Here's a fun one. Fried chicken and Gruner Vetliner

A great combination, sounds to me. Not that far actually from the custom in Austria, mentioned occasionally here -- they serve a crispy fried breaded pounded veal "Vienna" cutlet -- idiomatically, _Wiener Sschnitzel_ -- with cool G. V. in Vienna, frequently. The tart wine plays off the rich crispy meat dish. "Southern Fried Chicken" with G. V. is like a New World salute to that tradition. (The Austrians are practical, they dropped the Habsburgs but kept the excellent food and wine.)

I bet G. V. would go superbly also with that brochette served (casually, as a snack or appetizer) at Galatoire's in New Orleans: a small skewer of fresh oysters wrapped in -- I'm not kidding -- strip bacon, THEN breaded and deep-fried, very crunchy; it could have been impossibly rich but is not, it's done with taste; G. V should go well with that too.

Just a thought . -- Max

But in fond remembrance of Franz Josef still retain Tafelspitz, at least in Vienna. ;-)

Mark Lipton

"Mark Lipton" in news: snipped-for-privacy@eudrup.ude...

"I'm disconsolate, Herr Hofrat," [Heinrich, the ancient headwaiter at Meissl & Schadn on Hoher Markt] whispered. "A regrettable accident in the kitchen. The Hofrat's _Tafelspitz_ has been cooked too long. It has --" Heinrich didn't have the strength to finish the sentence, but the tips of his fingers twitched, indicating that the meat had dissolved in the soup like snowflakes in the March sunshine. . . . "I have taken the liberty to order for the Herr Hofrat the rear part of the _Hieferschwanzl,_ close to, and very much like, the _Tafelspitz._" . . . / The Hofrat sat up stiffly. He cast one short, shocked glance at the meat. When he spoke, at last, his voice had the ring of arrogance -- arrogance instilled in him by generations of boiled-beef-eating ancestors who had been around in Vienna in 1683 while the city fought off the assault of the Turks and saved -- for a while, at least -- Western civilization. / "My dear Heinrich," the Hofrat said, with a magnificent sweep of his hand, and accentuating every single syllable, "you might just as well have offered me a veal cutlet." A slight shiver seemed to run down his spine. He got up. "My hat and cane, please."

-- "Tafelspitz for the Hofrat," in Joseph Wechsberg, _Blue Trout and Black Truffles : The Peregrinations of an Epicure,_ Knopf, 1954. Academy Chicago reprint, 1985 (ISBN 0897331346). Further reprinted by Academy Chicago, October 2000 (by request, I'll leave you to guess whose). More (or less) info at amazon.com . In 1993 and 1995 in Vienna I had difficulty finding food people who knew of Wechsberg but by 1996, Plachutta the Younger opined to me that this story was published originally there; anyway he was distributing copies with his restaurant's updated service of Tafelspitz. Not quite 24 varieties, but those I tasted deserved credit. (As for the Herr Hofrat's view, who can say?.)

Max Hauser

(Q: Where is Georg Sinzinger when we need him?)

I am really amazed how important wine, food, and lifestyle of our little country are to this group. I don't know your background, Max. But the depth and insight of your posts surmount the awareness of most Austrians.

To be true, most of this is pre-war stuff. But the stories are good and show quite well the "Hofrat mentality" our country and esp. Vienna is famous for. It is correct, Plachutta and esp. the "Hietzinger Bräu" provide excellent boiled beef. Personally as a "beef tiger" I prefer a good "Schulterscherzel" or "Beinfleisch" to "Tafelspitz". IMHO they are juicier and tastier than the old Kaiser Franz Josef and Hofrat meat.

Another issue in order to return to the topic: Grüner Veltliner seldom accompanies the Tafelspitz. Most people drink a Krügerl or Seiderl (big or small glass of beer). That's what I used to do as well while young. Now I drink beer as aperitif and wine to the meal.

Prost Martin

Salut/Hi Max Hauser,

le/on Wed, 16 Jun 2004 00:58:38 -0700, tu disais/you said:-

As a half hungarian, I MUST protest. While Vienna entirely unprepared for defence against seige cowered in terror, a handful of hungarians, holed up like rats in a castle, fought the entire Turkish Army to a standstill until the winter. The Turks, unprepared for the bad weather went home again, and by the next year, Vienna had become fortified.

Hey, you're not alone ;)

Prost

Vilco

BTW - where the hell did "Prosit" end up?

Hello Ian, Well, I always heard the story told this way: the Turks were attacking. The Viennese were keeping them outside of the walls of the city. But then the Turks did something truly dasterdly: they began lighting the vineyards on fire. The heathens! The horror! The Viennese promptly surrendered in order to spare the vines. Perhaps that was a different Turkish siege on Vienna, but it does bring us back to the focus of our newsgroup. And it's a great story.

