Hungary, Austria and Germany
1/26/2022 | 26m 46sVideo has Closed Captions
Join Joseph along the medieval streets of Hungary, Austria and Germany.
Joseph samples the delights along the banks of Europe’s second-longest river when he travels from Budapest, Hungary through Austria to Nuremberg, Germany on the Danube. Magnificent cities, quaint villages, fields and forests unfold and each stop along the way reveals a piece of Europe’s ongoing cultural tale. It’s a region where so much has happened and the past continues to affect the present.
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Joseph Rosendo’s Travelscope is presented by your local public television station.
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Hungary, Austria and Germany
1/26/2022 | 26m 46sVideo has Closed Captions
Joseph samples the delights along the banks of Europe’s second-longest river when he travels from Budapest, Hungary through Austria to Nuremberg, Germany on the Danube. Magnificent cities, quaint villages, fields and forests unfold and each stop along the way reveals a piece of Europe’s ongoing cultural tale. It’s a region where so much has happened and the past continues to affect the present.
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Learn Moreabout PBS online sponsorshipAnnouncer: Welcome to "Joseph Rosendo's Travelscope"... Whoo hoo!
where you join us as we accept the world's invitation to visit.
Both: Santé!
[Cheering] Joseph: Today on "Travelscope," I follow a watery path on the blue Danube to cultural adventures in Europe's romantic, historic, and imperial cities.
Announcer: "Joseph Rosendo's Travelscope" is made possible by... Emerald Waterways.
It's been said that if experience is the best teacher, then travel is the best experience.
River cruising seeks to immerse travelers deep within a culture while moving gently through it.
With Emerald Plus, in-depth cultural experiences are included on every European cruise.
Emerald Waterways.
And No-Jet-Lag-- jet lag prevention.
Joseph, voice-over: From Budapescht to Nuremberg, the Danube meanders more than 400 miles through 3 countries and across the Continental Divide.
My journey begins in Budapescht, where a stunning dawn breaks over a bustling modern city of two million people.
With a history that dates back to the first century B.C., Budapescht has been the prized possession of Romans, Habsburgs, sultans, and Soviets.
From the Chain Bridge and Danube Promenade to St. Stephen's Basilica and the Váci utca, one of the world's most beautiful shopping districts, the city is like a confectionary shop-- like Szamos, where luscious handmade bonbons entice the visitor to enter and enjoy all of its many treats.
A gift of the Habsburgs absorbed into the local culture during the 19th-century Austria-Hungarian monarchy is the strudel.
There are about 50 or 60 different kinds of strudel here in Hungary.
There's about 4 that are traditional.
There's cottage cheese, poppy seed, sour cherries, and cabbage.
First things first-- you need to have the pastry, and it's said that people who make strudel have to have fairy hands.
That means, you know, delicate hands so they don't tear the pastry, obviously.
Gsaba is our, uh, expert strudel-maker here.
I'm just helping him out.
Look how thin it's getting.
Cottage cheese.
Cottage cheese.
Túró.
Next we have the sour cherry?
Cherry.
Let's really squeeze it to get the juice of the sour cherries and the sugar all mixed up.
This is really, really good.
OK.
This tastes so good-- these sour cherries-- you won't believe it.
Here.
Let's try one.
Mmm.
Oh, they're so good.
So good.
This is poppy seed and pumpkin.
I love poppy seeds.
You will make fasten it.
Uh-huh.
[Speaks Hungarian language] Whoo!
[Speaks Hungarian language] Pumpkin and poppy seed.
Cottage cheese here.
This is a dish that normally was in the countryside, was for special occasions-- for weddings and for anniversaries and births of children, and it came to the city.
Wow.
Mmm.
Pumpkin and poppy seed.
Oh!
Hot.
Hot.
Mmm.
Delicious.
Ah.
The only thing better than a strudel is many strudel-- or is that strudi?
Ah.
What they really are is finom, which means "delicious," which I think really is short for "phenomenally good."
Mmm.
Joseph, voice-over: My short day in Budapescht done, Austria is just a wine toast and a short float down the Danube away.
Located in the heart of Europe, Vienna, Austria's capital, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is noted for its Baroque architecture, world-class museums, magnificent monuments, and celebrated cafe culture.
