Christoph drove us up to the mountain Schauinsland (meaning "look into the country") rather than taking the cable
car like we did last year. We get to high places with him.
It’s a twelve kilometer drive along the side of the
mountain, very curvy road! Motorcyclists love it and some crazy, to my mind, regular cyclists were riding up. Christoph said the mountain is configured like swiss cheese due to all the mining of it. We drunk in the view and had a nice lunch. Walking
down to the parking lot I saw a salamander, or small lizard, it moved too fast
for me to photograph.
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| View all the way to France |
For good pictures go to the following link.
Veggy fans, skip this paragraph.
We bought a grill and have grilled lamb and a good
steak on it. The grill actually puts grill marks on it like a BBQ would,
electric but works like a charm, very pleased with the purchase. Our oven is
great, having a dry, mixed dry and steam options but not quite so good for a
nice cut of meat that you would normally put on a BBQ.
Spargel, or asparagus is in season, we buy the green
variety and steam it to el dente. I like lemon juice on mine and Bruce likes a
new brand of Hollandaise sauce we found, he adds lots of tarragon to make it more
like we used to make from scratch.
Why is it that 90% of the trips we make to Zoo
Burkart, the pet food store, it rains and we miss the bus connection by two minutes? Each Way!
When it’s sunny, we don’t seem to miss, oh well we don't melt. Rabbits and gerbils were frisky this
morning, usually they are less so.
We’re in the meat shop and this woman says hello,
not unusual, but then she asks to borrow 10 Euro. She says she lives in our
building and will drop by later to pay it back. Honestly I didn’t recognize her
and may not ever see the 10 Euro back but put it down to helping someone in
need.
She dropped the 10 Euro into our mail box with a note saying Thank You! Oh
me of little faith.
I made lasagna! Haven’t done that in about twenty
years I’d guess but it was fun. Bruce was sous Chef this time, reading recipes
from the web and how to best put it together. Ah, the smell was delightful! It tasted very good too.
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| Uncooked |
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| Cooked |
Went to Ciao Bella, our local Italian for a bite of
lunch, since it’s lasagne tonight we didn’t want a heavy lunch. Decided a pizza
would be good because we can take half home. Best pizza either of has had for a
very long time! Now I know why people order take out from there. We also didn’t
have Parmesan cheese so ordered a bit of that too, they shred it fresh so it
was a good addition to the lasagne.
Restaurants in Rieselfeld are: three, yes, three
Donar places, two Italian, one Chinese, one Indian and several ice cream,
bakeries and coffee shops. There is a Gasthaus, typical German food outside
Rieselfeld but not far. My question is with choices somewhat limited why the duplication of ethnic foods?
We have used a product called Panko before,
basically spiced bread crumbs. It’s an oriental product used to coat shrimp
mostly. I stopped off at the oriental shop here in Freiburg and found it, well
after we needed it mind. We thought we’d need it to cook stuffed mushrooms which
we did three different fillings for. Reminded us of the New Years Eve party we held with
two other couples. We bought a lot of ingredients for appetizers and let each couple
figure out what to make from them. It was a fun evening with very creative and tasty results!
Had a very fierce storm march through this week,
both kinds of lightening, high wind and the weirdest hail I’ve ever seen. It was
uneven chunks of ice while the hail I’ve seen many times is usually round. We
have two solar globes outside, they are plastic and both got shattered with the hail. Our citrus trees and all
manner of vegetation suffered as well. Streets were lined with fallen leaves and branches. While it was beautiful from inside the flat, I was thankful not to be out in it.
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| Admittedly not the best picture... |
We spoke to a neighbour who’s car got dented, he
said 10,000 cars were damaged in Freiburg! Insurance and car body restoration companies will be very
busy the next few weeks.
A fact about doing business in Freiburg. We broke
the handle off a closet door, Christoph translated for us when the fellow came
to look at it. He will send us a quote in the post rather than email it. I read
that businesses do not respond to email and have encountered that myself. The post
here is fast but I still don’t understand, perhaps they just haven’t their
changed ways since it works for them?
I asked Christoph about this and he says a written
quote allows for the company to legally bill up to 30% more on the job over the estimate
or quote. It is also the first document they show for tax purposes. Small to
mid-sized companies pay lots of taxes, insurance and the paperwork is boggling.
Larger companies of 100 employees or more can negotiate with the government for
lower or no taxes, being of service to the area by employing so many people.
It’s a negotiation between the company and the government. Hmmm, doesn’t work
that way in Canada to my knowledge.
It was different with the glass, plastic cutter for
Bruce’s project. The fellow wanted cash so there was no documentation. He made a
mistake with the cutting so could not charge more when he had to correct it. “Sometimes
you win, sometimes you lose” would apply here.
We returned to Staufen and the Kornhaus for lunch.
Balmy day, good food and lovely village, always a favourite little stop.
Pictures on this previous post. http://bevbrucelexi.blogspot.de/2013/11/staufen-and-synchronicity-with-next.html
The
ride there and back to Freiburg is through the Kaiserstuhl with all the grape
farms winding up and down the hills. Roses are abundant in the villages.
Christoph said we could be in Tuscany which I thought fitting.
Cheers, Bx2 and Lexi Cat
