Rising exchange rates don’t have to put you in the red when traveling in Italy. With record high Euro exchange rates, travelers can stretch their dollar when dining by trying some new dining options.
Eating is a pure pleasure for Italians and visiting guests. Italians take their meals very seriously and a full 3-5 course dinner in a fancy ristaurante can eat into a travel budget quickly. In order to stretch a budget, try these simple tips.
Breakfast is often included in a hotel’s room package. If it is not, follow the locals to a neighborhood bar for your morning coffee and pastry. A bar in Italy is not a place to consume alcohol and dance the night away. They are fancy little candy box establishments, found on nearly every corner. Italian bars are the place where patrons socialize over their morning coffee (sometimes several times each morning), return for a light lunch, and arrive again in the evening for an apertivo or cocktail before dinner.
Bars in busier cities, especially those in tourist areas, traditionally charge one price to stand at the counter (al banco) or a higher price to sit at one of their café-style tables (al tavolo). If you want to sit and enjoy the view, then the price is usually worth it. A coffee that might cost 1.50 Euro at the counter could cost twice as much to sit at a table. During the late morning/afternoon and evening hours, service at a table traditionally includes some salty snacks like potato chips or nuts, even olives, with your beverage.
If you choose to stand at the counter, patrons traditionally pay the cashier, and then present their receipt to the barista who will complete the coffee order.
Most bars have a tasty selection of pizza and panini.
ITALIAN COFFEE Italians consume a variety of coffee drinks throughout the day. Most will start the day with a cappuccino which is a shot of espresso served in a large cup with steamed milk and topped with frothy milk foam. Most Italians will not drink cappuccino after mid morning but switch to other coffee drinks. Of course, they’re happy to accommodate tourist requests for cappuccino at any time of the day.
Later in the morning, and throughout the day and into the evening, Italians consume what they call caffe which is espresso, or a small cup of very strong coffee topped with a delicious caramel colored foam called crema. This coffee is rich and strong, and usually sweetened with sugar. Espresso is the basis for most Italian coffee drinks.
If you want a weaker version of coffee that resembles what Americans drink, order a caffe Americano which is a shot of espresso with steamed hot water in a larger cup. This is also called caffe lungo.
If you want to be more adventurous, order a caffe corretto which is espresso corrected with a shot of liquor like grappa, cognac or flavored liquor. Nothing warms your heart faster or settles a full stomach.
EATING AT BARS Besides serving fantastic coffee throughout the day, an Italian bar usually offers a selection of sandwiches called pannini. These can make an affordable option for lunch or dinner. Some bars also offer a limited selection of pre-made one dish meals, like pasta or vegetables. These establishments are referred to as tavolo caldo. A simple one-course meal with a mineral water aqua minerale or a house wine (vino della casa) is an exceptional value for the traveler.
APERTIVO AND ANTIPASTO FOR DINNER Italians traditionally dine relatively late (8-9 p.m.) for dinner. After a long day of touring, visitors might opt for a lighter, less expensive option for dinner. Many of the local bars offer light snacks to entice cocktail business. Some wine bars also offer a variety of little sandwiches, potato croquettes and grilled vegetables either complementary or for a very reasonable price.
In Venice in particular, this selection of snacks is referred to as Cichetti. Combined with a spritz (cocktail made from Campari and Prosecco) or a great glass of local wine, these light snacks can make for a satisfying dinner.
Each region of Italy offers regional food fares, typical for that area. The Cichetti in Venice may include such items as marinated sardines, Bacala which is a salt fish cod spread for bread or polenta and deep friend calamari. Antipasto offerings in Tuscany may be a selection of salamis, cheeses and olives.
In Rome, the antipasto might be crusty bread with tomato, herb and olive oil topping called Buschetta or a sampling of small slices of freshly-made pizza.
Whatever, the region, the food is delicious, fresh and attractively prepared. Even the simple selections from a bar will satisfy your hunger and your quest for a delicious yet affordable meal.
Two famous Swiss Christmas cookies: on the left are the Mailänderli, on the right, Spitzbuebli. Both will be devoured throughout Switzerland this season. Courtesy Swissmilk.ch/Ursula Beamish
by Sharon Hudgins
Christmas is my favorite holiday season in Europe. Advent, the period leading up to Christmas itself, begins on November 30 or on the fourth Sunday before Christmas, whichever comes first on the calendar. And in most places, the Christmas season doesn’t end until six weeks later, on January 6, known as Three Kings Day (or Epiphany).
Special foods are prepared and eaten at this time of year, some of them with roots in Europe’s pre-Christian past. During the cold, dark days leading up to the winter solstice (December 21 or 22) and Christmas (December 25), people have a natural craving for caloric cookies, cakes, and confections to tide them over until warmer, sunnier weather arrives. Yet not so long ago, Advent was a time of fasting for members of the Catholic Church, which forbade the consumption of butter, eggs, and other animal products during this holy period, in solemn preparation for the coming of the Christ Child.
