Local Foods - Naschmarkt to Heurigen

After a couple of less than ideal weekends weather wise, yesterday was absolutely perfect.  Warm with bright sunshine and a cool breeze, which meant practically everyone was outside, my friends and myself included.  We started the day down at the Naschmarkt strolling around and grabbing some lunch.  The Naschmarkt is basically a long, mostly outdoor, market that sells all sorts of fruit, vegetables, meat, cheese, flowers, herbs, bread, etc. and they also have small restaurants along the way where you can sit at a table and grab a quick bite to eat.

Our main plan for the day was to eventually make it up to the Kahlenberg with a group of people and enjoy the view and then walk down from the top.  After the Naschmarkt a couple of our friends were going to bike to the Kahlenberg and meet us there, so we gave them a head start and wandered around downtown a bit more before we cheated and took the tram and the bus up. 

Karlskirche

Strauss statue in Stadtpark

After our wandering around a while, we headed up to the Kahlenberg and grabbed some chairs under the large umbrellas and soaked up the view of the city and the mountains while we waited for the rest of our group to get up there. 

And then we began our descent...Vienna is the only capital in the world that has vineyards within its city limits and actually produces significant quantities of wine.  They have these lovely trails that lead you to various vineyards and many of them are open for you to come taste their fresh wine and have small bites to eat.  There is also a little "Heurigen Express" Train that runs a loop on the mountain if you don't feel like walking, but since it was such a lovely day we opted for the hike.  (With these pictures, as always, clicking on them will open them larger in another window, which I might recommend...pictures barely do this justice, especially the small ones)

vineyards with the city in the distance

At the first Heuriger we came to, basically they have this little barn like structure where you can go and buy wine and little bites to eat (bread and cheese and meat mostly) and then they have these couches and chairs and picnic benches outside for you to sit and sip and enjoy the view. 

bread and cheese and herbs.

bread with ham and shaved horseradish

I probably could have stayed at that place all day, but we decided to go across the street and down just a bit to the next Heuriger.  This one had a bit more of a structure, with actual tables and waiters, but still just wine and small bits of things to eat, and an amazing view of the other side. 

Looking back up towards the Kahlenberg, you can see the hotel that is up there just next to school.

a few types of ham, olives, potatoes and tomatoes, kraut salad, and what is sort of a spinach strudel with sauce.  all very good and perfect for sharing.

I think it was approaching about 7pm at this point, and we hadn't actually walked all that far down the hill, so we decided we should probably keep moving.  Even if you didn't stop anywhere along the way, the views are just incredible, constant vineyards, with the city on the horizon, mountains on one side, the river on the other...

Much closer to the bottom of the hill, we stopped at another Heuriger which also boasted that Beethoven lived there in 1817. 

Still a nice open air space, although more of a courtyard rather than just tables outside, complete with live accordion music, and since it is asparagus season here, just about everything on the menu was based around asparagus.  I opted for some asparagus risotto which was wonderful. 

We sat there enjoying our food and local fresh wine well past dark, we then walked the rest of the way down and caught the bus back towards Grinzing to head home.  Such a wonderful day, and I'm sure not the last time we'll enjoy that trek down the hill.