Salzburg, Austria

For Easter weekend, we spent a wet and rainy few days in Salzburg, Austria. Despite not being properly attired for such dreary weather, we enjoyed strolling around town and experiencing as much as we could stand in the picturesque town. Austria continues to be one of my favorite European countries for its beauty, food and history.

Our very first stop in Salzburg was to the Salzburger Freilichtmuseum. The museum has amassed a wonderful selection of old homes and buildings to create a mini town complete with its own train. We came late in the day so entry was half-price (bonus!) and enjoyed walking around the grounds. 

Our weekend accommodations were at the JUFA Salzburg City hotel. They had a friendly staff, breakfast was included and it was dog-friendly. Our room looked out to the Hohensalzburg Fortress. 

The Easter bunny managed to find us in Salzburg and delivered a chocolate bunny to our room!

One of the top attractions in Salzburg is Schloss Hellbrunn. Our entry ticket included a tour of the trick fountains, palace and folk art museum. The trick fountains were really neat to experience, even on a dreary, rainy day. 

We also took in a marionette show while in Salzburg. The show was Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Despite not understanding all the dialogue, it was cute to see the show. Before the show started, Charles enjoyed a coffee and we shared some Mozartkugel. 

We had about two hours of sunshine after the marionette show! 

The other exciting experience during our visit to Salzburg was at Edelweiss Cooking School where we learned how to make apple strudel and Salzburger Nockerl. Both desserts were easier than I was expecting, so maybe I'll try to make them at home soon!

Salzburger Nockerl is a soufflé dessert that is supposed to represent the mountain peaks surrounding Salzburg. 

Sunflowers, Lavender and Aix-en-Provence

Not only can you find fields of lavender in Provence, but also fields of sunflowers! This one was up the road from our Airbnb so on our last night in Rians we drove over and took pictures. 

On another evening we drove out to Valensole to see if we could find these famous fields of lavender. Upon arrival, we discovered that most had been harvested already. We saw only one field that still had blooms. I was prepared for this, especially because it had been a hot summer already. It was still a bit of a let down. 

But before heading home, we found a spot with a great view. 

I did not see a lot of street art on this trip, so I had to snap a photo of this one.

The final city in our tour of Provence was Aix-en-Provence where we booked a food tour through Airbnb. Charles and I agreed afterward that it was our least favorite food tour out of the few we have done since being in Europe. The food was pretty good and our tour guide was friendly, but it did not provide a lot of detail about the city and why we were eating the things we ate. The French desserts were tasty, though!

Aix is known as the city of fountains and they were EVERYWHERE! Thank goodness, too, because it was soooo hot. We splashed water on ourselves from just about every fountain we came across.  

Peanut Butter Pretzel Magic Cookie Bars

We are dessert people, if you did not know that already. Like one of the contestants on the most recent Great British Bake-Off said, I don't just have a sweet tooth. I have sweet TEETH. 

I had a can of sweetened condensed milk and a couple sleeves of graham crackers in the pantry and thought "let's make magic cookie bars!" But I did not have any coconut. I scoured Pinterest for a variation that included items I actually had on hand and then checked my Beale Officers' Spouses' Club cookbook. It's one I hardly ever use and so sometimes I open it up and look through to justify keeping it. I found a recipe for PMS Bars which had pretzels and peanut butter chips instead of coconut. I used that recipe as inspiration and went off-book a bit for this my creation. 

Introducing my Peanut Butter Pretzel Magic Cookie Bars! They are sweet, crunchy and delicious. If you love the sweet-salty combo, then these will be right up your alley. I have NO idea how many pretzels or how much peanut butter I used, so if you make these use your best judgement. In my opinion, you cannot really have too much of either ingredient. 

Chocolate Peanut Butter Baklava

We had a very non-traditional Thanksgiving this year. We ate zero turkey, no normal Thanksgiving sides and no pie. I actually did not mind it. I had some traditional Thanksgiving meals twice prior to Thanksgiving, so that was checked off for me and Charles did not seem to really care. Instead, we made reservations at a local "American" restaurant where I had a steak and Charles had salmon. It was very delicious and relaxing. No stress about cooking and no dishes to clean up afterward. Of course, it is a lot easier to eat out when not in the United States where everyone celebrates Thanksgiving. For Germans, it was just a normal Thursday. 

In lieu of pie, Charles requested one of his favorite desserts--chocolate peanut butter baklava. I found the recipe a few years ago on Pinterest. I do not make it very often. It's an easy recipe, but because of the phyllo dough it is a bit of a process to put together. But if you love baklava and the chocolate-peanut butter combination, then you will very much enjoy this one! 

As the recipe states, it is extremely helpful to have everything ready at your workstation before starting the phyllo dough process. I have made this recipe by myself, but it is 100% better if you have a buddy that helps out. The way we do it is I butter and layer the phyllo and Charles adds the peanut butter and chocolate chips. Plus it is just more fun to do it together. 

One piece of advice, do not make this while hungry. Because we had an old person dinner scheduled (our reservation was for 4:30pm) and I made this prior to that, I was pretty hungry while preparing this. I have a tendency to get a little grumpy when I am hungry and I snapped at Charles over who knows what when we were starting to make this. For the health of your relationship, avoid baking while hangry. 

