Photos courtesy Schwabinger Christmas Market and Thomas Gießner
In times of technical developments and mass produced goods, the Schwabing Christmas Market in Munich, Germany strives to lift the focus to the individuality of arts and crafts.
FLYING HIGH, YET DOWN TO EARTH This market has caught the imagination of its visitors for decades with a mix of artisans creating art and crafts. The magical atmosphere of the Christmas market with its many culinary delights give it an unmistakable flair.
In addition, visitors can also expect daily music shows, kids’ entertainment and various culinary delights—and all is free of charge.
MUNICH’S FINEST ARTISTS MARKET More than 100 artists from all over Germany create a place where one can relax and enjoy this unique atmosphere. The concept has been one of an artist’s market from the very beginning. An unmistakable flair can be found here with the high level of artistic talent and craftsmanship. This is further underlined by the quality of the daily cultural programming and fine foods, as well as concerts and various events.
IDEA WAS BORN In the early 1970’s a number of artists who exhibited during the summer on the “Art Mile” on Leopold Street in Munich began to show their work at the former Swiss House prior to Christmas. In 1975 the idea of an artist’s market, with stalls and events, was born. With the backing of the local council, the Schwabing Chistmas Market was founded. A jury is responsible for choosing the work shown, as well as finding new exhibitors. This ensures that all exhibited work comes from the studios and workshops of the artists.
Steigenberger’s elegant five-star Parkhotel in Dusseldorf, Germany—located adjunct to a park—is an oasis in the middle of a popular shopping complex and entertainment strip of the Königsallee.
The prestigious hotel has just completed a multi-million dollar renovation of its entire first floor, kitchen area and more than 90 rooms and suites.
STROLL ALONG THE RIVER The hotel is located at the heart of a number of cultural and entertainment venues which are easily walkable, such as the Opera House, the Old Town, and the Rhine River is just a 10 minute walk away. There you can stroll along the river, regarded as one of the most beautiful of esplanades. Planned by Niklaus Fritschi and built between 1990 and 1997, it “joins” the city to its river. It symbolizes Düsseldorfers’ Rhenish joie-de-vivre and particularly in summer is an expression of the city’s Mediterranean lifestyle.
The Rhine embankment promenade links the traditional Altstad (Old Town) to the modern MedienHafen and is lined by cafés and bars. Thus the Steigenberger Hotel enjoys a prominent position in the life of the city which guests can take full advantage of.
The hotel’s lobby is large and welcoming, with a large vase of eye-catching flowers, a glittering chandelier in the middle, colorful contemporary paintings on the walls and rich wood registration desks, backed on the walls by more rich wood panels. I immediately felt at home in this place, especially with the attentive, personable staff.
The Parkhotel’s 130 rooms, all with high ceilings, are comprised of superior single rooms, deluxe double rooms, grand deluxe rooms and deluxe suites, all neat as a pin, roomy and comfortable. Rooms feature a flat screen television, work desk, air conditioning and access to the spa. Larger rooms include even more amenities. In addition, the rooms are quiet and feature reading lamps on each side of the bed.
HOTEL IS CENTRALLY LOCATED Rooms feature a flat screen television, work desk, air conditioning and access to the sauna and fitness area. The Hauptbahnhof is a few blocks away and guests can easily get there by cab from the hotel. The Dusseldorf trade fair building is about four miles away.
The hotel features six modular function rooms for meetings and conferences with air conditioning and state-of-the art facilities to enable users to make the most of modern multimedia.
Etoile Bar From mid-April the exclusive summer terrace of the hotel offers a chance to enjoy meals or drinks al fresco. Indoors, the dark wood-paneled Etoile Bar, where piano music can be enjoyed, is a good spot to sit a spell. There is also the Steigenberger Eck Lounge, a bistro and bar where one can have Champagne, tea or a drink, and seafood or other meal selections.
Artiste Restaurant
FINE DINING At the fine dining restaurant Artiste, chef Christoph Kaiser provides a varied range of excellent foods and fine table wines. A super appetizer of Colby fish topped with avocado cream was followed by a thick, juicy steak, creamed white asparagus and delicious small potatoes. My wife had the asparagus and new boiled potatoes, but with a delicate, flaky salmon as the main dish. All vegetables are locally grown and personally selected by the chef.
