Christmas Treats

In just the first few days here, I've seen all sorts of pastries and confections: candied nuts, fruit and cream cheese concoctions, giant swirled spice rolls, and chocolates (in a two-story chocolate story complete with a chocolate volcano oozing molten chocolate lava).

This morning we tried a traditional German Christmas bread called Stollen, a sweet yeasted dough filled with dried fruit and marzipan and covered with powdered sugar.

Wes wasn't a huge fan, but I liked it. It was cirtrusy and sweet with a creamy almond paste filling.

Perfect with a little black coffee, as Sylvie knows.

I also had an unintentional but delicious glass of blood orange juice

We were at a coffee shop to use the internet, so I was trying to order something other than coffee, but there were no menus. There was a basket of oranges on the counter, so I picked one up and said, in the best German I could manage, "Ich möchte diese bitte," (I'd like this please). The older Turkish man running the shop laughed, took the orange from me, put it back in the basket, and disappeared with both. I thought perhaps I'd made some faux pas so serious as to necessitate removing the oranges entirely from view, but he returned a few minutes later with a tall glass of deep pink orange juice.