Today, only a few people still deny themselves such temptations during the days leading up to Christmas. In many parts of northern Europe the annual Christmas baking binge begins as early as October, when home cooks make hundreds of cookies and dozens of cakes and puddings whose flavors are better if they “ripen” for several weeks before serving. Commercial bakers and confectioners hire extra help to produce thousands of holiday sweets for this most lucrative quarter of their business year. And colorful open-air Christmas markets in large cities and small towns sell the seasonal specialties of their own particular region.
Bakers in the British Isles start making their Christmas puddings several weeks or even months in advance of the special December day. Old-fashioned Christmas Plum Pudding—originally made with mutton, beefsteak, and fruits, including plums—has morphed in modern times into a dense, rich, dessert full of currants, raisins, and sultanas, with mixed fruit peel and candied cherries, steamed in a covered bowl and served with a brandy hard sauce made from sugar, butter, and brandy beaten together until fluffy. A sixpence coin is cooked inside the pudding, which supposedly brings good fortune to whoever finds it in his or her serving.
Also popular in Britain are a variety of fruit cakes, sometimes covered with a layer of marzipan and decorated with marzipan “fruits” and sprigs of holly—and small mince pies, their pasty cases filled with a fruity mincemeat mixture of apples, raisins, currants, sultanas, almonds, beef suet, brown sugar, and several spices. In earlier times, the oval shape of these mince pies was said to represent Christ’s crib, with the spices symbolizing the gifts from the East that the Three Kings brought to Bethlehem.
In Scotland, slices of densely textured Dundee Cake, filled with dried and candied fruits and decorated with almond halves on top, are served on “Boxing Day” (December 26). Buttery Scottish shortbread, taken with a dram of Scotch whisky, is traditional for the New Year. And in Ireland the holiday season is the time for loaves of fruit-and-nut-filled breads, as well as several kinds of round or oblong puddings made from wheat or potato doughs, sugar, spices, and dried fruits, wrapped in a cloth and boiled in a big cooking pot.
In the Scandinavian countries the Christmas season begins on St. Lucia’s Day (December 13), which is celebrated with coiled yeast buns colored with saffron. You’ll also find a number of yeast-raised Christmas breads (Julekaka, Julekage) made with plenty of butter and eggs, filled with raisins, nuts, and candied fruits, and seasoned with cardamom. Norwegian Almond Ring Cake (Kransekake) is a tower of baked almond-paste rings, the largest on the bottom and the smallest on the top, fancily decorated with white icing. Crispy molasses-spice cookies called pepparkakor are popular throughout Scandinavia, where they’re made in many holiday shapes and sometimes hung as ornaments on the branches of a special “pepparkakor tree” made of wooden dowels. And a traditional Christmas Eve dessert is rice pudding, with a whole almond hidden inside. Whoever finds the almond will be married before the next Christmas (in Sweden) or will have a series of lucky adventures throughout the coming year (in Denmark).
The Netherlands, Belgium, and northern Germany are home to crispy brown Christmas cookies known as Speculaas or Spekulatius, the dough spiked with ginger or black pepper and pressed into special wooden molds that outline the cookies’ shapes and imprint designs on them. Cookies in the form of windmills and little sailor boys are especially popular. And throughout all of Germany, the Christmas season seems to bring out the best in home bakers, whose kitchens are filled with the aromas of sugar, yeast, spices, nuts, and candied fruits combined in myriad ways to produce some of Europe’s best-known holiday treats.
German gingerbread cookies (Lebkuchen) have been famous throughout Central Europe since the Middle Ages, especially those from the city of Nürnberg. The stiff dough made of rye or wheat flour, honey, almonds, hazelnuts, finely chopped candied fruit peel, and spices—ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, allspice, cardamom, and coriander—is pressed into wooden molds that imprint intricate designs on the cookies. Other Lebkuchen cookies are made in simple shapes—circles, hearts, squares—and decorated with white or chocolate icing. No German Christmas season would be complete without plenty of Lebkuchen to nibble on during the entire six weeks from Advent to Epiphany.
Other traditional German Christmas sweets include flat, white, anise-flavored cookies (Springerle), made with pretty designs printed on them with wooden molds; spicy, round “pepper nuts” (Pfeffernüsse) containing ginger or black pepper; six-pointed “cinnamon stars” (Zimtsterne), redolent of that spice and covered with thick white icing; marzipan confections made of sweetened almond paste, shaped and colored to resemble tiny fruits, vegetables, animals, and other figures; Stollen, an oblong fruit-nut-raisin bread covered with a thick layer of confectioners’ sugar and said to represent the Christ Child in swaddling clothes; and Striezel, a braided bread whose three strands of dough symbolize the Holy Trinity.