Sorry no pictures. But trust me, it is yummy!

 

Gingersnap Cheesecake Bars

I have been working part time at the Thrift Shop on our base. It's not a dream job by any means, but it has given me something to do (not that I really needed one more thing to do between all my volunteer gigs) and some extra travel money. We had a potluck for lunch in honor of Veteran's Day and to celebrate one of our regular volunteers who is heading to the States for the winter. 

I scoured Pinterest for some ideas of something I could bring that did not require being warmed up since I was coming in to work in the morning and wanted to make sure my item was still going to be tasty a few hours later. I had this recipe for Gingersnap Cheesecake Bars saved and knew it was the perfect time to try it! Charles is not a huge fan of cheesecake, so he would not appreciate it as much as my co-workers and volunteers would. 

I received many rave reviews on the bars so the recipe is a keeper! The original recipe was for a 13x9 inch pan, so I halved it for this occasion, but seeing how quickly they were devoured I should have made the full recipe. The recipe card below is for half the recipe so if you want a full pan just double all the measurements. Enjoy!

 

Strawberry Lemon Bars

Strawberry and lemon is a great combination for sweet and sour! It also makes a great dessert. Bring these to your next summer potluck and everyone will leave happy.

Peanut Butter Fudge Pie

We love anything chocolate with peanut butter! It is really the ultimate combination of sweet and salty. I had a recipe pinned for a Peanut Butter Fudge Pie with Peanut Butter Salted Caramel that sounded amazing. I adapted slightly out of laziness. I did not have any caramel topping and did not feel like making my own. 

The pie turned out really delicious even despite one little mishap with my ingredients. When buying roasted peanuts, I just grabbed a container that said "Golden Roast" on the label. AFTER making the pie, my husband told me that he noticed the back of the label included ingredients like paprika, garlic, onion powder... Ugh! We ate the pie for dessert and I honestly could not tell, but I would definitely double check next time I purchase peanuts for any purpose. 

I'm back! A visit to Rothenburg odT

Hi friends! I have returned to the life of a housewife now that we are living in Germany. My husband has deemed me the travel agent during our time here, so I will be using this as a means to document our adventures. 

For our first out-of-town adventure, we headed to Rothenburg ob der Tauber (odT). I was drawn to this town after reading several recommendations from other people stationed here. It was promised to be a picturesque town with a ton of history.  We drove from Stuttgart, but I have heard that taking the train and/or bus is just as easy. We traveled with Suzie, so driving was a better option for us.

For our first day, the weather was a little cloudy so you can definitely tell a difference between day one and day two pictures. But even with less than perfect weather, we enjoyed walking around the town and seeing cute streets and alleys at every turn. 

As with any travel destination, there were a plethora of ice cream (or Eis in German) stands. How did we choose this one? Well, it was highly rated on Tripadvisor and the sign out front said that Rick Steves recommended this shop. It did not disappoint! I had Amaretto and Chocolate with hazelnuts. Charles had chocolate with ginger and walnut.

Another quintessential Rothenburg activity we participated in was a visit to the Crime Museum. We did not take any pictures while visiting, but it was a fun (it may be weird to use the word fun to describe it) time learning about all the ways humans are crazy. The museum features items such as shame masks, neck violins, punishments for alleged witches and more. We noticed several guests with their dog, so I guess dogs are allowed in the museum. Suzie would not have enjoyed it, so I am glad we did not try to bring her. 

This picture features one of the famous fountains and buildings that is off the Market Square. For our first night's dinner, we ate at a restaurant in the Market Square. I had wiener schnitzel and it was tasty!

This is THE photo you have to take while in Rothenburg. This spot is called the Plonlein and is one of the most photographed parts of the city. During the day you cannot get a picture without groups of people, but we were able to snag this nearly deserted shot in the morning before the day trippers arrived. We walked down the street from our hotel to grab some pastries and on the way back I had Charles take a few pictures. 

On our second evening, we had one eyes on one restaurant in town. After walking through twice with no empty tables, we decided to give up on it and try for another place. We ended up at Alter Keller and enjoyed an amazing meal! I had the kasespatzel with salad and a Riesling. Charles had the deer goulash with a beer and lemonade concoction. Our waitress was very friendly and understanding about my severe lack of German speaking. My mouth is watering just thinking about my meal. Mmmm!

On our second day, the weather was amazing! It was sunny and perfectly warm. We ventured outside of the city walls (and away from the crowds) for a hike. The path was well maintained, easy to traverse in my walking shoes and cool in the shade. One thing I appreciate about Germany, at least from what I have seen so far, are the fields of wildflowers. We have noticed this all around our area and I know the bees appreciate it, too! I have a bunch of pictures from this walk, but I will not bore you through all of them.

