Thank you, Betty Crocker

It is true that people in Germany love American cookies. They are "different" apparently than the regular cookies you find here (so I'm told). Anyway, Zev and my theory on what Germans like American cookies so much, is because they are sweeter than German cookies. And who doesn't like a nice, sweet, gooey cookie?

So I baked some Brownies for my German class and brought them in to school. They were eaten before you could say "Danke Shoen" which I thought was nice. Of course I was asked "did you make them yourself" to which I replied "yes, with help from my friend, Betty Crocker." It wasn't until after the class when my neighbor, Jasmine from China, asked me "could you please tell your friend Betty Crocker thank you for the brownies" that I realized that perhaps not everyone knew what I meant.

I wonder if Betty Crocker is friend's with Sara Lee?

Happy Thanksgiving all. Even if you don't celebrate Thanksgiving in your part of the world, I encourage you to take some time and reflect on the blessings you have to be thankful for. It will feel nice to do it. Just like a gooey Betty Crocker brownie.

The first signs of Christmas.

I know that we haven't even celebrated Thanksgiving yet, but I have been feeling in the Christmas mood for about 3 or so weeks now! Have you, too? I love Christmas! I think that living in Europe helps add to the romance and joy of Christmas. Every little town here seems to have their very own quaint little Christmas market. The Esslingen Christmas Market (Weihnachtsmarkt) and adjacent Middle Ages Market (Mittlealtemarkt) starts on Tuesday. I have already watched them build a little each day this week. You know I will be there. The Stuttgart Weihnachtsmarkt officially starts on Tuesday also. Tonight Zev and I popped into downtown Stuttgart to check out the ice skating rink and the beginnings of the Christmas market. It truly looks magically and the fun hasn't even started! Just all the lights twinkling at night. Sipping on hot Gluwein while watching people skate round and round to retro music. Just lovely.

So here are the first pictures we took from the Stuttgart Christmas Market. We ran into fellow Americans who also live in Stuttgart, Ryan and Laura, who were also on their way to the skating rink! Hope you guys had a lovely evening!!

Hope you have a great week, and for those who celebrate Thanksgiving- Happy Thanksgiving!

I thought their booth decorations were appropriate- ice skating theme!

German festival= German festival candy with writing on it. When in Germany.....

The ice-skating rink and surrounding tents.

A little stall being set up.

On comes the star...

I can't wait to see this model railway in action!! How cute is this model German village? Reminds me of sweet Esslingen.

The window display in one the department stores- the figures are made entirely of Lego!!

Zev looking in the store window. I loved the little Lego girl...

Little lego kids playing in a snowy German Lego land.

German class and a whole other world out there

Hallo! Here we are practicing our conversational skills with each other- we had to role play being at a party and asking each other questions. I am standing with Daniel from Australia, Wau from Brazil and Mohammed from Egypt.

Sheila from the Phillipines, Jeong-Hoon and Moon-Hee from South Korea (very cute newlyweds) and Rachel from France. I am learning so much about other cultures and countries as well as learning German with this class!

Going to watch Leerang in concert. Amazing talent displayed by these music school students!!

We watched a full concert for 5 euro!

How cool is this organ in the background? It was amazing to see this young lady play such beautiful music on such an enormous instrument!

You can kind of see Leerang in the far back, far right. She was the only tuba player!

I thought I would blog today about what I spend most of my days doing here- learning German. I attend a wonderful school in downtown Stuttgart (along with my best friend here, Adele), and I absolutely love it. Class is from 8.30am until 1pm every day. It is amazing how much of a language you can pick up if you study it for about 5 hours every day!! German (in my opinion) is a hard language to learn, but I am getting there and can actually speak conversational German with my classmates. Our next door neighbors now just speak to me in German (and even correct me when I pronounce something wrong- like "ich wuensche dir einen schonen Tag" as opposed to "ich wuensche dir einen schoenen Tag.") What's the difference you ask? Well it's all in the pronounciation and a little thing called "umlauts." If you say "schonen" then this means "already" or something has already happened. The word with the umlaut, "schoenen" means beautiful or nice. So I was saying "have an already day" as opposed to "have a nice day." ANYWAY, I am taking these classes in order to pass the University level German entrance exam (to study at a uni next year, God willing!!). My class at this school is VERY cool- we have students from South Korea, including one very musically talented young lady called Leerang, who is attending the local Conservatorium of music here in Stuttgart; as well as students from Brazil, the Phillipines, Egypt, China, and.....AUSTRALIA! Yes, there is a guy from Melbourne, Australia in my class, and it is cool to hear the Aussie accent and banter about the rivalry between Sydney and Melbourne. Here are some pictures taken by Jasmine from China, including some from our trip to the Conservatorium of Music to watch Leerang play the tuba in concert last week! Side note- even though I take German class every day, you should see Zev use the German he picks up from the street when ordering stuff at the store- he has a good ear for languages too! Now if only he would let me teach him Spanish.......Auf Wiedersehen! Fifi xoxoxo