Holiday treats very similar to these can be found throughout Switzerland, Austria, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, and Ukraine. Many Poles and Ukrainians also begin their Christmas Eve dinner with kutia, an ancient kind of pudding made with whole wheat grains boiled with honey, figs, dates, raisins, nuts, lemon peel, and poppy seeds. And they conclude the meal with a sweet compote containing twelve kinds of dried fruits, symbolizing the Twelve Apostles. In Hungary, poppy-seed rolls and cakes are popular at this time of year, harking back to the pre-Christian era when the tiny seeds were eaten as a fertility charm on the night of the winter solstice to ensure a bountiful harvest in the coming year.
Christmas traditions are a bit different in the Latin lands. In France, especially in the south, it’s customary to have thirteen desserts for the Christmas Eve dinner that follows Midnight Mass—including fruits, nuts, dates, marzipan, nougat, and always a “Jule log cake” (Bûche de Noël), a long cylindrical cake rolled up around a buttercream filling and decorated on the outside with chocolate icing swirled to look like tree bark, with marzipan “leaves” and meringue “mushrooms” attached to the log-shaped cake. The French end the Christmas season with the celebration of Three Kings Day (January 6), when they eat a special “kings’ cake” (galette des Rois), a round, somewhat flat, golden-colored cake made of puff pastry, often enriched with an almond-paste filling, which has a single bean or a porcelain or plastic good-luck charm baked into it. Whoever finds the charm in his or her piece of cake becomes king for the day and gets to wear the gold-foil crown that was perched atop the cake when it was served.
In Italy, bakers turn out a number of yeasty Christmas breads (pane di Natale), full of butter, eggs, nuts, raisins, and dried and candied fruits. Particularly popular throughout the country is panettone from Milan, a tall, delicate, dome-shaped yeast bread studded with raisins, almonds, and candied orange peel. The northern Italians like their own Alpine fruit bread (Zelten), another yeast-raised bread chock full of dates, sultanas, candied citron, almonds, walnuts, and pine nuts, scented with cinnamon and cloves. The Italian sweet tooth finds satisfaction in all the confections traditionally eaten during the Christmas season, too, including chewy almond nougat (torrone) and marzipan; candied orange halves, candied pumpkin slices, and candied whole chestnuts; and medieval panforte from Siena, a flat, dense, highly spiced, confection-like fruit-and-nut cake containing almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, pine nuts, honey, candied fruit peel, cinnamon, cloves, white pepper, and coriander seeds. And on Three Kings Day the Italians eat puff pastries filled with apricot preserves, as well as a type of sweet focaccia (flat bread) with a single black bean baked inside for the lucky eater who finds it and gets to be “king for the day.”
The Christmas season in Spain is a time for consuming large quantities of the confections for which the country is famous: marzipan from Toledo, often formed in fanciful shapes and sometimes decorated with white icing and colorful candied fruits; almond nougat (turrón), the hard variety from Alicante and the soft version from Jijona, as well as numerous other types of turrón containing hazelnuts, pine nuts, coconut, and chocolate; candied chestnuts; sugar-coated almonds; candied fruits and dried dates; the rich chocolates for which Spain is gaining an international reputation; and “fig bread” (pan de higos), a thick, chewy confection of dried figs, hazelnuts, almonds, and sesame seeds, flavored with grated orange peel and anise liquor.
The special meal on Christmas Eve in Spain often concludes with a sweet soup made of ground almonds, walnuts, or chestnuts, sprinkled with cinnamon. But for children the main event of the holiday season is Three Kings Day, when they receive gifts from the Magi who carried presents to the baby Jesus. As in other Latin countries, the traditional sweet is Three Kings Cake (Roscón de Reyes), a ring-shaped cake studded with raisins, nuts, and candied fruit, and with a coin, a bean, or a small toy baked into it—the lucky charm for the finder, who then gets to wear a king’s paper crown for the rest of the day.
The holiday season in Greece is also a time for indulging in sweets: pencil-thin bread-dough fritters fried in olive oil and drizzled with honey; coiled flaky baklava filled with ground almonds and roasted chick peas; spice cookies made with cinnamon, cloves, and olive oil, then soaked in a sweet syrup; delicate ground-almond cookies (kourabiedes) covered with a thick coating of confectioners’ sugar and with a whole clove baked inside to symbolize the spices that the Three Kings brought to the Christ Child.
Many kinds of special Christmas breads (Christópsomo) are baked in Greece during this season, too. Depending on each family’s own traditions, the Christmas bread might contain walnuts, almonds, raisins, dried figs, lemon or orange zest, cinnamon, cloves, coriander seeds, black pepper, and aniseeds. The shapes of these breads vary according to family preferences, too, as do the decorations on top, which range from symbolic shapes made of dough to sugar glazes and garnishes of chopped candied fruits. After the midnight church service on Christmas Eve, the family and guests gather around the table to share the Christmas bread. The first piece is set aside for Christ, and the rest is distributed among the diners, one of whom will find a coin baked into the bread, bringing that person the blessing of good luck. And on New Year’s Eve, the Greeks share another special bread called Vasilópita (St. Basil’s Bread), a yeast bread flavored with aniseeds or mahlepi seeds, honey, olive oil, and grated orange zest, sprinkled on top with sesame seeds and often decorated with the number of the new year made out of dough. The head of the household breaks the bread at the last stroke of midnight, giving a piece to each person at the table—and whoever finds the coin baked inside will have good fortune throughout the year.
