Glühwein

So a few weeks without a post and what have I been up to? 175 cm. Well normally I tell somethings about and to go along with the picture I have taken, but I have not remembered to take many pictures.

What can I say? Being a student is tiring.

I have been to the Weihnachtsmarkt few times with friends, they have the largest Christmas tree in Germany (or so I have been told) here and tried Glühwein, but I never got my camera out. I may see about going on a visit this week just to take pictures.

There has been a stand for Waffeln und Glühwein outside the Mensa for a while. I never associated waffels with Christmas before. Oh, and there was also a Weihnachtsmann in blue (or was it green?) costume. Through which I learned that this used to be common, but thanks to Coca-Cola St. Nicholas is dressed in red.

Did you know he delivers goodies on the 6th of December, which is St. Nicholas day? I am learning so much! At least here in Germany, Poland, and Romania. I think it is for most of Europe, but those ones I am sure about.  

Christmas and some Birthday presents arrived almost two weeks ago. By chance, I was at home to receive some of them, but I ended up making a trip to Herne to pick up a package from the UPS. Not a trip I will make again, out to the industrial portion of Herne. Next time I will just redirect it to the offices of my program at the Universität. I did get to walk throught the Weihnachtsmarkt  in Herne; it is much smaller.

Last Monday, the international office had its Second-Monday Party hosted by the Mathematics Fakultät. They had us make Christmas cookies. They had cookie cutters of each continent, and, after I showed were NM lies on North America, I got bored. I made some stars, ate some dough, and then decided that South America looked like a raptor tail.

 So South America made up the main body and tail, the rest came from cutting the dough with Africa.

 There was lots of fun to be had. Waffeln to eat, Kakao to drink, and dough to play with.

Sadly for Australia cat, there were casualties. But really from the first look at him, you knew he was a blood thirsty killer like every other raptor.

Last night Heidi had a Christmas party at her apartment. Everyone brought presents, white elephant style, and  we played a fun game with them. For the first part, the presents were put on the table in the center there, and we had two dice passing around the circle. If someone rolled a six, they got to choose a present off the table, but not unwrap it. Once all the presents were gone, Heidi set a timer with no one else knowing how much time it was set for. We then started rolling again, but when you rolled a six you got to steal a present from someone. It was great. Presents kept getting stolen back and forth (one in-particular had such focus as to become IT), some people had a large pile for a few minutes only to become the target of all thieves, and lots of laughs were heard in the room with a few groans. Finally after an hour or so the timer went off, and those who had some presents went around opening them in turn.

Now one more week before the break. And nothing large planned yet, so we will see when I write again...

Auf Wiederlesen,

Nic

Thanksgiving (oder Hüttenkäse)

So last week was Thanksgiving, and true to form, I decided to have friends over for a meal. This means the week before Thanksgiving I finally got around to inviting people. And then the Monday before my roommate (flatmate?) and I went to Ikea to get kitchen ware so I could actually cook the Thanksgiving meal.

 Mixing bowls, wooden spoons, plates for everyone, rubber spatula/scraper (what is the proper name for it?), glass pans to cook in the oven (9"x13" -ish), and all the other odds and ends that were needed. Well once we got it all home, I got excited looking through my recipe box and decided to make my sister's Manicotti recipe that night --not really having the equipment to cook had been limiting my culinary possibilities. Off to the store I went, on a harrowing 300m journey (not really, but as most will have no sense for how far 300m is I can play around).

Garlic, noodles, spaghetti sauce, and mozzarella (still in water) were all easy to find, but for the life of me I could not find cottage cheese. I wandered up and down the milch products, but I could not find it. Finally, I broke down and decided to ask at the "Cheese Counter".

 --Now while I now there are deli and butchers counters in american grocery stores, I have never approached them before, and I always remember them looking empty, maybe one attendant. Now in this German grocery store, there is a butcher's counter, with vast displays of jelled meats, ground meats, sausages, and cuts, and a cheese counter, with large wheels of different cheeses, with a couple of happy looking attendants just waiting to help. And I, worried about making a fool of myself with my scant knowledge of German, had avoided them up to this point.--

So, with not a little apprehension, I approached and asked the lady at the "Cheese Counter". Not having looked up the German term for cottage cheese, I first tried to see if she new it by its English name. No luck. Then to describe it. Hmm... how does one describe cottage cheese? I tried to explain it was little pieces. She took me back to the milch row were again we looked without finding it. Oh well. Then I asked her about parmesan. "Ah. Parmesan. Ja genau. komm." she said. So, I got myself a nice chunk of aged parmesan and grabbed a bag of random grated cheese to substitute for cottage cheese.

Then I started looking for hamburger, but I couldn't find any packaged hamburger. I knew I had seen it, and made another round of the store. That is when I realized I had seen in the discounter next door, which had no butcher, cheese, or fish counter. So happy with my interaction at the "Cheese Counter", I headed for the butcher's counter. There I did not see just ground beef. I did see a beef and schweine mix which looked just like what I would expect for hamburger, which brought to mind a dream like memory that the hamburger in the US is also a pork and beef mix, so I got a half kilo, payed for all and headed home.

 Fear of food counters = CONQUERED!!!

It took a while to stuff the noodles, but my dinner was delicious. Thank you Martha!
I looked up cottage cheese, it is Hüttenkäse, and now, armed with its proper name, I am able to find it in stores.

So that began my week of "huh, I guess that is an American thing".
 Campbell's Condensed Cream of Mushroom for green bean casserole I substituted with a can of Eraco (Campbell Germany) Cream of Phillinger (probably spelled wrong; a kind of mushroom) soup and a packet of the same.
 Cool-Whip for the Jello salad was substituted with spray whipped cream. I was a little surprised at how little is really in a can.
 Not having made a pie -- which are a foreign concept for Germans, I have been told it is impossible to find a pie tin-- this year, I talked with friends about traditional Thanksgiving pies and they did not know what pecans  were. Gulp. While the German name is easy, Pekannuss, I have not found them. Even the guy at the Turkish(?) nut shop did not know it.

The Thanksgiving dinner was very good, seating being procured for everyone the day before. We ate, we drank, we told jokes.

Left to Right is Luiza, Domiki, Mehdi (my roommate), Anna, and Alex. All in Mehdi's room as the kitchen is small.

Also, Sedillo Park has been 1-uped.

Time for Christmas!!!

Nic