The crème brûlée for dessert, as well as the citrus sponge cake garnished with colorful fruit was the perfect ending to a memorable dinner. The service was impeccable. Another hotel restaurant, the Menuett, is also available for breakfast and special events.
HISTORICAL, STUNNING BUILDING From the outside, the first impression of this hotel is of a magnificent, stunning building, in classical German architectural style. It’s history goes back a long way.
HISTORY The hotel opened in 1902 in conjunction with the industry, trade and art exhibition in Düsseldorf. Soon after it opened aristocracy, famous industrialists and the traveling pubic frequented the hotel. As an example, in 1908 Crown Prince Wilhelm of Prussia and Crown Princess Cecilie visited there.
(left) In 1908, Crown Prince Wilhelm and Crown Princess Cecelie visited the hotel.
From 1936 to 1937 the hotel was reconditioned and modernized but was substantially damaged in 1944 during WWII air attacks, with the upper floors destroyed by fire. Between 1945 and 1951 the Steigenberger hotel was taken over by American and later British occupying forces. Later it served as the Mannesmann AG administrative building until 1953.
Today, English carpets and both modern and antique furniture evoke a synthesis of functionality and noble ambience in the hotel. The elegant interior was designed by architect Bergit Countess of Douglas. The valuable high class furniture imitates the style popular in 18th century’s France ruled by Louis XVI, evoking a sense of comfort and security through its warm wood colors and wooden materials.
In all, the Steigenberger Parkhotel is an island of calm in the midst of a bustling downtown city. Its interesting history and charm make it a prime Steigenberger property.
Although goulash originated in Hungary, this popular dish later spread beyond its borders, first to the Austrian Empire, Germany, and the Balkans, and finally around the world.
Classic Hungarian goulash at a restaurant on Hungary’s Great Plain
By Sharon Hudgins Photos by the author
Everyone loves a good goulash. But ask a dozen people what a goulash is—and you’ll get a dozen different answers: a soup, a stew, a meat dish served on a plate; brown, red, mild, hot-spicy; made with beef, pork, mutton, game, even vegetarian.
Although goulash originated in Hungary, this popular dish later spread beyond its borders, first to the Austrian Empire, Germany, and the Balkans, and finally around the world. That’s why there are so many versions of goulash today.
GOULASH ROOTS Hungarian goulash traces its roots back to nomadic Magyar herdsmen in the ninth century. Shepherds cut meat into cubes and slowly stewed them in a heavy iron kettle over an open fire until the liquid evaporated. Then they spread the meat out in a single layer to further dry in the sun. This dried meat, an early convenience food, could be carried with them as they followed their flocks across the vast expanse of Hungary’s Great Plain. To reconstitute the meat they simply added water and heated it—sometimes with other ingredients, too—in a pot over a fire. If a lot of liquid was added, the dish was called goulash soup. With less liquid, it was simply goulash meat. In both cases it was eaten with spoons dipped into the communal cooking pot.
Goulash got its name from those early herdsmen, who were called gulyás in Hungarian. But goulash as we know it today did not develop until the end of the 18th century and beginning of the 19th, with the widespread cultivation of peppers in Hungary and the use of paprika as a popular spice. Originally it was considered peasant food, eaten primarily by country folk—farmers, shepherds, cowboys, and swineherds. With the rise of Hungarian nationalism in the second half of the 19th century, paprika-seasoned goulash moved from the campsites and farmhouses to the tables of middle class and wealthy city dwellers, to the menus of fashionable restaurants and eventually across the globe.
GOULASH VARIETIES Goulash is now the Hungarian dish most widely known abroad. But in many parts of the world, dishes called “goulash” bear little resemblance to the gulyás that originated in Hungary and is eaten there today. In Hungary, gulyás is a meat dish halfway between a soup and a stew, made with small cubes of meat (usually beef), no more than 3/4-inch in size, and flavored with bacon or lard, onions and paprika. Gulyás is traditionally served in a bowl and eaten with a spoon.
Over time, Hungarian cooks also developed many variations on this theme, using such ingredients as garlic, tomatoes, mild banana peppers and hot cherry peppers, caraway seeds, root vegetables, cabbage, beans and tiny egg dumplings, as well as pork, mutton, venison and boar meat. Regional recipes abound, with each cook claiming his or her own version of goulash to be the best and most authentic.