-e. winemonger

And those Austrians do have a sort of version of fried chicken called Backhendel. I've been told that it's from the Styrian region, but is available all over. I have also been told that if you asked a Styrian which wine one should pair with it, he'd tell you to go home. (but to be the devil's advocate, I know a number of Styrians who would be happy to recommend a pairing) I enjoyed it with beer. e. winemonger

Dear Ian,

Cut to: Türkenbelgerung II,- impale them harder. This time around an ambitious young Turkish vizier by the name of Kara Mustafa Pasa had the grand idea of paying Vienna a visit with an army of 200.000 Osmans. Guess who gave him the grand idea: None other than Hungarian Magnate Duke Thököly. It was largely at his instigation that the sultan undertook his expedition against Vienna, and in 1683 Thököly joined the Ottoman forces under Kara Mustafa in the siege of good old Vienna. It took a Polish charge, led by King Sobieski, to get the Viennese out of this one. By the by, his name is also spelled Tokoly,- not to be confused with Tokaji, the delicious Hungarian sweet wine made from the Furmint grape (just to keep it on topic)

Respectfully,

Stephan

Backhendl, actually. Sorry! ;-)

Can't say I recall seeing it either in the Osttirol or Vienna, but I may not have been looking hard enough...

Viele Gruße, Mark Lipton

Which is why the Flying Hussars are still commemorated by various businesses in Vienna. Oh, and there was also that plot to tunnel under the wall that was foiled by the bakers, leading to the invention of the croissant (the perfect accompaniment for the coffee left behind by the Turks).

Mark Lipton

Here's another. Empires have come and gone in the indefinitely long history of that city-state, but sometimes they leave good ideas behind. (The Ottoman Turks left coffee, for one; thence it spread to the rest of Europe, by popular tradition. Even if the first coffee houses in Paris in the late

The Romans, back to the story, were one empire of many, Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antonius, I believe, decreeing that residents of the district could sell their own wine without tax "in perpetuity," this statute being honored ever since, one reason why the metropolitan area is surrounded by myriad small or household wine bars, often with food (_Heurigen,_ etc.). Also why Marcus Aurelius (Germ. "Marc Aurel") has been long regarded there as A-O-K, as they say in the USA.

Max Hauser

Totally impossible. Every child in Vienna learns that the turks besieged Vienna twice, and both times in vein: 1529 and 1683.

M.

] Salut/Hi Max Hauser, ] ] le/on Wed, 16 Jun 2004 00:58:38 -0700, tu disais/you said:- ] ] >> But in fond remembrance of Franz Josef still retain Tafelspitz, ] >> at least in Vienna. ;-) ] ] >the ring of arrogance -- arrogance instilled in him by generations of ] >boiled-beef-eating ancestors who had been around in Vienna in 1683 while the ] >city fought off the assault of the Turks and saved -- for a while, at ] >least -- Western civilization. ] ] As a half hungarian, I MUST protest. While Vienna entirely unprepared for ] defence against seige cowered in terror, a handful of hungarians, holed up ] like rats in a castle, fought the entire Turkish Army to a standstill until ] the winter. The Turks, unprepared for the bad weather went home again, and ] by the next year, Vienna had become fortified. ] ] Spoken like a whole hungarian! Adele is half also, so between you there is a whole one. (Her Dad came to the US in 56.) It's a very old family, and believe it or not the crest is ... the bloody head of a turk! Charming.

-E

Salut/Hi winemonger,

le/on 16 Jun 2004 18:38:54 -0700, tu disais/you said:-

Ah but that was the following year. The siege at the castle of Buk (if my memory serves me right) DID stop Mustafa but of course didn't prevent him for still wanting to take Vienna. So I think it was the following year that he came back, but by then Vienna was defended.

I don't think that's right, I'm not sure that Vienna ever fell.

Salut/Hi Stephan Schindler,

le/on 16 Jun 2004 20:43:56 -0700, tu disais/you said:-

Who was a protestant, and whose faith had been systematically persecuted by the (Catholic) Hapsburgs.

But of course the Hungarians have a racial genius for fomenting revolution and rebellion, only equalled by their genius for being on the wrong side in conflicts. That's the only thing that _really_ worries me about the enlargement of Europe, Hungary has come in!!!

Unless I'm mistaken, the siege I was thinking about was conducted by Suleiman the magnificent almost 100 years earlier.

in Vienna. Oh, and there was

to the invention of the

True, there is this place Die Drei Husaren (The three Husares) my parents used to go to for very special occasions. I have never been myself and am now left with Schatzi on Main or my own humble cooking skills if I want to get a Schnitzl.

The Turks left more behind: Türkenblut, (Turk's blood), an expression for a dark red wine, the Gugelhupf, a Viennese cake that was supposedly shaped after the Turish turban fashion of the times and the word band,- believe it or not. The story goes that a Turkish group of musicians was captured and imprisoned in Vienna and hence referred to as "Bande" by the Viennese folk, - meaning something like "rotten gang" -, and apparently the word band for a group of musicians can be traced back to this very event.

The croissant though really makes me proud and helps soothe the pain still present from dicovering the Italian heritage of the Schnitzel a couple of years ago.

Stephan

Salut/Hi Emery Davis,

le/on Thu, 17 Jun 2004 10:35:28 +0200, tu disais/you said:-

Chuckle... I'm not TOO serious about this, for all that my hungarian blood does surface in odd ways from time to time! My uncle came out in '56 too. He tried to come out in '48 to join us in the UK, was betrayed to the communists and was comdemned to 2 years prison. He only came out from Recs (notorious death camp) when it closed in '51. To give them credit, the Hungarians have made a memorial of the camp "lest we forget".

of a turk! Charming.

I believe it. My hungarian family's pretty ancient too, and an ancestor was ennobled in the 16th century by the Emperor Leopold, for services (unspecified) rendered.

Please wish her "Kézem csókolom" for me.

Of course it didn't.

M.