Now that global warming seems to be raising temperatures in Europe, you can beat the heat on your next summer trip by eating cold soup. That’s right. If the thought of eating a chilled soup leaves you cold, think again. Chilled soups have been popular in Europe for centuries, from Scandinavia in the north to Spain in the south. Why not try them yourself?
Some of these soups are made with fruits and berries, often combined with milk products. Others are based on vegetables and meat stocks, sometimes spiked with wine. They can be cooked or uncooked, thick or thin, smooth or chunky, sweet or savory, plain or garnished.
Most cold soups are eaten at the start of a meal, but in elaborate dinners they are sometimes served as palate cleansers between courses. In various parts of Europe, chilled soups are also eaten for breakfast, for snacks, as a main dish of a light meal and even for dessert. Some cold soups are considered solely summer fare, whereas others are served year round.
The next time you travel in Europe, look for these classic chilled soups, some of which are regional or national specialties.
SCANDINAVIA The Scandinavians have a large repertoire of colorful cold soups made from fruits and berries (fresh or dried, bottled or frozen). The bounty of summer’s harvest turns up in many Scandinavian soup bowls: apples, cherries, apricots, plums, peaches and pears; blueberries, cranberries, raspberries, lingonberries, strawberries, blackberries, gooseberries, currants and raisins; and even other ingredients such as rhubarb and rosehips. Often these are combined with buttermilk, soured milk, yoghurt or sour cream, with a little lemon juice, sugar and cinnamon added, too.
Uncooked cold soups of this type are made simply by mixing the fruits and berries with the liquid and other flavorings, which are mashed together or puréed in a blender or food processor (much like a fruit smoothie). Cooked cold soups start with heating the ingredients together, then thickening them with flour, potato starch, cornstarch, arrowroot, sago, tapioca, semolina, ground rice or beaten eggs, before the soup is chilled for serving. Often these cold soups are garnished with a dollop of whipped cream or with heavy cream poured over the top.
The Danes make a cold buttermilk soup, which can be cooked or uncooked, seasoned with sugar and lemon juice and thickened with eggs or ground rice. Sometimes this pale-colored soup is poured over crumbled oatcakes in a bowl, topped with whipped cream and served at the end of a meal.
Surely the most famous Danish cold soup is rødgrød—literally “red groats”—a kind of thin pudding made from red fruits and berries (cherries, red raspberries, strawberries, red currants) cooked together, lightly thickened, then served cold, garnished with milk or cream. Occasionally blueberries, blackberries and black currants are added, which give the mixture a deeper, darker color. Considered a “national dish” of Denmark, this chilled pudding-soup is actually very popular throughout the Nordic countries, where you’ll find it on the table for breakfast, served as a soup before the meat course of the day’s main meal, or eaten as a summer dessert.
GERMANY & AUSTRIA Rote Grütze is the German version of this same dish. It’s considered a specialty from the northern part of Germany, particularly the region of Schleswig-Holstein (near Denmark), where it’s known as Rodgrütt. You’ll now find Rote Grütze served throughout Germany, especially in the summer, from hotel breakfast buffets to the dessert menus of fancy restaurants, from beer halls to local festivals—the ruby-red mélange is topped with vanilla sauce, whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.
In the German language, cold soups in general are called Kaltschalen (“cold bowls”). Germans and Austrians both enjoy a variety of cold fruit-and-berry soups, at the beginning or end of a meal, as much as their northern neighbors do. Germans also make a chilled beer soup with currants and grated pumpernickel bread, seasoned with lemon, sugar, cinnamon and cloves, and garnished with pumpernickel croutons or little airy egg-white dumplings; cold spiced red or white wine soup, adorned with crunchy almond macaroons; a refreshing buttermilk soup embellished with stewed fruit or whipped cream; and a pale-green sorrel soup containing dill, sour cream, diced cucumbers and chopped hard-boiled eggs, served with an ice cube in each bowl.
The Austrians have their own versions of cold wine soups, such as lemon soup with sugar, egg yolks and white wine, sprinkled with a dusting of ground cloves, and a rich beef consommé (clarified meat stock) spiked with dry white wine, with a thin slice of orange and some finely chopped parsley floating on top. Austrian cold tomato soup combines white wine with a purée of tomatoes and onions cooked in beef stock, spiced with garlic and paprika, and with finely chopped cucumbers stirred into the soup just before serving.
