's mother had a new years eve dinner party, so after enjoying 6 amazing courses (with wine pairings!) with 6 others over about 5 hours, T and I hastily bundled up at 20 til midnight, grabbed our Batterie Feuerwerk, and set off on foot through the light snow for Teufelsberg.

The Grunewald forest is a couple of blocks around the corner, and with a little running we just barely made it to the top of the hill at midnight.  Teufelsberg is the highest hill in Berlin, and is manmade - from all the city rubble after the war.  Wikipedia says it's 80 m, or 240 ft high, so it's really not that tall but you do have a view of the entire city, which is pretty flat.  It's kind of sobering to be standing on that hill and have what sounds like a war zone all around, with the fireworks.

There is plenty of space up there, and being a hill top at least you can see where people are setting off rockets, so it feels safer than being down in the city.  The snow didn't obscure the view very much, which was great, and in the middle of the video you can kind of see (and hear) the fireworks in the distance, at the horizon, which are the fireworks all across Berlin.  It was truly marvelous, so without further ado, enjoy the video! (Click here to see it in on YouTube)

Happy New Year!!

Happy 2010!

I realize that, this being January 9 already, the sentiment is a little belated, but we went into full vacation mode for 2 weeks and I'm just now getting back to the blog.  Vacation mode was really nice, for a change!  We had a wonderful Weihnachten und Silvester in Berlin with T's mom, and then returned to Graz via Salzburg.  Lots to post!  I couldn't stop taking pictures in Salzburg, it was so beautiful.  And I have to say that on 1/6, Epiphany (a national holiday), the hills really WERE alive with the sound of church bells going off madly every hour on the hour.  Not exactly Rodgers & Hammerstein, but quite the musical city nonetheless.

And another teaser - right now I'm trying to edit my videos of Berlin fireworks to put up - it all adds up to about 10 min so I'll just do the highlights, but this is really something.  Millions of fireworks going off all over the city, and we were on top of Berlin's highest hill, (Teufelsberg, created from the rubble after the war) adding to the explosions with our own round.  Last time I was in Berlin for New Year's we were somewhere down in the city and I was terrified, with rockets zipping off all over the place in these urban canyons of housing and kids throwing firecrackers at cars and each other.  (And the next day on the news, all the stories of rockets through windows, fires, extremities damaged or lost entirely.)  Up on our hill it was absolutely fantastic, absolutely indescribable.  Which is why I need the videos - so stay tuned!