Strasbourg Christkindelsmärik: The Capital of Christmas Markets Since 1570

Yeah, Christopher Columbus’s kids may have dropped by Strasbourg for some spiced wine and locally made handcrafts prior to following their father’s footsteps and sailing to the New World.  Strasbourg has records going back to 1570 stating that they have hosted a Christmas market since those early days.  I would say they have the right to call Strasbourg the Christmas Market capital of Europe.

The horse pulled carts and gas lamps have long been replaced, but the concept of eating locally made food and buying handcrafted Christmas goodies is still the central theme.  Strasbourg sets the tone with Christmas lights decorating the main streets, buildings, and central plaza.  The Christmas tree in the central plaza is a massive 100 feet tall pine and is decked out with lights and decorations.

With the cold weather and ground covered with snow, it felt even more so like Christmas.  We entered the Christmas market to see what the independent vendors had to offer.  You can buy just about everything Christmas related from ceramic manger scenes, blown glass Christmas bulbs, to hand knit doilies.  Food of course was to be found.  My wife sampled a chocolate filled donut while I had a classic crepe with sugar and cinnamon.   There were plenty of other goodies to be found from gingerbread cookies, fruit skewers dipped in chocolate, sandwiches loaded with cheese and ham, and spicy hot wine.  

I could smell the aroma of cinnamon and anise emanating from the steamy caldrons of spiced hot wine sold by many of the vendors.  I have also seen it called Glog in the U.S.  Spiced wine can be thought of as the European equivalent of hot spiced cider.  When the temperatures are chilly cold, there is nothing like drinking something warm like spiced hot wine or hot chocolate.  If you want to give spiced wine a try, here is my wife's prized family recipe that you can use: 

Hot Spiced Wine Recipe

1 bottle red wine

1 bottle water (same quantity as wine)

7 tbsp sugar

4 anise pods (or substitute cloves)

4 sticks cinnamon

1 orange

1.       Pour water into a pot on stove top, add sugar, cinnamon and anise into the water.

2.       Bring this to a slow boil for 5 minutes and stir. Remove from heat.

3.       Now add the wine. Any red table wine will work.

4.       Slice orange and add to pot.

5.       Warm this on low heat for 10 minutes but do not boil.  Enjoy.

French Holiday Eats

Joyeux Noël!!  Awh, the holiday eating season is here.  This is the time of the year when there is always room for one more bite.  Below are a couple of the plates and treats that I was able to enjoy over the last few days here in Alsace.

One of my wife’s family’s traditions for their appetizer is to eat Apericubes amongst other munchies with their Champagne.  Apericubes are little cubes of flavored cheeses that are wrapped in tin foil with trivia questions written on them.  The questions cover a range of topics but primarily focusing on European topics with the occasional question about the U.S.  The easiest question for me to date was, “In what sport does Tiger Woods play?”        

What would a Christmas meal be without les escargots.  I’m a snail veteran of many years now and look forward to this buttery, rich dish.  Don’t let all of the childhood images of those slimy mollusks fill your mind.  These edible delights are tiny, have an unrecognizable shape and are each baked in individual baths of butter and parsley.  Once you've taken care of the little tasty snails, the butter-parsley liquid is sopped up with a crunchy baguette.  It is almost a meal in itself.

Foie gras, goose liver, is another one of those unique French treats that you should not pass judgment on until you try it.  This is nothing like beef liver and onions.  It resembles a pate but it is so rich and creamy that it is in a category of its own.  It is usually accompanied by a salty jello and a sweet fruit jelly such as fig or strawberry jelly.  In the U.S., I always said that just about any food would taste better with bacon on it, foie gras would be the French equivalent of bacon.

For my birthday, my wife treated me to a raclette meal.  This meal is one of those active eating meals where you are preparing your food as you go.  We went to a restaurant where cheese is the featured ingredient.  I thoroughly enjoyed this meal as you grill cheese and dip prosciutto, salami, and other cold cuts in the melted cheese and eat.  The meal was accompanied by fresh carrot and cabbage salads.    

Plenty of good food to discover here in France especially during the holiday season when the French pull out all of the punches.  There always seems to be one more course coming and a wine pairing with each course.   

Gearing Up for Christmas in France

Just a few days from Christmas!  I am looking forward to celebrating the holidays here in France.  There are a lot of activities and customs that are the same in the two countries, but there are also a number of differences.  I’ll highlight some of the differences that I have observed just in this region of France

Both cultures have the standard Christmas chorales, gift share, and family gatherings.  Here in France, I noticed that they put up a lot less Christmas lights on the exterior of people’s homes.  The French do put up lights in most of the historic downtowns and I’ve seen some in the windows of a few homes.  I think part of the reason is that electricity prices are so high here that it discourages putting up a pile of lights outside, manger scenes, etc.  In the U.S. we like the outward displays of extravagance; some towns (for example McAdenville, NC) have turned themselves into holiday tourist attractions putting up hundreds-of-thousands of lights.