Germans adapted the basic Hungarian goulash recipe to their own tastes, producing the Gulaschsuppe (goulash soup) that is now so popular throughout Germany, where it’s traditionally served with a slice of rye bread and a mug of beer. Germans and Austrians also make a variety of thick, paprika-flavored meat stews called Gulasch, served on a plate and accompanied by boiled potatoes, egg noodles or dumplings. (The Hungarians, however, would call this kind of stew a pörkölt, not a goulash.) And Kesselgulasch (kettle goulash)—cooked outdoors in a pot suspended by an iron tripod over an open fire—is a Hungarian specialty that many Central Europeans now eat at their own backyard dinner parties and local festivals.
German “Beer Goulash” at brewery beer garden in Erfurt
As part of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Austrians certainly love their own versions of Gulasch. There’s even a Cafe-Restaurant Gulaschmuseum in Vienna, where the menu lists more than a dozen varieties of goulash, including turkey or chicken-liver goulash with potatoes, bean goulash with paprika-seasoned sausage, veal goulash with little spinach dumplings, and even a dessert called Schokogulasch (chocolate goulash) containing cake, chocolate sauce and rum. In Prague I purchased a Czech cookbook devoted entirely to the subject of goulash—including versions identified as German, Austrian, Slovakian, Slovenian, Serbian, Bulgarian, even Chinese and Mexican! And recently in New Mexico I came across a Cajun goulash. What a mixture of geography and culinary cultures! From its humble beginnings on the plains of Hungary more than a thousand years ago, this simple peasant food has now become a truly global dish.
GOULASH-SPEAK “Goulash” has also entered several languages as a word meaning more than just “a soup or stew.” In Hungary, “Goulash Communism” was a term for the Hungarians’ attempt in the late 1960s to create their own, more market-oriented, economic system distinct from the Soviet model. In Germany and Switzerland, a “goulash cannon” is military slang for a mobile field kitchen—a big, heavy, black, iron stewpot on wheels, with a cover on the top and a built-in firebox—which is also used for feeding crowds at festivals and other public events. And in the Czech Republic, political parties had a tradition of setting up their own “goulash cannons” in front of polling places at election time, where they dished out free goulash in a blatant attempt to influence voters’ choices on the ballot. As the Czechs said to each other when they headed to the polls to vote, “Have a good goulash!”
Since the Middle Ages, the English university town of Oxford has been attracting scholars hungry for knowledge. Today it also draws hordes of tourists hungry to see its Gothic colleges, top-notch museums, colorful gardens, lively student hangouts and cozy pubs.
We all know that sightseeing is a strenuous activity that boosts your appetite. And Oxford offers plenty of places for filling empty stomachs as well as hungry minds. In this historic “city of dreaming spires,” you’ll find something to suit every taste, from traditional English pork pies to sushi rolls, from falafel sandwiches to chocolate fudge, from goat cheese pizza to the best of British cuisine.
Classic Cornish pasties at West Cornish Pasty Company on Cornmarket Street
FAST FOOD In a town full of students, there’s no dearth of fast-food joints. Skip the inevitable McDonald’s and KFC, and head for the simple eateries offering more typical British fare. The West Cornish Pasty Company on Cornmarket Street sells very good versions of these traditional English turnovers with a selection of savory fillings. Many other takeout places, including supermarkets, offer fresh sandwiches stuffed with prawns, sliced cucumbers or egg salad, perfect for a picnic on a hot summer day. And food trucks parked around the edges of the central city cater to eaters on the go, selling a variety of takeaway dishes from India, Pakistan and the Middle East, as well as British standards such as “toad-in-the-hole” (succulent sausages baked inside Yorkshire pudding batter).
Mushroom stand at the weekly Oxford open-air market
OXFORD COVERED MARKET Opened in 1774, Oxford’s venerable covered market is one of the city’s most popular tourist attractions. In addition to its fruit, vegetable, meat, fish and cheese stores, it includes several little shops selling cooked foods to nibble on site or take away. Choose from an eclectic group of eateries: a “Brazilian Cheeseball” stand, a “Sooshe” bar, Nash’s Oxford Bakery, David John’s traditional butchery and meat pie shop. An especially popular place is Pieminister, which offers several kinds of freshly made, double-crust, meat or vegetable pies served with “mash” (mashed potatoes), “groovy” (gravy) and “minty mushy peas” (just what they sound like).
