Eating ones way through Vienna

One thing has been for sure on this trip to Vienna, I will not be losing any weight. In fact, I would be shocked if I did not gain some weight. We have eaten so much food the previous 6 days. Some of it has been traditional Viennese food and some has not been. It is not M and my style to eat out so often. In fact, even when I go on these business trips, I will usually just eat some “street” for or stop by a grocery store. This week, since N is with us, we have to eat out to ensure that she gets enough food.

I guess we should divide this into different categories, to make it a little easier to read. Otherwise I would go from day to day. I guess we should start covering the street venders, which being Christmas time there are extra many of them. Then we will cover with the most traditional- Viennese food. Then finally we have to cover everything else.

I am not sure if this would actually be categorized as Viennese food or not, but from my observation they will be- chestnuts roasted over an open fire (Jack Frost nipping at your nose). Just about every other street corner had a chestnut proprietor. We found our favorite on the corner of Schottenring and Schottengasse. They were always fresh and were just about the least expensive ones we found. I think that over a period of 8 days, we had them 4 times, that is how good they are. The other street Viennese food we had was sausages from a street salesman. It was not until the last full day that I finally got my sausage. If M and N did not come, I would have ate one every single day for dinner (and saved a small fortune).

We actually only ate at one traditional Viennese restaurant. Still located in the city centre, but off of Am Hof square, Brezlg’wölb (1, Ledererhof 9) is an excellent choice for good food and phenomenal atmosphere (sadly the service was below sub-par at best). M had the weinerschnitzal and I had the dumplings. The dumplings were good, but the weinerschnitzal was fabulous. Yes, I was totally jealous of M and wished that I had ordered it myself.

A couple of nights later we went to an Austrian pancake house called Palatschinkenkuchl (1, Köllnerhofgasse 4). The place was small and cozy. The waitress was very helpful, even though she did not understand my German, but then again no one understands my German. The pancakes are not the traditional American or French style of pancakes, but more like an oven pancake which has been cut into little strips called kaiserschmarren. Then they are covered with powered sugar and preserved fruit. M had apples and I had plums, both of which were good.

Ironically M and I ate mainly at Italian places. N loves pasta, it is by bar her favorite type of food. She will eat almost anything, as long as pasta is included. The first night we ate at a little place behind the Börse- which was really bad. It looked bad before we ever went in, but thought that we would give it a try anyway. The other nights we went to a place closer to the hotel. Both of which were good, but not really worth mentioning. The other nights we had Japanese takeout from Mr. Wongs. It will never get a Michelin Star, but not a bad option. M has a favorite lunch option called Salado on Währinger Strasse- very kid friendly and reasonably priced. In fact, they thought that N was so cute, that they gave her a little treat.

With all that mentioned, how could we add anything. Well, we are missing one very important thing- the sweets. Vienna is known for their café life. We had several sweet breads from the different Christmas markets. M had a donut with cream filling. They filled the vanilla cream when she ordered it. They filled it up so much that the cream shot out of the donut the other side. I had a pretzel with coconut topping- different. The crème de la crème though was a visit to the Demel. This is one of the oldest cafés in Vienna and one of the upper class ones. I had a snowball and M had apple strudel. Of course we had coffee to go with it. What a café culture, with about 20 different types of coffee- putting Starbucks to shame (plus if you have kids and a stroller, they have an elevator that you can take, though it is a little difficult to find).

When one comes to Vienna, food is not the first thing one would think of. I personally would think more on the alcohol side then the food side, but the everyone has several options in all price ranges.