The Austrians also like lightly gelled cold consommés enhanced with chilled green grapes, diced ham and minced herbs (parsley, chives, chervil, tarragon). And the unusual Austrian Kalte Paradeissuppe (Cold Paradise Soup) consists of chilled cantaloupe, cucumber and melon balls in a shallow soup plate surrounded by a cold purée of tomatoes and sour cream with strips of cooked ham, decorated with chopped parsley and mint—a combination worthy of being labeled “Baroque.”
POLAND, UKRAINE & BELARUS Cold soups are as prevalent in Eastern Europe as in the central and northern parts of the continent. Poland in particular has a rich heritage of chilled soups based on a variety of fruits, berries and vegetables mixed with meat stocks, dairy products and pickled or fermented foods that give a slightly sour taste to some of these soups.
Sweet soups include pear and buttermilk with cloves and lemon rind, as well as soups made of strawberries, gooseberries, blueberries, apples and plums, sometimes partnered with rhubarb, scented with cinnamon or vanilla and garnished with fried bread croutons or little puff-pastry pellets. The Poles also make Zupa Nic (Nothing Soup), a sweet, ice-cold, custardy concoction, with frothy egg-white dumplings, much like the French dessert, Oeufs à la Neige (Snow Eggs).
Polish cold savory soups are often based on cooked or raw vegetables mixed with a sour liquid. In addition to several cold versions of barszcz (borshch) made with red beets and garnished with sour cream, the Poles make beet and buttermilk soup poured over hard-boiled egg slices; buttermilk and pickle brine soup; cold cucumber soup with soured milk, dill pickles, and hard-boiled egg quarters; and a creamy green cold soup of soured milk and buttermilk with sorrel, dill pickles, green onions, parsley, chives, dill weed, garlic and hard-boiled eggs.
Borshch, served hot or cold, is the national dish of Ukraine, where you’ll find as many versions as cooks who prepare it. Usually based on beets, which give it a bright red color, borshch can also contain potatoes, onions, carrots, cabbage, peppers, cucumbers, radishes, dill, garlic, meat stock, buttermilk or sour cream, pickle brine or sauerkraut juice, hard-boiled eggs, chopped beef or ham and even crayfish or shrimp. You name it, and the Ukrainians are likely to throw it into the soup pot. And in the summer they’ll often serve it chilled.
Sweetened fruit soups are popular in Ukraine and Belarus, too. On hot summer days, a light meal in these countries might consist of a bowl of cold fruit soup or chilled borshch, accompanied by a fresh vegetable salad or a fruit compote.
HUNGARY & ROMANIA Hungarians love cold fruit soups. You’ll find chilled cherry soup on many Hungarian restaurant menus—a pretty pink soup made with tart Morello cherries, flavored with red or white wine, sugar, cinnamon and lemon, with a dash of sour cream or a dollop of whipped cream as a final flourish. Cold raspberry and strawberry soups are also popular, as is the simple but elegant fruit soup composed of puréed peaches and peach seeds, sugar, sparkling wine and Hungarian Riesling wine. Hungarian chilled vegetable soups include beet soups similar to Slavic borshch and a creamy yellow squash soup seasoned with dill.
Romanian fruit and berry soups range from apple, apricot, cherry and plum, to gooseberry and red currant. Some are sweet and creamy, garnished with puffs of sweet meringue and sliced nuts. Others are slightly sour, from lemon juice or soured milk products, and some even contain chopped or slivered smoked meats. The Romanians also make a cold vegetable soup containing cucumbers, carrots, onions, celeriac, veal stock, sour cream and dill.
FRANCE Surely the most famous “French” cold soup is Vichyssoise—the classic potato and leek cream soup—which was actually created in New York by a French chef, Louis Diat, in the early 20th century. But the French can claim plenty of cold soups on their home soil, from seafood bisques to Crème Cyrano Froid, a cold chicken soup thickened with eggs and seasoned with mustard, tarragon and cayenne pepper, along with pieces of finely diced chicken or ham, all lightened by whipped cream folded into the mixture.
Other cold and creamy French soups include such flavors as broccoli, asparagus, cucumber with tarragon or mint, tomato with garlic and dill, carrot with cayenne, pumpkin with ginger and nutmeg, and green pea with diced chicken or turkey. These are often served in a bowl placed on a bed of crushed ice to keep the soup chilled while you eat.
In summer the French have a penchant for chilled consommés with pieces of cooked meats or vegetables suspended in the slightly gelatinous stock. They also make a lovely cold sorrel soup seasoned with garlic and lemon juice, mixed with heavy cream, chopped hard-boiled eggs, and thin slices of cucumber, then poured over diced black bread for serving.
