Autumn eats in Zurich

How do I know fall is here? The Wild [German for ‘game’ – the kind you eat, not the kind you play] menus posted outside almost every single restaurant in Zurich told me so. Despite the title, even vegetarians like me can rejoice in these seasonal culinary offerings. Good restaurants offer at least one fall vegetarian option, and the ones I’ve tested so far have been pretty delicious.

Seasonal starters include soups such as creamy porcini or pumpkin. For the main course, flakey pastries filled with wild mushroom ragù are popular, as are pumpkin ravioli. Or you could just go for a big plate of seasonal vegetables served with some spatzle. These fall vegetable plates can include red and white cabbage, chestnuts, chanterelles or other mushrooms, poached pears, Brussels sprouts, braised grapes, and cranberry sauce.

For the carnivores, there’re offerings such as deer schnitzel, jugged deer, and some sort of wild boar. These freshly-hunted meats are usually served with some sort of the vegetables I listed above.

The dessert menu swings a little seasonal, too. There are lots of berries and berry sorbets, and several other perfectly acceptable offerings. But there’s one I feel it’s my duty to warn you about. Even if you’re a chestnut aficionado, as I am, don’t get suckered into ordering the ‘vermicellis’ dessert. This is basically some sort of chestnut-sugar paste extruded into wormlike shapes and served with a meringue and a dollop of whipped cream. I don’t know exactly what they do to the chestnuts, but they come out tasting awful.

Apparently the Swiss don’t share my distaste for chestnut worms, because the stuff is EVERYWHERE. Not only has every restaurant in town added it to the menu, it’s also prominently featured in every pastry shop and supermarket. If only fresh roasted chestnuts were this easy to come by…

Tags: food, Switzerland, vegetarianism, Zurich

A day in Lyon

We spent a day in Lyon on our way back to Zurich from southern France. Our guidebook (The Rough Guide to Europe ) promised good things, so we decided to check it out.

We started the day by taking a funicular up a hill to see some Roman ruins and an archeological museum (which, truth be told, we burned through pretty quickly). We headed back downtown and popped into the Cathédrale St-Jean, where we learned how to tell the difference between good angels and bad angels.

Having met the tourist requirement for cultural and historical activities, we then set out to do some serious meandering, enjoying not having any particular goals for the rest of the day. Turns out Lyon is a nice city. It felt much bigger than Zurich (and probably is, I’m just too lazy to look it up), and it was full of people out and about.

Although Lyon is know for its cuisine, the trusty guidebook let me know that I shouldn’t get my vegetarian hopes up since “the specialties focus on meat and offal.” I’m not even sure what offal is, but it doesn’t sound particularly appetizing. We opted to just grab some savory crepes for lunch and continued exploring.

As we walked around town, we started noticing more and more people dressed like weirdoes. We figured something must be up. Carnival? Nope, wrong time of year. Some crazy French holiday? It turned out to be some extremely large dance festival-type-thing, and all the costumed folks were meeting up with their respective gaggles for the start of a giant parade. We entertained ourselves watching that for the rest of the day, and then caught the train home.

You know you’ve spent too much time in Europe when Roman ruins, ornate cathedrals, and quaint cobblestone walking streets fail to dazzle you. Lyon was nice and all, but I’m starting to feel somewhat jaded.

Tags: France, travel

Switzerland votes in stronger anti-immigrant laws

Last night we missed yet another riot in Zurich. This time it wasn’t anything as fun as a teenage boy band or an international soccer victory for Switzerland. Instead, it was a demonstration against the anti-immigrant laws that the Swiss voted into effect yesterday. This vote will severely tighten the political asylum laws of Switzerland, and also make things more difficult for all non-European foreigners looking to live and work in Switzerland.

We were eating dinner outside at a downtown restaurant when we heard and saw three police vehicles go by. These were followed by several vans filled with police in riot gear. We could only guess that they were going to the ‘demonstration’ that we had heard about on the tram (in the form of an announcement explaining why some trams were being diverted). By the time we finished eating and headed up to Central ourselves (reluctant parents in tow), the demonstration had moved on, and there were only a few remnants to show it had ever been there. According to this article in 20 Minuten, there were about 400 demonstrators, and the protest came to some mild altercations between police and demonstrators (rubber bullets were used).