I began my explorations at the Naschmarkt.
The Naschmarkt has been a market here in central Vienna since the 1800s, and it was originally a site for ash and manure, so out of that grew all of this.
And, Chef, it's kind of late--8:00.
Yeah.
Foreigners coming, like from Turkish-- uh, we learn from them because they are not that workaholic like us, so we start a little bit later.
Hey, hello.
How are you?
How are you?
I am fine.
What's this?
This is olive.
And is that spicy?
No, no.
It is not spicy.
It is sweet.
You say spicy, it's like health.
[Laughter] Mmm.
Delicious.
Oh, here we go.
We'll have these nice Chanterelle.
You're gonna need those?
We need those.
It's the freshness you can check here.
You open.
Mmm.
very good.
Ooh.
Beautiful.
Am I supposed to eat this?
Smell and then you need to taste.
Uh-huh.
Because this is the life of the chef.
You need to taste everything.
I like this.
I like this.
Next to them you have plums.
It's the high season now, and they're growing in Austria everywhere.
Here are the grapes.
These are always growing now in Austria high season.
You can make wine from that.
You will see it.
You will love it.
Joseph: So this is the grapes that are fermenting right now in the bottle.
And then it becomes wine later on.
This is part of Vienna's culture, because-- This is Austrian culture very good, you know?
This is only this-- you have these two months, one month season, and that's it.
Wow.
That's good.
You only can drink now, and that's it.
That's true, but you shouldn't have too much.
You can.
It's very funny after.
Ha!
Ha!
Joseph: Ah, cheese!
Look at all the cheese, Chef!
All very nice cheese.
But this one is the very special cheese--the hay.
Hay.
Hey, guten Tag.
Guten Tag.
What is it?
Grass?
This is grass.
No, that's hay cheese.
Hay cheese?
Hay cheese.
So is there-- It's not grass.
Is there hay in the cheese?
No, no.
The cheese is wrapped in hay... Uh-huh.
so the aromatics of the hay...
Right.
it's, like, in the cheese.
But still, you can even eat the hay because it's organic.
So you get your roughage at the same time.
[Laughter] That's perfect.
Instead of eating-- We use everything here, you know.
You use ev-- instead of eating fruit and cheese, you get hay in cheese.
Yes.
What is more Austrian than sauerkraut and pickles, huh?
Nothing is more Austrian.
Nothing.
OK. Oh, look at this.
Look at this.
Great.
Awesome.
This is sauerkraut?
This is champagne kraut.
Oh, made with champagne?
Yes.
Yes.
Sparkling wine?
Mmm.
Exactly.
Mmm.
Delicious.
Do you do something like this on board your ship?
Yes.
We have this Bavarian lunch.
You have sauerkraut on everything.
But Bavaria is Germany.
Yes, but our Austrian sauerkraut is better, you know.
Taste it.
Right?
So you used Austrian sauerkraut.
Of course.
And are these sour pickles?
Yes.
Hmm.
Mwah.
Wonderful.
A little bit Schnapps, and [indistinct] is very good for you.
Drink and then eat?
Yes, of course.
All: Prost!
Prost!
Prost!
Mmm.
Do you feel that?
Perfect.
Perfect.
Awesome.
Chef, thank you so much for bringing us here.
It was a pleasure.
Danke.
Danke.
[Speaking Austrian language] I know it's been said here at the Naschmarkt, if you can't find it at the Naschmarkt...
Both: you don't need it.
Ha ha!
Danke.
Danke.
Joseph, voice-over: After that breakfast of sauerkraut, pickles, and fiery Schnapps, I meet up with my friend Norman and wash it all down at a traditional Viennese cafe.
Ah.
Danke.
Danke.
Danke schoen.
Whoa.
Look at this.
That's the Einspanner.
Einspanner.
If you have a carriage with only one horse, you need only one hand for holding it, the reins, and you have the second hand free, and that's why this glass have this hook, and in one hand you have the horse, in the other one, you have the coffee.
So the Einspanner, the name of the carriage, gave this kind of coffee the name.
And this, it looks like a strudel.
It is an apple.
Joseph: This is serious here in Vienna.