One food item that is mentioned over and over again for visitors to Rothenburg are Schneeballen or snowballs. They can be found in pretty much every bakery in town. Despite reading that Rick Steves recommends forgoing a snowball, we thought "while in Rothenburg..." and bought a few. The shop we purchased from offered mini versions which is part of the reason we chose that bakery. The traditional snowballs are like the size of tennis balls which were so much bigger than what I was expecting. Snowballs are basically fried balls of pie dough or short crust pastry covered in cinnamon-sugar or chocolate. Some are filled with marzipan and such. The snowballs we purchased were not filled and upon trying all three flavors, we were less than impressed. But I am glad that we at least tried them. 

Since we traveled with Suzie, our greyhound, we needed a pet friendly hotel. Germany seems to be much more dog friendly than America. I believe that is in part because Germans are much more intentional about dog training and owning well-behaved canines. I started my search on Booking.com and saw soooo many dog friendly accommodations. I settled on the Goldene Rose mostly because their website promised a fenced area for dogs to walk around. Now that we are living in a hotel, having an area where Suzie can roam free is a huge bonus! Our hotel was perfectly located inside the city walls and just a few minutes from the Plonlein and all the other sights in Rothenburg. We booked a junior suite, but upon checking in we discovered we had been upgraded to the full sized suite!

Pineapple Rum Cake

Wow! Has it really been since June that I last posted? Well, I am still alive and have been busy, busy, busy.

Recently I had to purchase some rum for a fondue recipe. While at the store I saw pineapple rum and on an impulse bought a bottle. Fast forward a couple weeks, I attended a murder mystery party and we were asked to bring either an appetizer or dessert. I thought, what can I make with that pineapple rum? I searched Pinterest for inspiration and came across a recipe for Rum Cake. I wanted to punch up the pineapple flavor, so I experimented a little with the recipe. It turned out pretty tasty, so I thought I'd share the recipe on here.

I hope you enjoy!

Homemade Chocolate Pudding

When I was growing up we made chocolate pudding a lot. We always made the cook & serve kind. Not instant. Chocolate pudding is one of the many pleasures in life. Recently I wanted to make a chocolate pudding pie, but was curious about making pudding from scratch. I found a recipe on (you guessed it) Pinterest. It turned out to be so easy and very tasty! I'll never go back to the box mix again.

The recipe is from Moms Need to Know.

Homemade Chocolate Pudding

Ingredients
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/2 t salt
4 cups milk
2 T butter
2 t vanilla

Directions
In a pan, whisk together sugar, cocoa, cornstarch and salt.

Whisk the milk into the mixture and heat to boiling, stirring constantly. Once it has started to boil, continue to cook and stir for 2 minutes.

Remove from the heat and stir in butter and vanilla. Transfer to serving dishes and chill in the fridge.

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies

I love chocolate. I love oatmeal cookies. Combine the two and it is pretty awesome. I found this recipe on Pinterest a while back and finally decided to make them. It makes a whole bunch, so I sent a tray to work with Charles. He came home with an empty tray and tons of compliments. I altered the recipe just slightly, but you can see the original recipe by visiting Something Swanky.

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies

Ingredients
1 cup butter, softened
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup unsweetened apple sauce
2 eggs
1/2 t baking soda
1 t salt
1 t vanilla
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup old fashioned oats
2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

Directions
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Beat together the butter, brown sugar and applesauce until creamy. Add the eggs one at a time and mix in-between each addition. Add the salt and vanilla. Mix well. Mix in cocoa powder, flour, oats and baking soda until dough forms, but don't over mix. Add the chocolate chips and mix.

Scoop onto cookie sheets by rounded tablespoons. Bake for 10 to 14 minutes, until edges are set.

Vermont Maple Carrot Cake

My sisters and I recently visited my parents. My middle sister, Courtney, brought me some goodies from New England--maple syrup! It reminded me that I have a little cookbook that we purchased when we visited Vermont several years ago. It features recipes that all include maple syrup. I was flipping through it the other day and telling Charles some of the recipes that sounded good. One of which was carrot cake and he asked if I would make it.

Vermont Maple Carrot Cake

Ingredients

Cake
4 eggs
1 cup maple syrup (Dark Amber or B is preferable)
3/4 cup oil
1/2 cup sour cream
1 T lemon juice (I didn't have any, so I used 3 drops of my lemon essential oil)
2 t vanilla
2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups chopped nuts (I used pecans)
1/2 t salt
1 T baking powder
2 t cinnamon
3 cups grated carrots

Cream Cheese Frosting
8oz cream cheese, room temp
1/4 cup butter, room temp
2 t vanilla
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Directions
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Beat eggs on high speed until frothy. Add next 5 ingredients and beat together another minute. Combine flour, nuts, salt, baking powder and cinnamon. Add liquids to dry ingredients. Fold in carrots. Pour into slightly greased bundt pan.

Bake for 1 hour 10 minutes or until a toothpick emerges clean. (I didn't need to bake that long. I could smell that it was done and took it out early. You might want to check it with 30 minutes to go just to make sure). Cool in pan until easy to handle. Frost when cool with cream cheese frosting.

To make frosting, cream together cream cheese and butter with mixer on high. Add vanilla and beat until combined. Add powdered sugar and beat until you have your desired consistency.