The UN has come out against the results of the Swiss vote.

Tags: expat life, news, Switzerland, Zurich

Jul’s guide to successful living abroad

As a perennial expat, I often get asked for advice about how to survive and thrive while living in a foreign country. For your reading pleasure (and the edification of expats and future expats everywhere), I have composed the following list of my top tips. Don’t leave home without them.

Although this advice is primarily aimed at Americans moving abroad, the general concepts can be applied to those from other home countries as well (except Upper Volta).

• Expect everything to be exactly like it is in your home country. Complain loudly about any differences you do find.

• Don’t bother to learn the local language. Instead, treat any natives you encounter who don’t speak English as if they are deaf idiots.

• Whatever you do, don’t compromise your diet. Demand butter be served with the bread in restaurants (best to carry an emergency supply in your purse, just in case). Spend as much time and effort as required to seek out every last food item you used to eat at home. If necessary, spend CHF 11 for a jar of pickles (sorry Sara, couldn’t resist…). Require all your visitors from the US to bring you peanut butter, ranch dressing, and easy cheese.

• Every chance you get, tell the locals (preferably in your best ‘loud American’ voice) what’s wrong with the way they do things in their country. They will greatly appreciate your expert opinion.

Please let me know if I have left any important items off this list. Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to go teach the Swiss how to make a proper burrito.

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I almost forgot to add: this post was inspired by this Group Writing Project. Check out the other entries to learn how to do almost anything.

Tags: expat life

Eating and drinking our way through southern France

Wednesday evening we hopped on an overnight train to go visit our friends who live on the southern coast of France. Being on a French train and all, we had a couple of unscheduled delays, but in the end we were content to arrive at our destination a mere two hours late (yay, no strikes). We spent these extra two hours talking about how much we love Swiss trains, and vowing to never leave our country again.

Things only improved from there. Our friends picked us up at the train station and whisked us back to their home by the sea in St. Pierre la Mer, a tiny village of 500 inhabitants which swells to 100,000 during the tourist invasion of the summer vacation months. We spent the morning wandering the outdoor market by the beach, marveling at treats such as fresh almonds (which had furry green coats) and baby artichokes.

The afternoon was spent hopping from winery to winery, sampling everything the region had to offer. » Read the full post

Tags: cooking, Europe, food, France, travel, wine

New art for the Bahnhof (and I get interviewed for Swiss radio)

Move over Niki de St-Phalle’s angel, the ceiling of the Zurich train station just got a new tourist-distracter. This evening was the unveiling of NOVA, a three-dimensional LED display that makes trippy patterns and pictures from 25,000 spheres.

NOVA uses some of the same technology as the infamous Bahnhofstrasse Christmas lights, which were much complained about during their first December on display last year. The grey and white patterns were too stark even for this city.

Luckily NOVA is more colorful and interesting than the Christmas lights were, and we will supposedly be treated to ever-changing displays over the three years it is scheduled to grace the Bahnhof ceiling.

The unveiling involved some interpretive dancers in body suits and some equally weird music/sound effects. The engineers involved in NOVA’s creation were overjoyed that everything worked as planned. The crowd seemed mildly impressed with the whole thing. Maybe their lack of enthusiasm had to do with the display’s calming effects, which I learned about during this exchange:

Reporter (shoving microphone in my face): What do you think?

Me (in crappy German, which I warned him about so it’s his fault for wasting his time): Um, it’s nicer than the Bahnhofstrasse Christmas lights.

Reporter: Ah, yes. Do you find it calming?

Me: Um, hmmm, well, maybe.

Reporter: No, you don’t.

Me: Should I?

Reporter: That’s what they claim.

He then walked away, seemingly proud that he had found yet another bystander to confirm his ‘not calming’ theory. Can’t wait to tune in for that broadcast.
More pictures here.

Tags: art, Switzerland, Zurich

Boy Shooting: not as fun as it sounds

Today is a half day of vacation for many of the workers of Zurich. They all have the afternoon off so they can go watch children shoot at things. The holiday is called Knabenschiessen, which literally means ‘boy shooting’ (despite the name, girls are allowed to shoot at things too, at least since 1991). This tradition apparently dates back to the 17th century, when shooting skills probably actually came in handy during day-to-day life.

