Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Corner View: German food staples

I've decided to join the "Corner View" series that Jane, over at Spain Daily, started. Fun glimpses into various 'corners' around the world. This week's topic is 'staple foods'. I think one of the top staples of the German diet is pork anything. Here we even have Bärchenwurst, (little bear sausage) that the kids I babysit love. They'll have a slice on their buttered bread for dinner. See him below, next to a bunch of other pork products?
Even MORE pork products, and there are so many more! *as a side note, back in '98 I did a 3 month internship in Germany where it was pork everywhere, then went right on to Israel for 4 months of study, where you could find no pork! I liked that b/c by then I was so sick of pork! =)
Here's an old shot from a Metzgerei (butcher's shop) down in Bavaria we went to last fall. We love Landjägers for a treat. A kind of smoked pork stick thing.
Bread and white potatoes are also staples, but I suspect others will do a better job of capturing them (edit: check out Allison's post on potatoes, a little history lesson), so I will just post a picture outside of our local bakery.
I wanted to focus on cherries (Kirsch) though. Summer, and the school summer vacation here, really kicks off when the cherries are ripe for the eating. Yesterday at the bakery I got the seasonal special, which was a cherry and custard pastry.
Before I left for the bakery I went to finally return the plate that Frau Tille had used to bring me our wedge of ice cream pie. I ended up meeting Herr Tille in the stairwell who promptly sent me back upstairs with the plate again, this time full of fresh cherries! He'd received a huge pail of fresh cherries from a friend and wanted to share. Yes, we have awesome neighbors! So this was our dinner last night. It was too hot and humid to do much else anyhow. I have another huge bag of cherries in the fridge, too!
We won't talk about the giant rain storm meeting our open kitchen skylights when I was gone to the bakery and the three huge towels I needed to fix that problem...

For more staple foods from around the world, click here.

9 comments :

Traveling Mama said...

Yeah! I'm so glad you joined Corner View! We are with Israel- no pork products. We bring our bacon in a cooler from Spain when we go and freeze it. My husband and kids are nuts about pork so I tend to just let them eat it! Those cherries look delicious too. And I am totally suffering from neighbor envy!

Allison said...

The biggest surprise for me about living in "the land of pork" was when I went to McDonald's the first time for breakfast. I had it in my head that I would order a delicious sausage McMuffin. You cannot imagine my disappoitment when they told me that had no such thing. How could the country that has pork in every varation not have sausage?!?! Thus, this is why I eat sausage every morning for breakfast when I go home.

Now it is me who owes you an e-mail... it's on the list after the folks leave.

Pamela said...

German sausages, and then cherries and custard in pastry??? Oh, I have died and gone to gastronomic heaven!

Juliette said...

I have to say I've yet to find good, thin-sliced bacon here - HERE in the land of pork!

Allison- no worries; I disappeared for the weeks my parents were here last fall too - it's a great excuse! =)

Jodi said...

very nice post and I love the cherries at the end. btw your Eßecke looks great!

jane said...

great post. i love the name kirsch. don´t know why. thanks juliette!

likeschocolate said...

I have never seen the Bear Wurst when I have been in Germany. I think I will be looking for it. I am going in 18 days to pick up my son from his Oma's house. My favorite is the press kopf. If I told anyone here in the U.S. what it was they would be so grossed out, but I think it is delish. Looking forward to a good Schnitzel.

;) said...

Amazing choice !!! I know some kids that would like to taste a little bear on the first picture !!! ;)

Katie @ makingthishome.com said...

well it's a good thing you have so many meat pictures so we don't go out of our minds jealous over here. :)

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