If you've read my blog for any amount of time you'll know that one of my favorite things to write about is all the food that I get a chance to try while traveling. Germany was another chance to try some new stuff...
Having grown up in Philadelphia, I was excited to eat as many German soft pretzels as I could stuff into my gullet, which I did...at least three or four per day during my visit. Trust me, I definitely overdid it with the pretzels! I also had the chance to try a new-to-me local specialty drink called apfelwein.
Apfelwein is an apple-based (alcoholic) cider that's from the Hesse state (and region) of Germany of which Frankfurt is one of the main cities. It looks sort of like pineapple juice because of its "milky" yellow-gold color. With my love of all things sour, like Sour Patch Kids for example, the puckery-apple flavor was right on target. This was the first apfelwein I had during the trip. I enjoyed it and some local pound cake along with our gracious hosts while we hung out on the Main river:
The glass, called a Geripptes ("ribbed" in German), that apfelwein is served in is also a tradition. From what I understand, the diamond pattern was first created back when people would eat greasy food with their hands and they had a hard time keeping the glass from slipping. I'm not sure if that's true but it's cool that they've kept the tradition alive. Apfelwein and the Geripptes are such a part of the local culture that a local office building was built in the style of the glass!
One night while we were in town, we went to a modern Japanese dance show at a local theater with our hosts and a couple of their friends. It's actually kind of funny because I (from the U.S.) went to a Japanese dance performance in Germany with people from Colombia and China (we did have one local but he was from another area of Germany) followed by an Italian dinner. How many times have you gotten to cross off six countries at one time? It was a very fun and interesting night. Here's the apfelwein-in-a-bottle that I had that night:
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