In honor of Knabenschiessen (or Chnaabeschüüsse in Swiss German) there was a large carnival in Zurich all weekend long, complete with rides, sugary deep fried foods, and carnies (I’m pretty sure this part dates back to the 1600s as well).

I’ll be skipping the actual shooting today, since I got my fill of fried foods and slowly-moving crowds yesterday. We visited the carnival and marveled at how similar it was to an American carnival, with just a couple subtle differences poking through. Instead of funnel cakes and candy apples, the big food items being hawked were apple fritters (Öpfelchüechli) and garlic bread (Chnoblibrot). That, and most of the crowd wasn’t obese.

It’s sights like this that really make me proud to be an American….

But seriously, why were there so many American-themed booths there? I don’t even think American carnivals are this American.

Tags: food, holidays, Switzerland, Zurich

Not that I’m actually considering starting my own religion…

The Swiss are big fans of silence. There are very strict rules about noise and when what types are allowed to be made. Many leases stipulate that activities such as vacuuming, laundry, and even showering may only occur during certain hours. (One thing I will never figure out is why this people with its noise aversion hasn’t yet embraced the concept of sound-proofing.)

Sunday is the day when noise is prohibited most of all. No laundry. No car-washing. No depositing your glass bottles in the recycling bins. No blowing your nose in public. (OK, I made that last one up.)

The big, glaring exception to this Sunday-noise-Verbot is churchbells. We must live within spitting distance of at least three churches I have never seen, because the bells come at us from all directions. Sometimes they all ring at once, and this sometimes for a solid 20 minutes or more. The Swiss churchbells ring more enthusiastically than I ever remember the ones in Italy to be, and this in a country where religion seems to play a rather minor role in people lives (at least compared to Italy and the US).

I actually love the sound of churchbells. They remind me of when I first moved to Italy, about 10 years ago. Every morning I would be woken up by the bells of the nearby monastery booming in my ears, and every time I would be overcome with giddy joy as I thought, “I live in Italy!”

But I digress. All this thinking about noise and churchbells has gotten me wondering… if the Christians are allowed to make all this extra noise on Sundays, shouldn’t other religions be able to as well? And how do they decide which religions get to make noise, and what kind? What if the Muslims wanted to set off firecrackers? The Jews wanted to play tubas? The Scientologists wanted to parade through the streets in alien costumes making alien noises?

I’m actually not even sure what the Swiss laws have to say about freedom of religion. All I know is that unless I adamantly and consistently insist that I do not belong to an organized religion, a big chunk of my earnings will be whisked away in the form of a church tax.

If you started a religion, how long would it take for the Swiss government to start helping you collect tax money from your followers or allow you to make noise on Sunday? What qualifications would there be? Membership counts? Is there a 100-point checklist somewhere to determine if you are a real religion?

But most importantly, once your newly-invented religion had official recognition from the government, what sort of noise would you insist you be allowed to make in order to honor your deity or deities of choice? I’m still thinking about this one.

Tags: Switzerland

I conquer the Zürichsee and ridicule Swiss ‘Mexican’ food (again)

On Friday afternoon I finally got to swim across the lake (that’s me in the picture, which was taken from the boat by my shark-attack-fearing husband). Unlike the day of our first attempt, the weather was gorgeous and there was not a cloud in the sky. We could see all the way to the snow-covered Alps. At 18˚ c, the water was a little, um, chilly, but the experience was still enjoyable.

After the swim, we went back to the Züricher Theater Spektakel for dinner. Although it was a fun place to sit, drink, and enjoy the evening, I was less than thrilled to be faced with the same food choices. But swimming across a lake can leave a gal so hungry that she’ll eat almost anything, so it worked out just fine.

Still, there’s something disturbing about a burrito topped with about a half a bottle of ranch dressing (which the Swiss seemed to have confused with sour cream). Our Swiss friends didn’t understand my objections to the dressing-drenched spice-free creation until I found an analogy for them: this was like them visiting us in the US and us bringing them to a restaurant which made fondue using bright orange American cheese. That seemed to drive the point home.

Needless to say, eating Mexican food still tops my list of things I’m looking forward to doing on my next trip back to the US.

More pictures from the day here.

Tags: food, swimming, Switzerland, Zurich