SPAIN Gazpacho is the king of cold soups in Spain. A regional specialty from Andalucía, in southern Spain, gazpacho can now be found on tourist menus all over the country, especially in the summer. The most common kind of gazpacho is a reddish-colored purée of tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, bell peppers, white bread, garlic, olive oil and wine vinegar. Served at the beginning of a meal, this type of gazpacho is often garnished with fried croutons and diced raw onions, cucumbers and peppers.
Before tomatoes and peppers arrived in Spain from the Western hemisphere 500 years ago, Andalucían gazpacho was simple peasant fare, made with the cheapest ingredients—only bread, water, salt, garlic, olive oil and vinegar or lemon juice—mashed together in a wooden bowl and eaten as the midday meal by farm workers in the fields. Today you’ll find many kinds of gazpachos in Spain: red, white, green and yellow, thick or thin, containing a wide range of ingredients from fruits and nuts to eggs, fish, meat and milk.
Salmorejo is a version of red, tomato-based gazpacho from Córdoba, where chopped hard-boiled eggs, canned tuna and strips of Spanish serrano ham are added to the cold mélange. Córdoban cooks also concoct a chilled white gazpacho made with almonds and sometimes pine nuts. Granada and Málaga both claim ajo blanco, a smooth white garlic and almond gazpacho garnished with green grapes. And Spanish gazpachuelo frio is another chilled white soup, prepared from thick homemade mayonnaise whisked with plenty of ice water before chopped red tomatoes and black olives are stirred in.
SOUTHERN & SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE Given the torrid summers in southern Europe, it’s surprising that Italy, Greece and parts of the Balkans don’t have a tradition of many chilled soups in their regional or national cuisines. The Italians do have a minestrone freddo alla milanese, a rice and vegetable soup from Milan, garnished with basil leaves and grated cheese. But even that soup is eaten only at room temperature, not chilled.
Greeks cool off with tzatziki soupa, cold cucumber and yoghurt soup blended with lemon juice, olive oil, garlic and fresh mint. And around Thessaloniki, Greeks eat a sweet cherry soup made with dry white wine, heavy cream, cherry liqueur and cinnamon—much like the fruit soups favored in many northern European countries.
Tarator is a classic Bulgarian cold cucumber-and-yoghurt soup, very similar to the version eaten in Greece. But Bulgarian tarator is enriched with a paste of pounded walnuts, garlic, salt and olive oil swirled into it, often with chopped walnuts or dill sprinkled over the top. Bulgarians make other chilled soups from yoghurt combined with zucchini, sorrel, mushrooms and fresh herbs (especially dill). Cold tomato soups can sometimes be found in the Balkans, too. And on Christmas Eve the Bulgarians even serve a cold soup made of sauerkraut and sauerkraut juice, chopped leeks, onions and paprika, accompanied by a bowl of grilled hot peppers!
Many people travel to Hungary for the architectural treasures, historical sites, and cultural life of Budapest, the cosmopolitan capital. Some venture farther into the wine country of Tokaj and Lake Balaton. Others float down the Danube on leisurely boat cruises.
But I go for the food.
And what would Hungarian food be without paprika, the red spice so characteristic of Hungarian cooking?
Paprika is an essential ingredient in Hungarian goulash
PAPRIKA PAST
Although many Hungarian dishes use paprika as an ingredient, this colorful, flavorful spice is actually a relative newcomer to Hungarian cuisine. Pepper cultivation was established in Hungary during the Turkish occupation of that country in the 16th and 17th centuries. But it wasn’t until the late 18th century that paprika gained widespread acceptance as a spice in Hungarian foods. Formerly found only in peasant dishes, it gradually entered the culinary repertoire of the gentry and the nobility, dispersing throughout all levels of society so thoroughly that today it would be hard to imagine Hungarian cooking without paprika.
PICK A PEPPER
Many different kinds of peppers are cultivated in Hungary, including those grown specifically to be dried and ground into paprika. These include several kinds of long red peppers commonly used for making the milder paprikas, and small round red “cherry peppers” used for some of the hotter varieties of the spice.
After being picked, the peppers are left to rest for two to three weeks, to let their flavor and color develop even further. Then they’re washed, dried, and ground into a powder. Paprika is now such an important cash crop that the locals even call it “Red Gold.”
Before the Industrial Revolution, farmers would string all their ripe peppers by hand, hang them up in a protected place to dry, and then complete the drying process in large earthenware ovens. The dried peppers were crushed underfoot, then ground into a fine powder by hand, using a huge mortar with a large pestle. Water mills, windmills and steam engines eventually replaced the hand method for grinding paprika. And today modern automatic machines wash, dry, crush, sort and grind the peppers all in one continuous process.
PAPRIKA PLACES
Much of Hungary’s paprika comes from the fields and factories around the small town of Kalocsa, near the Danube River, and the larger industrial city of Szeged, on the Tisza River, both located on the country’s Southern Great Plain. These two centers of paprika production have just the right combination of soil characteristics, temperature, rainfall and sunshine necessary to cultivate the pepper plants successfully. Harvesting starts at the end of the first week in September and lasts for about a month, depending on weather conditions.