The show in the U.S. might be the lights and decorations, but here in France, it is the food.  No surprise there.  This was even more evident to me after counting how many mail advertisements we received for specialty food and grocery stores.  Over the last two weeks, more than half of the 40 catalogs and fliers were for Christmas food items.  In the U.S., I would have received three or four times as many advertisements for consumer merchandise as opposed to food items.  When I walk by even the small town bakeries and butcheries, I understand why.  Some much food to sample and not enough meals in the day to do it! 

Speaking of food, the Christmas foods are one of the holiday highlights here in France.  Pain surprise, or 'surprise bread' in English, is one of the delightful French Christmas eats.  The name doesn’t give a hint of what it is.   The version that I ate was is a large baguette that has been cut into sandwich thick slices across its width and filled with smoked salmon, different pâtés, and herb seasoned cream based spreads.  It is usually served as a lighter course after eating the main meal.  Another typical French Christmas treat is Bûche de Noël, a super sweet Christmas cake that is formed and decorated to resemble a log.  It is made from a thin cake that is covered with a buttery sweet icing, rolled, covered with chocolate icing, and decorated with a few crunchy, green sugar leaves.  Very sweet.    

The French even found a way to integrate food into their Christmas count-down calendars.  One of my wife’s delights is the Christmas Calendars that her parents give to her each year since she was a kid.  Like clockwork, her parents gave us one at the beginning of December.  Each day we get to eat the chocolate surprise hidden behind the corresponding day.  I am a big fan of the calendar although my wife likes to eat the chocolate first thing in the morning.

Bredeles, The Little Alsatian Cookies

A family family tradition has been to bake Christmas cookies together.  It gives everyone a reason to get together prior to the holidays.  Each family will bring two or three of their favorite cookie recipes and then everyone gives a hand mixing the batter and baking.  Sampling is permitted.  We usually bake more than our appetites can sustain over the holidays…except for M&M cookies, which are my favorite.  

My wife and I decided to continue the tradition here in France with of course French Christmas cookies.  Her region of Alsace has a strong Christmas tradition that includes a wide variety of delicious cookies.  My wife's aunt was the queen of bredeles.  She set a high standard, baking a wide variety of cookies and quantities that you think could only be produced by a commercial bakery.  I had the opportunity to try her cookies a few years ago when I visited my wife’s family over Christmas.  Prior to returning to the U.S., my wife's aunt gave me a bag of her cookies that lasted no more than two days. 

Needlesstosay, I was stoked when my wife suggested that we bake bredeles.  My wife has a couple bredele cookbooks so we choose 9 different types of cookies to bake.  The cookbooks are in French with Alsatian names like Schkola Schpirale, Labkierchle Zengle, and Schwobebredle.  Fortunately, correct pronunciation was not a prerequisite to baking them.  We baked coconut, gingerbread, sugar, jelly, and other cookies.  It took us almost an entire day but we finished with a nice variety and plenty of cookies.  Now the best part begins…sharing and eating them!               

Mount Saint Odile: A Magnificent Monastery

I recently visited one of Ottrott’s most celebrated attractions named Mount Saint Odile.  Historians say that in the 8^th century, the wife of a nobleman named Etichon gave birth to a baby girl who was born blind.  The daughter, named Odile, regained her sight during her confirmation in her adolescence.  Her father being inspired by the miracle decided to construct a monastery in her name.  Since that period, other buildings were added and destroyed due to wars during the middle ages.  The monastery was purchased in the 1860s which was the beginning of its restoration.

The twisty mountain roads that climb up the Vosges Mountains to the monastery are surrounded by mature pine forests.  The day I visited Mount Saint Odile, it was overcast and raining.  The forest took on a mystic feel with limited visibility through the ground level fog.  I was visiting the monastery with some new friends that I had encountered through the mandatory immigration training that I was required to take upon my arrival in France.  Steve is an American like me who married an Alsatian.  Steve and his wife Isabelle had just moved to France themselves.

Isabelle parallel parked their miniature car and we headed for the entrance.  The main entrance passes through an oval tunnel that runs the length of the front building.  There are no longer any doors in place but you could easily imagine massive wooden doors at the entrance providing security for the monastery residents.  After passing through the entrance, you arrive at an open garden area surrounded by pink sandstone buildings.  The massive stone blocks that form the buildings and stain glass windows and stone sculptures that decorate it give the building its character and solemn strength. 

The monastery was constructed on a massive sandstone outcropping at the top of a mountain overlooking the Rhine Valley below.  The fog prevented us from having a spectacular view on this visit; however, on a clear day you can see across the Rhine Valley to the Black Forest in Germany which is less than 50 miles away.  While walking around the property, we heard the sound of a brass band.  Surprised to hear the strong sounds at a monastery, we searched for the source.  We eventually found the source and were treated to a special musical performance of a group of trumpeters wearing traditional clothing and playing Alsatian folks songs.           

