Some Baking Impressions from Germany - SIGH!
Visiting my family and friends in Germany I took some photos I want to share.
My friend Michaela likes shopping at an organic farm store at Gut Wulfsdorf. I never sah Laugenbaguettes (pretzel baguettes) or Laugencroissants (pretzel croissants) before. The baguettes tasted quite nice, the crumb was airy but a bit chewier than regular one.
The breads are baked in a wood fired oven at the farm bakery. (This is a batch of Easter Bunny Cookies.)
All breads are baked at the same time, for one hour, but in different places in the oven, where temperatures are higher, or lower.
They use only beech wood, or beech wood shavings, from a local forest, to achieve an even temperature (they tried it once with mixed wood, and that didn't work).
Their whole grain flours are milled on the premises.
The vegetable section in the store: six different kinds of heirloom carrots, in red, yellow, white and black.
My cousin Uta has an incredible bakery around the corner. This is a Sunday breakfast basket - every one of these rolls tasted great.
SIGH!!!
And she baked us a wonderful Chocolate Apple Torte (I never heard of this flavor combination before - the apples went well with the rich chocolate frosting).
And when I visited the Hansetown Wismar, an UNECO world heritage monument - here the "Alter Schwede" (Old Swede) restaurant
we had in a nearby cafe this Marzipan Torte. It was really difficult to choose from Cafe Hegede's selection of mothwatering cakes.
SIGH!!!!!
Comments
I love being a vicarious bread tourist.
Karin
Wonderful photos and thanks again for the interesting tour. It's great to see such a wide selection of baked goods from around the world. I have never been to Europe yet, but hopefully one day I will get to visit. For the time being I appreciate your keen view!
Regards.
Ian
I hope you will have the opportunity to travel in Europe and Germany, my stepdaughter joined us for the first time, she had never been to North Germany, and really liked it.
Karin
Thank you for the tour, Karin. That bread rack could leave a bread lover paralyzed with indecision and with the breakfast basket your cousin puts together breakfast could go on all day! Wonderful stuff. Oh, and the marzipan torte is completely out of control! Sigh indeed.
Marcus
Marcus, I wish I had the recipe for that marzipan torte. I tried to convince my daughter (chef) to train in a German or Austrian Konditorei (pastry bakery), but no such luck...
Karin
Beautiful breads and tortes, wish I had some now! Love seeing baked goods from other countries :)
Thanx for sharing, Karin! great photos and nice virtual tour of the bakeries. Looks like you had a really good time!
Happy Easter!
codruta
I did have a good time, the first two days we could even sit outside in a cafe at the Alster (big lake in the middle of Hamburg). I'm always looking for new bakeries and breads, hoping to get some new ideas about scoring and patterns (and found some - see my next blog post).
Karin
is since you are from Hamburg, the home of hamburger, traveling there for pleasurable root finding, did you have a good hamburger there, possibly with hemp seeds on the bun?
These things bother me and I can't sleep as well as I should :-)
As my American husband puts it, culture finally has come to Germany with Golden Arches and Burger Kings. (Staples is there too, but Walmart gave up, not being allowed to go below wholesale prices.)
Yeah, I was a few times tempted to enjoy a real value meal, but my fondness of Brötchen, herring, Turkish döner and potato pancakes with apple sauce always won.
Or of that here:
The only time I came close to the real deal was when we visited "Currywurst Company" in Hamburg, where we had the choice between the "Classic", the "Berliner", the "Fiery" and several other variations. Currywurst was invented in Berlin, a bratwurst, cut in big pieces and served with a more or less hot curry sauce, with additional curry sprinkled on top. It was served with a bun - but no hemp seeds, too bad. The restaurant instead had equipped every table with an iPod dock (it was that fancy!).
I hope I could alleviate your worries - and don't forget to check in my next blog post: THERE'S MORE!
Karin
to get decent, authentic, real hamburger in Hamburg is disturbing to no end! Now I won't sleep for a week :-)
Is that an apple blueberry tart by chance? Maybe I could forget about hamburgers in Hamburg after all.......
to inflict such pain on you! The apple cake has no blueberries (those would be good, too) but raisins, soaked in calvados or apple schnapps. Quite nice! (This is actually a cake I made myself).
Karin
It always amazes me how farmer's market produce (and the produce above) looks like the produce I remember my grandfather growing in his garden.
