Anniversary Trip: Vienna

Our thirteenth (I can't believe it has been that many years already) wedding anniversary was earlier this month and to celebrate we took a trip to Vienna, Bratislava and Nuremberg. 

Upon arrival in Vienna, we grabbed dinner around the corner from the Airbnb at a place called Coconut Curry. We had some delicious sushi and Asian dishes. One thing I thought was neat, and then noticed it at other restaurants and cafes around Vienna, was that at the outdoor tables the restaurants provided blankets. It was a slightly chilly evening, but I am sure the closer and closer we get to winter the more necessary those blankets become! 

Vienna is set up in different zones and we stayed in the zone with Prater Park which is a very old amusement park. The Ferris wheel is iconic to Vienna and promises great views of the area. Since I am afraid of heights, this was not something I wanted to try out for myself. The park is completely free to enter so we walked around to see all the rides and other typical amusement park booths. 

St. Stephan's Cathedral is at the center of the 1st District and where all the tourists flock to. It has a really interesting roof made up of a patterned tile. 

This is a neat art installation inside the Cathedral. I love that it's included as a statement of how the Cathedral is still a modern part of the city and that it still values art. Cathedrals and churches throughout Europe are great places to see amazing pieces of art and architecture, but they don't always feature anything new. 

St. Stephen's has two towers that visitors can visit for views of the city. One of the towers is only accessible by elevator and it was broken on the day of our visit, so we visited the top of the other tower which is accessible by climbing over 300 stairs. Needless to say, I was a bit tired after that climb. But we got that promised view over the city. 

We visited the Butterfly House and saw a bunch of beautiful butterflies fluttering about. This would be a great place to visit on a cold day as it was nice and toasty inside. However, after visiting the butterfly house in Niagara, this one felt so small. 

Vienna, like many old cities, is filled with statues. I have no idea what this one is representing (if only I remembered more symbols from my college art history classes), but we loved the faces and drama of this one. 

We did not take any other pictures inside, but on the rainy day of our visit we headed over to the House of Music to walk around. It had a lot of interactive exhibits and information about some of Vienna's famous composers and musicians. At the very end, you enter a hallway that is dark except for this neon sign. I loved how, after all the music and sounds from the museum, they offered a relatively quiet space to reset before heading back out into the bustling city.

One of the highlights of our trip was a pastry tour that we booked through Airbnb. Unlike our food tour in Prague, we had two other couples on the tour with us which led to some fun conversations and a little less awkwardness. We visited several places all over Vienna and tried a variety of traditional Viennese desserts. This picture is from one of our favorites where we tried dumplings and strum. Strum is from the first harvest of grapes for wine and has a low alcohol content and is very sweet. It is only available for a limited time, though, so our trip was timed perfectly to try it!

Oktoberfest Quiche

I am not normally one to go off-book when it comes to recipes. I love following directions. I love rules. I am not a confident cook. However, I had this idea to make an Oktoberfest or German themed quiche to bring to a Fest potluck with the other residents in our apartment building. I searched Pinterest and did not come up with anything exactly like what I had in mind, so I combined ideas from a couple different recipes and came up with my own Oktoberfest Quiche. It is a little risky serving something you have never made or tried before, but it turned out pretty tasty! 

This was my first time wearing my brand new dirndl! I am in love with it and so glad I found it in the sale section. Not only did I save a bunch compared to buying a current season style, but I had my eye on this exact one from my online browsing. Finding it in my size at 50% off made my day! And of course Suzie was a big hit in her "dirndl". 

In addition to my Oktoberfest Quiche, I brought my German Apple Cake. This is one of my favorite things in life and this time I made a salted caramel frosting instead of the typical vanilla buttercream. Yummy! It's not authentically German AT ALL! Germans would never make something that sweet, but it was made with apples we picked in Germany, so that makes it more legitimate to me. 

Apple Cider Rum Punch

During the fall there is nothing more refreshing and delicious than a glass of apple cider. I'll take it in just about any form--cold, hot, slushy... I was attending a social function and wanted to bring a fall beverage for everyone to enjoy and ran across a recipe for apple cider rum punch. I had to settle for grocery store apple cider, but I bet this would be even better with some freshly pressed cider. 

Cheesy Beef and Pasta

Do you ever try new recipes, save them and then completely forget about them? That is the case with this recipe. I was looking through recipe files on my computer and saw this one. I honestly cannot remember even making it, but because I took the effort to create a recipe card for it, it must have been tasty. Make it and let me know what you think!