 

Thanksgiving in Paris

My wife and I decided to travel to Paris this weekend to spend some time with her friends.  It was Thanksgiving weekend in the U.S. and I was really craving turkey, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie.  Although I was not able to partake in an American style feast nor watch football in the turkey induced food-coma state of mind, I was able to partake in some delicious French food in the City of Lights and visit a number of the city’s neighborhoods.   

We had an exceptional time visiting a number of popular Paris neighborhoods, Eiffel Tower, famous Christmas displays at the massive Printemps store, and plenty of other sites.  The first evening, we were able to visit the Basilique du Sacré-Cœur de Montmartre, a stunning roman church that is perched on top of one of the tallest hills in Paris providing a panoramic view of the evening lights of Paris.  The name of the church means the Sacred Heart of Christ and was placed on the Mount of Martyrs (Montmartre).  It had served as a place of worship dating back to the 4^th century and a large number of Christians were martyred on the hilltop in the 9^th century.    The architecture of the basilica is rather unique for a roman catholic church.  The bulbous-shaped domes of the basilica resemble those of the Taj Mahal as opposed to the more linear shaped design that you find in Notre Dame with its square shaped towers.  It took 44 years to build the basilica, 17 years just to install all of the stained glass windows.  The basilica is dedicated to prayer and has a banner hanging on the front of the church stating, “For 125 years, Here, Day and Night, Somebody has been praying to the Lord.” 

We left the Basilica and returned to our friends’ apartment, which is located in an immigrant neighborhood in the 18^th arrondissement.  Paris is divided into 20 different arrondissements or districts.  The numbering starts at 1 in the center of the city and spirals outwards in a clockwise direction.  The 18^th arrondissement has a tarnished reputation due to high poverty and crime rates; however, it boasts one of the most diverse food scenes that I have seen in Paris.  Part of the food attraction was the number of West African restaurants although I saw French, Asian, Turkish, and Algerian restaurants as well.  Just on the few streets that we explored, I saw close to a dozen West African restaurants and plenty more specialty food stores supporting this local food niche.  One small grocery store that we entered, offered several varieties of dried and smoked fish that are popular in West African sauces.  I also spotted the Ivorian specialty of attiéké.  Attiéké is a sort of couscous that is made from cassava, a starchy root vegetable.  The smoked fish smell was a little pungent but the exhaust from several of the restaurants that wafted up the street reminded me of spicy peanut sauces and deep fried plantains.  My mind was flooded with images of dusty road-side cafes, sitting on rickety wooden chairs, and eating hot meals in the oppressively hot-humid climate.

Although we did not sample any of West Africa’s delicious cuisine, we did visit a small French restaurant in the neighborhood serving heavy, old country style French food.  It was below freezing outside so we were pleased to be seated in the corner of the small restaurant next to the large cast iron radiator.  Our waiter brought the menu over to our table which listed appetizers, deserts, and six entrees on a small chalkboard.  I chose a cheese fondue dish while my wife opted for the lamb shank with a rich brown sauce.  While our food was being prepared, we enjoyed an appetizer of different pâtés, salamis, other cold cuts, and cornichon (small French pickles).  The cheese fondue came served in a large cast iron bowl with a gel fire placed underneath and a pile of sliced French bread.  Each time I dipped a piece of the crusty baguette in the fondue I had to raise my fork above my head and turn it a dozen times before the string of cheese would snap.  Cheese paradise!  My wife was gracious enough to share her savory lamb and the carrot and potato accompaniments.  We also cleared out palates with a Chinon red wine from the Loire region.  Dessert was out of the question, we were stuffed.

The following evening, we celebrated the birthday of one of our friends.  They had invited several other couples to their apartment to celebrate together.  To get to their apartment from the street, we passed through massive wooden doors that gave you the impression of entering a castle.  They lived in a building built prior to the dawn of elevators.  We climbed up five flights of spiral stairs to arrive at their 4^th floor apartment.  Not sure why, but the French call the 1^st floor the zero floor.  Parisian apartments are quite compact, like something you would find in New York City, with no wasted space.  The fireplaces with their marble mantels and wooden plank floors gave the apartment character.  That night, they had invited over several other couples and had laid out a spread of more than a dozen different types of cold cuts.  As the hosts originated from the north of France, they provided a few of the regional specialties including andouillette, which is a pork tripe sausage.  They also shared pâté campagne, rillettes (finely shredded pork in a pate form), dried sausages, smoked ham, boudin noir (blood sausage), boudin blanc, and knack (pink pork sausage).   The conversation was lively and fun.  For desert, we had crepes topped with nutella. 

It was a great trip to Paris.  I enjoyed hanging out with her friends and sampling the delicious food.  It was Thanksgiving in the U.S. and although I missed being with my family, I was thankful to be able to be with my wife and spend some time with her friends.