A Busy Weekend So Far

Well, it was the typical Friday night for me I guess. I met a friend of mine, Ted, and went to the 7 Stern Bräu (49-Stiftgasse), a favorite restaurant and brewery or mine in the 7th district, for a few drinks before going to a party in the 18th district. The food there is great, and my favorite dish is the Käsespätzle, a dish consisting of small oval-shaped noodles, onions, cheese, and bacon. They brew 7 of their own varieties of beer including a chili beer which I am told tastes like you are drinking a sausage! I've never tried the chili beer, but the beer they brew with hemp (Hanf) has a unique taste to it. I wasn't aware that hemp was a very popular flavoring for beer in Europe during the middle ages until, at least according to the menu, the 1516 German Purity Law (Reinheitsgebot) specified that you could not produce beer with any ingredients other than water, malt, and hops.

I decided today to head down to Stephansdom (U1,U3-Stephansplatz), the mammoth cathedral that is at the very center of Vienna in the 1st district. It is such a large building and it is packed so close to the surrounding buildings that it is really difficult to get a good picture of the outside. Unfortunately, my pictures of the inside also did not come out so well, so I will retake and edit those in when I get a chance.

I attended Mass at the cathedral today and the music was incredible. The prelude was J.S. Bach's Chorale Prelude Jesus Christus, unser Heiland; during the mass, they performed Haydn's Salve Regina in G Minor for solo-quartet, continuo, and strings; and the postlude was the Mozart Kirchensonate in E-flat major. Colin mentioned to me that the services at the cathedral were a great place to hear good music for free, and I'd have to agree! I'm going to post some pictures of the organs in the cathedral as well, but I need to retake them.

After Mass I walked down Graben, one of the main streets and shopping centers in the 1st district which is open to pedestrian traffic only. Towards the middle of the street you find the Pestsäule (plague column) which commemorates the end of the plague which struck Vienna in 1679.

When I was researching this sculpture I was surprised to learn that so many different artists collaborated on this project and that the overall design changed multiple times before its completion in 1693. At the other end of Graben is the Julius Meinl, an international grocery store of sorts where you can pretty much find anything you want from around the world. I am really hoping that I can find the ingredients to make good Tex-Mex for those times when I miss home cookin'!

Well, I guess this blog thing is going to be good for me because it's going to force me to learn the historical details that I tend to ignore a lot of the time! More to come...