Creamy Parmesan Mashed Potatoes

Need a good potato side? I've got you covered!

Prague

Our first overnight stay outside of Germany since moving here was in Prague. This city has been high on my travel wish list for a while and I left feeling like we hardly saw any of it. Our three day weekend just wasn't long enough. There were so many museums and buildings to see but we just did not have time to see it all. 

We stayed at Hotel Klarov on the other side of the river from Old Town. The hotel was lovely and probably a little fancier than we normally book. Each room at that hotel is named after a famous musician and we stayed in the Joan Baez room. I was hoping for Queen, but what can you do! Breakfast was included, but it was the pretty standard free hotel breakfast so nothing exciting. A big draw for the hotel was free parking was included with our stay. 

Even though it was across the river, it was an easy walk to the Old Town. 

For our first night, we booked an hour at the Original Beer Spa. I came across this concept during my research phase and thought it sounded interesting enough to try. It was super relaxing!

When you arrive for your appointment, you can start drinking beer while you wait for your room to be ready. They had two options--a light and a dark beer. 

Once in the room, the lady put a bucket of the beer, hops and barley into the whirlpool tub. The Czechs believe beer baths are very beneficial for your skin. Mine was pretty soft afterward. It felt a little weird having the barley and hops floating around us in the whirlpool, but it was relaxing. Right next to the tub is a tap with both the light and dark beer so you can drink as much as you would like. We were also given slices of their beer bread to enjoy while soaking. Two slices had some kind of (what we think was) potato spread. We are not completely sure though. 

After soaking for about 30 minutes, the whirlpool jets turn off and you are supposed to lay on the straw bed. The smell of the fresh straw was amazing. Sheets were provided so we did not lay directly on the straw. Super relaxing! 

Overall, it was a neat experience and I am glad that we tried it out!

On our second day, we walked over to Prague Castle and walked around the grounds and inside some of the buildings. I really enjoyed the church. It had a variety of styles for the stain glass windows and I appreciated that one was the Art Nouveau style which is seen throughout Prague. 

On our way to Café Savoy for coffee and a snack, we stopped at the John Lennon Wall. It is one of those while you're in Prague you might as well see it things. It was cool to see the variety of languages, colors and styles on the wall. 

In the late afternoon we took a food tour with Taste of Prague. We took ZERO pictures on the tour (epic fail on my part), but it was really enjoyable. Our tour guide, Martin, was friendly and full of information. We were the only two on the tour and he was great to converse with. We ate delicious food. Our first stop was to a local beer hall where we tried Czech beer from Pilsner, fried cheese, sausages, bread and pickled Carp (yes, even I tried the fish... It wasn't my favorite, but I can at least say I gave it a shot). 

On our second stop we visited a local butcher that specializes in using the whole animal and local ingredients. The restaurant was in an old bank and had a really cool style. We tried some pickled veggies, pork and beef--both cooked and tartar (tartar was a first for me). There we had a dark Czech beer which was my favorite beverage of the tour. 

Our third stop was a small local restaurant with amazing food! We had tapioca chips, beef with an apricot sauce, chicken with an Indian butter sauce and a Czech rose wine. I am not normally a fan of rose wines, but this one was delicious. 

Our final stop was a huge restaurant doing everything--coffee roaster, bakery, restaurant, pastry chef, etc. It was in an old factory and the food was delicious. We tried a gin and tonic (the restaurant makes their own tonic, of course) with seasonal fruits. We're not big gin fans, so it wasn't our favorite but still cool to try. The savory dish was called burnt potato soup which Martin explained is nostalgic for Czechs as it reminds them of summer camp as a kid. The soup had smoked carp in it, but if he had not told me that I would not have known. It was delicious and creamy. We also tried their coffee and a couple desserts which were probably my favorite part because I love sweets. 

The really great thing about this tour is that they provide you a guide book for Prague with tons of recommendations on restaurants, cafes, bars, shopping and more. Plus Martin told us several times throughout the tour that whenever we travel to other European cities to reach out to them and they will give us restaurant recommendations there, as well. What a great value! 

On our last morning in Prague we decided to skip the hotel breakfast and headed to a local café called Cocovanka. It had a boho vibe. We both ordered a Café Latte. I enjoyed an apple tart and Charles had some kind of lacey cookie thing. 

As I said in the beginning, I feel like we hardly saw anything of Prague so I think we will have to visit again during our time in Germany. 

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.