The produce I see at Safeway looks like a Stepford Wives version: It's looks too good to be true. (And, I guess, it isn't, being what results from herbicides, pesticides, and every other -cide this side of Monsanto).
Many grocery chains put special lighting in the produce section to make their tired, old goods look fresh and lively. Bring that luscious-looking tomato out from under the reddish lights above the shelf and then take another look at it -- it may not appear so appetizing.
The subterfuge of the supermarket knows no bounds.
(I inherited the land my grandfather lived off of. I think it's time to take out my coveralls, hoe, shovel, and get a'plantin'.)
in that market I had never seen before, I would have liked to have a kitchen to prepare some of those, Thomas.
My favorite lettuce, mâche tastes much stronger in Germany, the leaves are larger and darker, whereas the ones you get here in Maine don't look and taste much different from baby spinach.
The tricks to make wilted vegetables look more appetizing - I had no idea, Dsadowsk, but I believe it.
Karin
Karin,
Thanks for sharing photos of your trip! I am a living-room traveler and it is always so nice to view trips that people here take and then post for us to see. Mouth watering indeed. If I ever were to travel I would have my itinerary already set long before boarding a plane.
Loved seeing behind the scenes in the bakery you visisted.
I loved the looks of their grain mill. Did you by chance ask them how they keep the grains cool when milling? Do they store the grains in the refrig. before milling or anything special to protect the flour from the milling temps generated by the friction of the stones?
Glad you had a nice visit and glad you posted your photos here :-)
Take Care,
Janet
I didn't think of asking the baker how they keep the grains cool during the milling. As far as I could see, the bags with grains were standing right next to the mill.
They bake about 200 breads per day, and not all of them are whole grain, therefore, with that big stone mill, the temperature probably doesn't get too high.
I would have liked to ask more, but the poor guy had been up since 4:00 am, and other people had questions, too.
Take care,
Karin
deserts, tortes, produce, restaurants, cookies and freshly milled flour - You must be on vacation!!!!
Thanks for sharing the photos and verse.
I'm still try to figure out what fine bread of yours to put hemp seed in, on or both :-)
I vote for on AND in the Alsatian Beer Bread.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/26559/pain-%C3%A0-la-bi%C3%A8re-alsatian-beer-bread
I think I've made it ten times since she posted it–because there's always room for beer. And bread! And hemp! And seed! And beer bread with hemp seeds!
Beer bread with hemp seeds wins hands down - without any close competition whatsoever - just as it should be !!!
For the first time I was a tourist in my hometown Hamburg (staying in a hotel), a very strange feeling.
I actually made a hemp seed bread (Nils Schöner's "Pain au Levain with Walnuts and Hemp Seed") a while ago, it was very nice, I should make it again and post about it.
Happy baking,
Karin
Thanks for photos and tour hanseata,
The cracked surfaced rye breads in the first photo are amazing .... and they mill their own wholegrain flours ... Fantastic!
a real treat .. thank you
Cheers,
Phil
I thought the same, Phil, and would have bought one, if I had not stayed that weekend at my friend's house.
Cheers back,
Karin
Hello Karin:
What a wonderful trip you must have! The cakes and breakfast basket is to die for.
About the veggies in the store: I didn't know that there are so many kind of carrots!!! I only got one kind, the orange kind at the grocery store here in Moneta, VA. (which tasted hardly sweet.) I had a shock when I tasted one in Chiangmai, Thailand 3 weeks ago. It was short and stubby like the one in the picture but it tasted like sugar. According to the store owner, the gardener harvested it two days ago. To have breads( with flour mill on the premises) and cakes that are so gorgeous like yours would only be a dream at my little village in VA. Sigh!
Thank you for sharing.
mantana
would be a great place for such a farm bakery, too, Mantana, and I could dream about a cafe with pastry like the ones I had.
Karin
What a tour, Karin! lovely array of breads... i'm sure they must taste great, too. Its germany afterall.
Thanks a lot for the tour, Karin. This is truly what makes this community special, when members like you capture bread beauty from different parts of the world, and share pictures with us.
Thanks, Karin.
my long suffering husband only rolled his eyes when I had to take another shot at breads or pastry - and those are not the last ones (see my next blog post).
Karin
German bread and cakes - about as good as it gets. And such a variety! Drool (sorry - not much of an image to leave off on)!
Cheers
Ross
you are so right! I would have loved to try every one of those.
Karin
there's more to follow - see my next blog post (the best of all husbands didn't roll his eyes for nothing!)
Happy baking,
Karin