Raclette!

Last weekend we had a Raclette-Dinner!
Raclette is typical swiss dinner. You melt a side of a big piece of cheese and scrap it off on your dish. Then you eat the cheese with bread and vegetables. "Raclette" is from the french word "racler" and means to scrap something.

We love raclette but we make it a bit different. In Germany you can buy a little oven for the table with little eight till twelve pans and wooden scrapers. You can slide the pans into the oven and there is a heating element cooking your food and roasting stuff on the top plates.

The raclette is a very simple and creative dish. You can take everything you want in your pan and put some high fat cheese on top. Then you have to wait a few minutes and there comes out a wonderful dish out of the small oven!

My family used to have the raclette on New Years Eve and my sister and I also wanted it for christmas because we love it so much!

My cat smelling the grilled bacon and cheese...hihi

It's nice to have this dinner in the winter time when it's getting colder because when the oven is on the table cooking and roasting it get's soon very warm and cosy!

Here I have the wikipedia link in english and here in german if you want some more information.

Christina 

German Reunification

Today is the 22th birthday of the Federal Republic of Germany.
Since a couple of years I'm wondering why we Germans do not celebrate such a day as much as other countries do. Well I guess it's still because of our history. 
But: We Germans should be more proud because we reunified the country in peace!

source

So what happens at the 3rd of october in Germany?
It's an official holiday. There are flags in front of the civil services, agencies and other offices. On TV you can see several shows about the topic.

What does not happen at the 3rd of october?
We're not having dinner with the family just to celebrate reunification.
We are not decorating our homes in the colors of our flag and we don't have fireworks all over the country. Maybe just in the bigger cities.

Isn't that sad?! I think from now on I will have a big party on the 3rd of october! Why not also baking pies in the flag colors, decorating the home, having fireworks, wearing clothes and make up in black red and gold?

For more information in english click here, in german click here.

I wish you all Happy Reunification Day!
Christina

Quiche

I visited my parents today. My mother asked me to modify her t-shirt so I packed my whole stuff for sewing. 
She cooked a quiche and we drank "Federweißer" something between grape juice and white wine. It was a very delicious dinner.

There are other names for "Federweißer". It's also called "Bitzler" or "Neuer Wein" (new wine) and a lot more different names depending on where you are. You can read more here.
You can buy the new wine in bottles or -like we did- in a plastic canister. 
A quiche isn't quite a german dish but is close to the traditional onion cake you can buy/cook in autumn. So Federweißer and Zwiebelkuchen (onion cake) belongs together. 

Christina

Wurstmarkt

Last weekend Chris, two friends of ours and I went to the Wurstmarkt in Bad Dürkheim (fun times!). A must for us since we come from a wine-growing area. The Wurstmarkt or Worschdmarkt (which basically translates to sausage market/fair :) is actually the world's largest wine festival (at least that's what they state on their web page.) It takes place every year around the 2nd and 3rd weekend in September and it really became a tradition for us to go there (my parents used to take me there since I've been a little kiddy).

Chris and I enjoying our Weinschorle

Of course, the most important thing at a wine festival is .. yep, the wine. The main part of the Wurstmarkt, and the part where you get the good stuff (wine), are the so-called Schubkärchler, which comes from the german word for hand-barrow. In this part there are 36 tents where different vine dressers from our region sell their wine. You can decide if you want your wine pure or as spritzer. If you go for the spritzer, you get a 0,5 liter glass filled with three quarters wine and one quarter water. The special glasses are called Dubbeglas, because they have spots on them. Tradition has it that butchers from Bad Dürkheim invented the Dubbeglas in order to get a better grip on them, because normal smooth glasses would slip easily out of their greasy hands.

caramelized almonds, yummy!

 Aside from the (very good) wine you get at the Wurstmarkt there is also food food food! You get all the good stuff from sweet to spicy. And of course Wurst, all kinds of Bratwurst (even a half-a-meter Bratwurst!). In addition to that you find a whole lot of typical food from the Rhineland area where we're from. 

Lebkuchen hearts, ham sandwich, cotton candy and Brezel

All in all we had a super fun time, although it was crammed with people, Chris even got to talk to some nice Americans. Looking forward to next year.
And now, have some more picuters:

top right corner: The Dürkheimer Riesenfass, the biggest wine barrel in the world (what a coincidence). There's no wine inside, but a whole restaurant

My

North Sea (German Ocean)

I was at the North Sea coast with my friends in 2010. Here are some pics of our vacation. 

The beach of Römö. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rømø

The Pancake House at Föhr. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Föhr

Farmers market

It was farmers market this saturday. I drank my first new wine, something between grape juice and wine. Yummy!

"New Wine"

Artichoke

Yes, a padded badger next to sausages. I don't know why.... :D

Egg noodles

Fruit liqueur

Germans like painted pumpkins.

You also can buy several brushes and scrubbers.

Christina

Bad Dürkheim

I wanted to go to the flea market in Bad Dürkheim. I walked with my husband over the place but I didn't find anything pretty to make a photo of. It was just a normal german flea market with old stuff, most of the time ugly stuff.

So we decided to walk through Bad Dürkheim and I took some pictures. 

This shows a statue of a winemaker with a basket on his back at the grape harvest.

Bad Dürkheim is a city on the Germany Wine Route.

This is the park next to the hotels.

At the "Römerplatz" (Roman Place)

I was surprised to see this little one! I thought parkometers were "extinct"!

Myriam, our friends and myself will go to Bad Dürkheim next weekend because then there is the biggest wine festival in the world. Of course we will make some pics for you.

Christina