Photo above is Freiburg Münster – view from the top of the hill. The over 700 yrs old münster is really majestic, you will be blown away with its details inside outside.
I really love Freiburg city – the architecture, the atmosphere, the food and the things all around 🙂 Enjoy the morning market when you’re there – get fresh vegetables, flowers, fruits and some souvenirs. Anyone traveling to Germany must definitely include Freiburg.
Another ‘Must-Eat‘ checked today: Currywurst
Travelled about an hour from Lörrach to Freiburg today on a Bahn train. Confession.. I love Freiburg!
The old city is amazing – the main highlight is the Freiburg Minster which is over 700 years old now. We went in the morning and had the opportunity to walk the morning market. The morning market surrounds the minster where you can get fruits, flowers, vegetables, wood carvings, souvenirs and even some clothing include hats! We bought fresh blackberries and strawberries at €2.50 per box each. (Photo below)
As we walked further, we were spoilt with so many choices of ‘wursts’. So many trucks selling all sorts of sausages. The smell was super tempting we were literally glued to that area.
We got the ‘Lange Rote’ (which means Long Red i.e. a distinctive long, thin and red sausage broken into 2 and stuffed into a bun) and another one – obviously Currywurst.
Currywurst is basically fried sausages cut into small cubes and drenched with ketchup sauce and curry powder. I got this for €2.50 and the Lange Rote for €2.80 (Photo below)
The taste? Good!! But apparently, I was told (since this is my first time having it) – that a better Currywurst does not have such strong ketchup taste. And I must say, the curry powder was too little and I can hardly taste the spiciness. (Rest assured I will surely try a second Currywurst in this 2 weeks in Germany.)
Nevertheless, I’m glad I tried it, and you should too – when visiting Germany.
Another ‘eat‘ in Germany: Checked!
Pic: My dear friend, Rachel picking her books to read and to strengthen her German language.
The community here sure encourages reading habit. You can find book shelves in the middle of the town with books contributed by the people for the people. You just need to pick one that you fancy most and walk away. Pls do return it once done and you could also contribute and donate yours.
Let the books go from hand to hand, let them touch lives and make more wonders to the world.
Kudos to such an awesome culture.
As expected, Germany-Austria 2016 is a gastronomy trip for me; the ‘eat’ part of my version of eat-pray-love.
Started the day with a typical German breakfast i.e. boiled eggs and various types of breads and pretzels that goes with butter, jam, cheese and cold chicken ham. As for dinner, we were pampered with yet another round of German food – “Spätzle“, homemade egg noodles.
To make Spätzle, you need flour, eggs, salt and water – all mixed together into a medium hard dough (with a hand mixer). Then with the help of a wonderful equipment i.e. the ‘Spätzle maker’, you just pressed the dough into strips of noodles thru the tiny holes. (Photo below – which I thought is a giant version of the garlic presser)
The Spätzle was served with stewed beef (shoulder strip) that was coated with mustard and had cubes of pork, onions and pickles wrapped inside it. To keep all these inside the meat, a short piece of straight and thin metal was poked thru the meat to hold things together.
First, fry the wrapped beef and put it aside to rest. Then make the stew by frying mixed vegetable (carrots, celery roots and lots of onions) and some red wine. The put back the fried beef into the stew and let it cook for a good long hour.
While waiting, make your favourite salad. We had ‘field salad’ with honey mustard with yoghurt.
Final results, please enjoy the photo I took above!
German #eat trip – checked!
Went to Blackforest today and trekked up Belchen Gipfel for approx 40 minutes and just enjoyed the breath-taking view all the way up. The track/trail was easy to climb so anyone could do it I’m sure.
And we thought, hey it’s summer so it should be sunny and hot. But no.. It was crazy windy, super cold and my fingers were freezing slowly.
You have the option of taking the cable car up and/or down so we decided to hike up and cable car down. (Cable car was €5.20 – 1 way.)
There were many other trekkers, and some with their dogs. As we climbed higher, the view got even more amazing – the mountains, the pine trees, the valley, a little village and a herd of sheep.
After a long hour climb, we arrived at the Belchen Gipfel summit and we knew we arrived when we saw the Summit Cross (photo).
A summit cross is usually erected to mark the top of a mountain or hill. A summit cross is usually 2-4 meter high, made of either wood or metal.
Trekkers usually pit stop here to rest after the hike and to ‘fuel up’. We had sandwich and nectarines.
Enjoyed my healthy (hiking) Sunday surrounded by such beautiful scenery. Blackforest is a must visit when you are here.
After dinner last night, we were surprised with an awesome dessert. Thanks to our German friend, Mathias – he made us Käsekuchen ie German cheesecake and I must say, it was really nice.
Ironically, this cheesecake has no cheese. Instead it was made of Quark (curd cheese/soft unripened cheese). The taste: Sweet but not so sweet so it’s good for health conscience people, soft so it’s easy to eat and to have extra slices if you wish to.
The only thing ‘not-quite-right’ about the photo above is that it was a little burnt! Mathias had it in the oven for too long – but thankfully, it still tastes good.
My German #eat trip – checked.
After the earlier German lesson on how to pronounce Lörrach, I’m better now!
I boarded the Bahn ICE high speed train from Frankfurt airport all the way to Basel and from there, switch over to another connecting train to get to Lörrach.
As I alighted at Basel, I attempted to ask someone to validate if I need to get onto Track 7.
This time… “Excuse me, which train gets to LO-ARCK?”
And she replied, “Lo-arck!?!, Track 7.”
Yay. Pronunciation passed!! (Feeling so local suddenly)
I will be spending my first couple of days staying with my friend at her place in Lörrach. When Mr. Immigration Officer asked where will I be putting up, I said “Lorak”. He went, “What???”
Didn’t want to sound rude nor like bargaining at the wet market, I decided to spell it out instead. “L-O-R-R-A-C-H”. And he replied, “Ah, Lo-Arkh”.
I must say, I find it almost impossible to even spell how to properly pronounce that word/name. And when he asked further where exactly will I be staying, I gave up and immediately showed him my Whatsapp conversation where I had her address in it.
Apart from answering his question on where I stay, how long will I be in Germany, he also asked for my return tickets.
So for those entering Germany, maybe good to just standby your email and e-tickets.
Things to declare: I brought a whole bunch of food items as a surprise gift for my friend – thinking probably she would have missed home flavours. From coffee to spices, sambal belacan to instant Bak Kut Teh – and as long as it’s not cheese and meat, they are all good to go!
That’s that. The process was seamless thereafter.
The very iconic headlamp Teddy Bear at Hamad International Airport, Doha.
Not quite sure why is the lamp cut into the brain.. But he sure caught many eyes and attention and selfies!
Just landed and now waiting for my connecting flight to Frankfurt. First time in Doha.
It’s 5.03am and of course, first thing to do is to hunt for coffee! To my surprise, Qatari Riyal (local currency) has exactly the same exchange rate as MYR. It makes it so easy for me – no mental calculation needed whatsoever 🙂
So for Malaysians traveling to Qatar, I guess life is easier buying stuff around here.
Flight in another 2 hours. Gonna sip my Latte now. Cheers.