For three to four weeks every autumn, more than 8,000 acres of fields around Kalocsa are filled with farm workers picking bright red peppers and stacking them in small wooden crates or big plastic mesh bags. In the town itself, strings of shiny red peppers hang from balconies, porches, and eaves, like colorful ribbons on a peasant girl’s costume. And on some of the houses, long cylindrical mesh bags full of peppers are suspended from the eaves like giant sausages.
During September the entire town, its population swelled by busloads of tourists, celebrates the pepper harvest with a paprika festival called “Kalocsa Paprika Days,” featuring exhibitions of food products, a variety of sports competitions and a cooking contest (with paprika as an ingredient, of course). The highlight of the festival is the Paprika Harvest Parade, complete with local bands and colorful folk-dancing groups, followed that evening by a Paprika Harvest Ball.
Regardless of the time of year, however, the visitor is never far removed from paprika in Kalocsa. In addition to its pepper fields and commercial paprika factories, Kalocsa has a Paprika Street and a Paprika Museum. Strings of dried peppers festoon store windows and roadside stands. Souvenir shops are filled with folk-art gifts adorned with images of bright red peppers, including hand-painted eggs, decorated dishware and embroidered linens. And walls of houses and restaurants are painted with murals depicting traditional floral motifs, often with red peppers incorporated into the design. A sleepy little town that was once just an agricultural center has become a tourist mecca, especially at harvest time, attracting travelers from all over Europe and beyond.
The much larger city of Szeged also has a paprika museum, as well as a pepper-and-paprika festival in early September.
Hungarian women in traditional folk costumes from Kalocsa
TYPES OF HUNGARIAN PAPRIKA
The Hungarians produce a range of paprikas from mild to very hot—although the milder versions are used most often in Hungarian dishes. Contrary to popular belief, the brightest red paprika powders are the mildest and sweetest in taste, whereas the pale-red and light-brown colored paprikas are usually the hottest.
Heat levels range from édes (sweet, mild) to félédes (semi-sweet, medium-hot) to erös (hot). Füszer on the package just means “spice,” and orlemeny means “powder.” What’s important is the type of paprika you choose.
Különleges (Special): The brightest red paprika of all, with a good aroma and very mild, sweet flavor.
Édesnemes (Noble Sweet): Bright red in color but with only a mildly spicy flavor. Most of the paprika exported to the rest of the world is this type.
Csípmentes Csemege (Delicate): Mild-tasting, richly flavored, light- to bright-red paprika.
Csemege (Exquisite Delicate): Similar in color and aroma to “Delicate,” but with a slightly spicier taste.
Csípös Csmege (Pungent Exquisite Delicate): Similar in color and aroma to Delicate and Exquisite Delicate, but a bit spicier in flavor. One of the most popular of the hotter varieties of paprika in Hungary.
Félédes (Semi-Sweet): Medium-hot paprika.
Rozsa (Rose): Paler-red in color, with a strong aroma and hot-spicy taste.
Erös (Hot): The hottest variety, pale rust-red to light brownish-yellow in color.
PAPRIKA PACKAGING
Paprika is a popular souvenir to bring back from your trip to Hungary. The largest (and freshest) selection can be found at the Great Market Hall in Budapest. If you travel in the countryside, you’ll find paprika sold at many souvenir shops and roadside stands, too.
Kalocsa paprika is often packaged for retail sale in small cloth bags sometimes stamped with the image of a ripe pepper plant, or decorated with red, white and green ribbons, the colors of the Hungarian flag. Paprika also comes in less expensive, but still colorful, tin boxes and even cheaper cellophane or plastic bags.
In the United States, where Kalocsa paprika is less commonly available, you’re more likely to find tins of paprika from Szeged at gourmet stores and major supermarkets.
Paprika peppers are also made into bright-red pastes and packaged in cans, jars, and even tubes (like toothpaste).
Since all powdered paprikas lose color and flavor as they age, it’s best to purchase paprika that was harvested and milled during the past year. Keep it in your kitchen cabinet, away from heat and sunlight, and use it within a year after buying it.
COOKING WITH PAPRIKA
Hungarian souvenirs with pepper motifs on them
As the spice that defines many Hungarian dishes, paprika is often in combination with other traditional Hungarian ingredients such as lard, onions and sour cream. Hungarian cooks always have several kinds of paprika in their kitchens, in a whole range of hues and flavors.
Just remember that when cooking with paprika, you should always stir the spice into HOT fat, to dissolve the powder and release its full flavor and aroma. Then quickly stir in the meat or a liquid to lower the temperature, to keep the paprika from burning, or it will turn bitter and ruin the dish.
Once you’ve tasted true Hungarian paprika—and mastered the simple technique of cooking with it—you’ll never again think of paprika as just a pretty spice, good only for garnishing potato salad and devilled eggs.
