Essen and Trinken (Eat and Drink) to Ring in the New Year

Colmar, France

My parents were here to visit for a week between Christmas and New Years. We tried to see a lot while they were here, but it was also nice to just have them around to be with us. Unfortunately, the weather was consistently foggy and cold with little snow on the ground in Basel; we would have liked to enjoy more outdoor activities otherwise.

However, we literally got our full of giving them a tour of food while they visited! Our major food adventure was cooking a Christmas goose at home. We hadn't cooked one before and since it's an Old World tradition, we thought this would be a perfect European holiday meal to share. A goose is smaller than a turkey and all dark meat and it was a fun experience. We paired it with chicken and mozzarella wrapped in blattertieg (similar to puff pastry) and decorated to look like a bunny (or mouse?). All part of a feast! During the week, we also made cheese fondue at home. We dipped bread, pears, onions and pickles in the cheese. Yum!

 

And I have to mention the sweets too. We had plenty of excellent Swiss chocolate, but also traditional holiday sweets like marzipan, nougat and Christstollen (a fruited bread).

We did two day trips. One was to Colmar for a Christmas market (charming and much like the one in Basel). We made sure to come home with some Alsatian wine (Colmar is in the Alsace region of France).  We also took the train to Bern, the capital of Switzerland (in a double-decker!). Bern's Old Town was lovely to walk around. A major attraction is the bears of the city: bears live in a park on the banks of the river Aare. We didn't get to see the bears because they were hibernating, but the bears and their predecessors have lived in the city since it was named. (The name Bern is derived from the word for "bear".) Their latest park, which was built in 2009, is a major improvement over the "pits" that they used to live in. The bears are also a symbol on the city clocktower, which has been in operation since the 1500's. There are mechanical bears that circle around, to the right of the lower clockface.

New Year's Eve was memorable, with church bells ringing loudly at midnight and a surprisingly lively neighborhood fireworks display. There were plenty of professional-looking fireworks going off in our normally quiet neighborhood. We didn't even miss seeing the Basel fireworks, which we couldn't see from the house because of the weather.

We all made sure to have a bite of the lucky marzipan pig! We saw so many window displays with pigs for the New Year this week. The pig is a good luck symbol and traditionally given between Christmas and New Years. He is holding a four-leaf clover and mushroom (we also saw plenty of the mushrooms as holiday decorations; more about this in a future blog entry). The lucky pig symbol is based on agricultural prosperity; the pig can live off of very little, provides a lot of meat, and breeds well. In German, "ich habe Schwein gehabt" means "I was lucky", but literally translates to "I have had pig".

May you have health, luck and prosperity in the New Year!