My First Trip to Europe - The Food & Drink Post

 

There were lovely tours during the trip, but I was really in it for the food, beer, and wine.

The food in London was unimpressive largely because we had few chances to seek it out on our own. The dinner we were provided at a hotel on the first night was just not good: hamburgers or fish and chips. The fish was bland and not at all crisp, and the burger was merely okay. I did manage to get good fish and chips at a pub in Trafalgar Square, though. Breakfast provided by our hotel was also much better.

Our hotel also had a nice bar, and I discovered that the Gordon's Gin in England is NOT the Gordon's that we have in the United States. Theirs is much better, and I really wish we could get their little canned gin & tonics.

France was also a situation where we had limited opportunities to sample the local cuisine, but where we could it was usually good. We did have dinner at a French restaurant provided one night by the tour, but that was planned to be acceptable to a bunch of teenagers, so it was a quiche with a green bean salad. I think the quiche would have been better if it wasn't still cold in the middle.

Bistro food in Paris is great. Four Saisons in Montmartes served me a delightful tagliatelle bolognaise, and the cafe down the street from the Eiffel Tower served the first escargot that I have ever truly enjoyed. As a side note, I have a picture of our check from the bistro in the Louvre. I find it amusing that Lavender's soda cost four times as much as my glass of wine.

Switzerland provided some opportunities to try new things. Bistro Gornergat-Dorf introduced me to röstis, which I have mentioned before. It's a simple idea by very satisfying. We also got sorbets for dessert. I got the Sorbet Princessie, which seems to be lemon served with a little glass of Prosecco, while Lavender got the Sorbet Framboise, which came with a little shot of strawberry schnapps.

In Crans Montana, we tried a restaurant called Le Mayen, where Lavender got some fondue and I tried Beef Tartare for the first time. When you order Beef Tartare, they ask how spicy you would like it (I asked for medium), then they bring you a little spoon of it so you can check whether the spiciness is right before bringing the whole dish. Nice concept, although I was a little confused at first.

Fondue is also serious business in Switzerland, as indicated by this endcap in one of the local grocery stores.

Most of our meals in Röthenburg were provided by the tour, but we did have lunch in town one day at Reichs Kúchenmeister, and when I saw wild game goulash on the menu, I knew what I was having. I also got an Italicus Spritz while we were waiting for lunch, and that's definitely a discovery I brought home.

Hopefully the teenagers didn't discover that there are vending machines in Germany that you can buy wine or beer from.

Finally, we did need to run by a grocery store in Röthenburg for some things, so we walked to a nearby Lidl, which is much like an Aldi (not the same company, though). Out of curiosity, I checked the adult beverages aisle. This picture isn't anywhere near all of it. Why can't we have nice things in the US?

My First Trip to Europe - Austria

 (6/18) On Tuesday we traveled to Bad Hofgastein, Austria by way of Dachau. Yes, we visited the concentration camp. I don't have many pictures. It's a somber place to visit. It reminds you of how awful people can be and makes the statements and actions of many modern politicians disturbingly ominous.

I actually have relatively little in the way of activities and photos for Austria itself. Bad Hofgastein is beautiful, and I got to walk around it a bit, but we didn't go into Salzburg for the Mozart and "The Sound of Music" tours that the kids went on. In fact, on Thursday we went to see a doctor in Bad Hofgastein to see if we could do something about Lavender's persistent cough. The hotel staff directed us to Dr. Fischer, who managed to fit us into her schedule on short notice. She diagnosed Lavender with a bacterial infection and prescribed antibiotics and some other things, which we picked up at an "apothekare" in town. The doctor visit and medications were both easily affordable, so yay for EU healthcare.

I do have a few pictures from my wanderings, the concerts in town, and the last dinner in a beer hall in Bad Hofgastein.

Friday morning, we scrambled into buses to get to the airport in Munich for the trip home.

But there is a food and drink blog entry.

My First Trip to Europe - Röthenburg

(6/16) Röthenburg originated in the 12th century CE, but it really came into its own in the 13th century. It's a walled city on a major trade route, and many of the buildings inside the walls are very old. Some members of our tour group got to stay in hotels inside the walls, but we ended up in one just outside the walls.

(6/17) We had a few errands to run that took us to places outside the walls, and even the surrounding city is picturesque.

Later we had time to walk around Röthenburg (inside the walls) and have lunch before choir concert time in St. James Cathedral. I had the Wildgulasch at Reichs Kúchenmeister.

After the choir sang in the church, the orchestra played in the town square.

After the concert we had time for dinner before taking the Night Watchman tour of Röthenburg.

In the morning, we venture on to Austria.

My First Trip to Europe - Switzerland

(6/13) We left Paris by coach for a drive to Crans Montana, Switzerland. One thing you can count on in Europe: if there's a hill near any sort of civilization, someone probably built a fortress on it at some point. In fact, as you get into the mountains, any slope of less than 45 degrees probably has a small town or farm or resort or something on it. Steeper slopes are likely to have vineyards.

Crans Montana is a ski resort town, so we were definitely there in the off season. Even so, there were plenty of people around.

 

Swiss hotels are funny about keys. For starters, you're likely to get a good old metal key that turns in a lock instead of a magnetic key card. They also expect you to leave that key at the hotel desk whenever you leave the hotel. Sounds kind of crazy from a security perspective, but I guess it works for them, and no one in the tour group reported anything missing from their room.

(6/14) Friday we traveled to Zermatt via coach and train. Zermatt is a larger ski resort town, but this one has an inclined train up to Sunnega station, where you can get a view of the Matterhorn if the weather cooperates. It didn't cooperate much, but the views are still great.

We had lunch at Bistro Gornergrat-Dorf in Zermatt, where I learned about röstis, which are kind of like hash browns with an assortment of topping options. This is some serious comfort food that I shall have to reproduce, which should be easy, since hash browns are plentiful here. We had sorbets for dessert, and sorbets here come with a little shot.

(6/15) Saturday we took our coaches into Montreux, on the shore of Lake Geneva (Lac Léman). Our first stop in Montreux was Chateau de Chillon. Afterward we looked around town a bit, saw the statue of Freddy Mercury, and had some gelato before heading back to Crans Montana for concerts.

Crans Montana was another town where everyone was very kind to us, especially the nice lady who noticed that Lavender was coughing (turns out it was walking pneumonia) and insisted on getting her tea, Vick's, and locally made cough drops. It turns out that by Unit 20 of Duolingo, you can be surprisingly functional in French.

Next day, Germany.