Fall Bike Riding

Today, Zev and I set out on a fun bike ride through the woods up the back of our house. The weather was cool and crisp, and the leaves were simply gorgeous- yellows, oranges, reds, browns. Fall is really a beautiful time of the year. We definitely got a good workout, traversing through the hills (and I mean HILLS!) up to a spot called "Jagerhaus", and then on to another mountain top called "Katherinenlinde" where we ate a late lunch at one of our (ok, my) favorite restaurants in town, "Uferlos." They seriously serve the world's BEST salads there, and they are so tasty. The "small" salad is enormous and that is the one I got. Everything tastes good there, it is really good value (not expensive at all, and actually quite cheap) and you just feel warm and cosy inside like you are visiting someone's house. Then we rode down the hill to our house, and here I am, still in my bike riding clothes, posting this because I want to share with you the beauty in the little things in life.

I could just sit and stare at this gorgeous mini waterfall...the colors of the leaves are different every time we pass it. So peaceful and quiet....

Guess we can't tease our German friends anymore- when we first arrived here, we remarked how funny we thought it was that the Germans seem to like wearing matching "outfits" to go bike riding. Even my German teacher agrees that it is a "German thing." I mean, we have seen couples in their sixties cruise past us in matching bikes (very nice bikes too), matching helmets, matching spandex tops and bottoms...and now, I guess you can say we are just trying to blend in to the culture. Our bikes are slightly different colors though!

I love this man. How about his huntin' cap to go bike riding? That's my Zev!

Zev counting sheep. This was up by Katherinenlinde. First time we have seen sheep up there!!

Hmmm.....it's nice and warm here...

I'll have....the usual thanks!

I am very happy. Can't take my ear warmers off though, sorry. I don't like cold ears!

This is the "small" portion. For like 6 Euro 50 cents. Can't beat that!

You don't have to travel far to have a really enjoyable day and see something new and beautiful, and today was a perfect example of that. God bless and take care, Fifi and Zev xoxo

French Cooking 101

My sweet friend, Adele, and I walk to school (our German language school) every day. I drive to her house in town and park in her parking spot, and we walk down to our school which is right in downtown Stuttgart. I love hearing about the yummy things that she cooks for her husband, and Zev and I have even been lucky to experience some of her cooking, whenever we have been invited to their house for dinner. And it is GOOD food too!! Anyway, on one of our walks, we came up with the hair-brained idea to host lunch at our house on a weekly basis, rotating from house to house every other week. The plan is teach each other how to cook a dish from our homeland (I get to choose from Australia AND the US!! I'm thinking about Mexican for our first round. Wooo hooo!!) This week Adele showed me how to make quiche- from scratch. We were talking about this plan one morning when she asked me how I like to make my "pastry" or crust for the quiche. I've never honestly made quiche before, so I said "make the crust? I just buy it. Don't you?" Hmmm, nope, she makes hers from scratch!! We invited our friend, Hend, to join us for lunch at Adele's house the day after the cooking lesson. It looks like Hend might join us in our cooking lesson round robin- I can't wait to learn how to cook some yummy Lebanese dishes! Zev likes this exercise too, because I bring him a sample of what we have cooked. Thanks for the lesson, Adele! I look forward to our next session!

Adele has the cutest kitchen- with lots of great accessories from Ikea and some very cool appliances.

I was on chopping detail.

Step 1: Make the crust.

Adele's super cool crust-maker-machine.

Looking good.

Isn't this a great idea to store your spices? The tins have magnetic bottoms.

Tomatoes from Adele's garden outside.

Adding water to the dough.

Kneading the dough.

Mise en place. (Adele that one's for you, from Zev ;-))

Creme Fraiche, Curry Powder and Riccotta Cheese.

Mix it all together.

Roll out the dough.

Line the tin with the crust.

Add a thin layer of "sharf senf". AKA "sharp mustard."

Start layering the ingredients.

Spoon in some of the egg mixture.

Keep repeating.

Add some riccotta cheese and ham to spice up the tomato layer.

Mushrooms from Adele's grandparent's farm in France- they may be a little hard to find in the US, but I am sure any mushroom will work ;-)

A light dusting of curry powder on one of the layers.

The finished product, ready for baking.

 

Voila -- DELICIOUS!!

Let's have lunch!

Don't forget dessert! Hend is a dietician (strawberries, cream, vanilla wafers) - it must be healthy!