As the Hungarians say, “Jó étvágyat kívánunk!” (“Enjoy your meal!”)
Typical half-timbered house in Kayserberg, on the Alsatian Wine Route
By Sharon Hudgins Photos by the author
Quick: Which region of France has also belonged to Germany—and is a top culinary destination for travelers from all over the world?
If you answered “Alsace,” then immediately pass GO, collect $200 from the nearest ATM, and head for a memorable meal in one of the most famous culinary regions of the country.
Bonus: You can drink well there, too.
Alsace produces fine wines from Riesling, Sylvaner, Gewürztraminer, and other types of grapes, as well as clear, potent, aromatic distilled liquors (eaux-de-vie) from the many varieties of fruits and berries that grow in abundance in this northeastern corner of the country. Located along the Rhine River across from Germany and Switzerland, Alsace is also the main beer-producing region of France.
And all of these local beverages pair perfectly with a cuisine that anchors Alsace solidly on France’s gastronomic map.
Traditional earthenware casseroles from the pottery village of Soufflenheim
TRADITION MEETS MODERNITY Alsace has long been known for the high quality of its cooking, from home kitchens to cozy bistros and brasseries to some of the top-rated restaurants in France. Based on locally grown crops, farm-raised animals, and wild game from the forests and fields, traditional Alsatian cuisine reflects the rustic simplicity of rural life, influenced by next-door Germany (to which Alsace has belonged at different times in history), but with a decidedly French twist.
Modern Alsatian restaurant chefs have sought to reduce the butter, cream and lard so prevalent in past preparations, and to lighten the load of pork products and heavy casseroles that once characterized the cuisine. Some have even fallen for the fancy foams and deconstructed dishes of the latest food fads. But most of the region’s modern chefs remain true to their roots, using fresh, local ingredients in creative ways that still pay homage to the established traditions of Alsatian cooking.
Poulet Grand-Mère (Grandmother’s-Style Chicken), cooked and served in traditional earthenware pottery from Soufflenheim
WHERE TO EAT Modern Alsatian cuisine can be tasted at many of the region’s highly rated upscale restaurants (see list). For more traditional fare, look for smaller, family-run restaurants, bistros, bakeries and pastry shops. Some of the best of these are located along the Route des Vins d’Alsace (Alsatian Wine Route) between Marlenheim and Thann, in little villages of old half-timbered houses, their window boxes bursting with red geraniums in summer.
Many traditional restaurants serve their dishes in rustic handmade earthenware from the pottery town of Soufflenheim. And they pour excellent Alsatian white wines out of handmade blue-and-gray stoneware pitchers, from the pottery village of Betschdorf, into tall, thin, green-stemmed wine glasses set on tables covered with Alsatian-made linens. Dining in Alsace is a feast for both your palate and your eyes.
WHAT TO EAT ► Kugelhopf, a richly flavored, light-textured, yeast-raised cake studded with raisins and almonds, baked in a special fluted mold shaped like a Turk’s turban. Traditionally eaten for Sunday breakfast, accompanied by big cups of café au lait (coffee with milk). Also served in the afternoon with coffee or tea and sometimes after dinner as a dessert dressed up with sweet sauces and whipped cream.
► Choucroûte garnie, mild sauerkraut cooked in white wine, beer or cider and seasoned with juniper berries and black peppercorns. Considered a “national dish of Alsace,” the big mound of sauerkraut is served on a large platter and topped with a variety of meats—especially ham, bacon, sausages and other smoked pork products—along with cooked whole carrots and boiled potatoes. Traditionally served as the Sunday midday meal, but now available on many restaurant menus every day of the week.
► Bäckeoffe, a stick-to-your ribs casserole made with layers of sliced potatoes and leeks with two or three kinds of meats (beef, pork, lamb), cooked together in white wine inside an earthenware casserole hermetically sealed with a strip of bread dough. In earlier times, Bäckeoffe was assembled at home on Monday mornings, then taken to the local bakery to be cooked in the wood-fired oven while the housewives were busy doing their laundry by hand.
► Tarte flambée, the Alsatian answer to pizza, made from a very thin crust of bread dough topped with a layer of crème fraîche (slightly soured cream) or fromage blanc (fresh white cheese), thinly sliced onions, and small pieces of smoked bacon. Known in Alsatian dialect as Flammekueche, the best of these are baked in wood-fired ovens.
► Munster cheese, from the Alsatian town of Munster. When ripe, this cow’s milk cheese has a slightly creamy interior and a deliciously pungent aroma. Often served at the end of the meal, accompanied by slices of fresh fruits or garnished with a sprinkling of caraway, fennel or anise seeds.
► Fruit tarts, from rhubarb in spring to apple and pear in autumn. The Alsatians have a well deserved reputation as excellent bakers of breads, cakes, tarts and cookies. Their bakeries and pastry shops are among the most tempting in France.
European Traveler 