Traditional English pie with gravy at Pieminister in the Oxford Covered Market
PUB GRUB Oxford’s historic pubs are famous as much for their denizens as for their beer. You can quaff a pint of British bitter or English ale in the same spots where Thomas Hardy, Lewis Carroll, J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Graham Greene, the fictional Detective Inspector Morse and many other Oxford luminaries wet their whistles. Pubs also serve food, sometimes the best bargains for a full (and filling) meal in Oxford. Typical dishes include fish-and-chips (battered-and-fried fish filets with French fried potatoes), Scotch eggs (hard-boiled eggs surrounded by sausage meat and deep fried), “Ploughman’s Lunch” (thick wedges of cheese and a slice of ham served with apple slices, sweet pickle relish, bread and butter) and “jacket potatoes” (aka baked whole potatoes, in their skins) with a choice of toppings: Cheddar or blue cheese, pork and beans, sautéed mushrooms, even meaty (or vegan beany) chili.
Traditional English ale at an Oxford pub
(left to right) Food shop inside Oxford Covered Market; Cottage loaves for sale at the weekly Oxford open-air market; The Bear, one of Oxford’s famous traditional old pubs
Purchase a guide to Oxford’s pubs at the Visitor Information Center on Broad Street or at many bookstores. You can also buy a postcard depicting 36 classic pubs for an “Oxford Heritage Pub Crawl.” My own favorite pubs include The Bear, The White Horse Inn, The Rose and Crown, The Lamb and Flag, The Eagle and Child and The Head of the River.
Head of the River, a favorite Oxford pub with a large beer garden
TEA & SWEETS You can’t visit England without having afternoon tea—a civilized sit-down with a pot of freshly brewed tea, finger sandwiches and baked goods (such as scones with jam and clotted cream, and a selection of scrumptious cakes). Several cafes advertise afternoon tea with a sign in their front windows. Some upscale restaurants also serve formal “teas” between 3:00 and 5:00 p.m. For an elegant experience in the grand old English manner (with prices to match), “take tea” in the drawing room of the Macdonald Randolph Hotel across from the Ashmolean Museum.
If you just need to satisfy your sweet tooth, stop in at Nash’s Bakery in the Covered Market for traditional British pastries, or head for the Fudge Kitchen on Broad Street, which sells more than 20 different flavors of fudge made fresh daily.
Handmade fudge at the Fudge Kitchen on Broad Street
RESTAURANTS Oxford has a wide range of full-service restaurants to fit any budget. Local foodies especially like Brasserie Blanc, on Walton Street, owned by one of the most respected chefs in Britain, Raymond Blanc; Jamie’s Italian, on George Street, one of a chain owned by another famous chef, Jamie Oliver; Gee’s, an Oxford landmark on Banbury Road; The Old Parsonage, on Banbury Road; and Magdalen Arms, a “gastropub” on Iffley Road. Look for fixed-price lunches of two or three courses for approximately £12 to £17 per person. Some restaurants also offer the same deal for “early supper” between 5:30 and 7:00 p.m.
Luncheon appetizer at Gee’s Restaurant on Banbury Road
Oxford has no lack of Asian restaurants, from Indian to Chinese, Japanese, Thai and “Asian fusion.” Popular Asian eateries include My Sichuan, Shanghai 30’s, Majliss, Saffron, Chiang Mai Kitchen and Wagamama.
And for your big splurge, drive out to Raymond Blanc’s Le Manoir aux Quat’ Saisons in Great Milton, just seven miles east of Oxford. This fine restaurant has garnered two Michelin stars and won many other culinary accolades. You’ll be tempted to stay overnight at the historic manor house, too. Just be sure to make reservations well in advance, for both the hotel and restaurant. Dining there is an experience you’ll never forget.
● Travel tip: The Oxford Visitors’ Guide, a handy booklet that costs only £1 at the Oxford Visitor Information Centre (15/16 Broad Street), contains a short history of the town, a map, a brief description of the colleges and their opening times, Top 10 Things to Do, a self-guided walking tour, and vignettes of Oxford’s most famous characters. Also pick up a free copy of the Oxford Restaurant Guide booklet.
With summer approaching, it’s a good time to plan to visit the annual food and vegetable markets that pop up in the United Kingdom. Here are four of them that you might like to put on your “shopping list.”
Selection of colorful fruit, Borough Market, London, EnglandPecorino Favoloso, Borough Market, London, England.The farmers’ market in Winchester, England has a great variety of produce, organic vegetables and fruit.
European Traveler 