The cafe culture is absolutely serious.
When does it date back to?
It's the Turkish occupation.
There have been two.
The second one was 1683.
Right.
And when there was an Austrian spy...
Right.
and he went through the tent city, what was around Vienna, and he stole a bag of coffee, and when the Turks were gone, with this coffee, the sack, that he opened his first coffee house in Vienna.
No, no.
Do you think that's true?
Ah...
It doesn't matter.
It's a good story.
This is a fabulous little coffee shop.
It's been here since 1880?
1880, and you have all kinds of coffee shops-- very modern ones, very traditional ones.
But I think the typical Viennese coffee house is nice to sit in, there's comfortable chairs, and seeing this traditional old style.
Oh, it's beautiful.
It's beautiful.
So I love it.
Now, what other traditions are associated with coffee and the cafe culture here in Vienna?
We call it Jause.
Jause?
Jause.
What is that?
You can say it's a break in the middle of the afternoon.
It is said the coffee house is the enlarged living room of the Viennese people.
Danke.
Bitte.
Once again, thank you for bringing me here.
Joseph, voice-over: Less well known than coffee and sauerkraut, making and drinking wine is one of Vienna's favorite pastimes.
There are 1,400 acres of grape vines planted less than 20 minutes from the heart of the city, and I'm just in time to help with the harvest.
Ah.
Nothing I like better than to help out in the grape harvest.
Look at that.
And as you can see, the whole family is here, all ages, helping out.
and this is a special kind of wine they're gonna produce from this.
It's a mix because all the grapes are already growing-- different kinds of grapes are growing together here.
Wow.
What a great opportunity!
Wow!
Fantastic.
Joseph, voice-over: Grape-growing in Vienna has been going on since Roman times.
This tradition of producing a fresh wine has been going back since the days of Joseph II, where he decreed that people were allowed to sell the wine from their own vineyards.
I'm with Elisabeth III, the Wine-Queen of Vienna.
Heuriger Wolff-- it's a typical wine tavern.
Where people come to drink the fresh wine like this.
Yeah, grape juice which is getting to wine.
It's something in the middle.
We can't say "prost" because the wine isn't ready yet.
You say "mahlzeit."
And what does that mean?
When you're starting your dinner or your lunch, you sing "mahlzeit" because this is like--like food.
It has so much vitamins and all this inside.
So we say "bon Appetit" or "mahlzeit."
Exactly.
Mahlzeit!
Joseph: The Heuriger is a wine tavern, and back in the day, people would come here to get the new wine, and they could bring their own food.
It's much more convenient to come and have them serve you a wonderful spread here and for you to toast with the wine.
Now we can say "prost," right?
Right.
OK. Prost!
Both: Prost!
And danke!
You're welcome.
Joseph, voice-over: Whether in the bright light of day or the soft glow of night, Vienna is always a sight to behold, yet more treasures await, and I continue my journey on the Danube through the Wachau River valley, one of Europe's loveliest, to the abbey towns of Melk and Durnstein.
Made notorious by the imprisonment of Richard the Lionheart in its hillside fortress, Durnstein is also noted for its 15th-century abbey and as a gateway to the Wachau wine country, where it's said that although man cannot live by bread alone, if he's got Wachau wine and its traditional rolls, he'll do pretty well.
One of the traditions is bread.
The bread that people eat while they're at the Heuriger drinking the new wine or when they're tasting wines in the area.
Here they are rolling about on baskets to give them the right shape.
Whoo!
There you have it-- the Wachauerlaberl.
Joseph, voice-over: To complete the local bread and wine pairing, I join winemaker Heinz Frischengruber in the cellars of Domain Wachau.
Joseph: How old is this part of the cellar?
This is over 300 years.
It was built in the end of the 17th century.
Man.
It is a so-called artists' cellar from the guys who visit the winery in former times-- artists, musicians.
Uh-huh.
Chefs.
They're artists.
Actors.
Good food.
OK. Television hosts?
Yeah.
Ha ha ha!
Joseph, voice-over: Cellar tours are fun, yet the soul of the wine is in the vineyards.
Heinz: And this is Riesling.
Joseph: Mm-hmm.
Oh, they look good.
Ah, well, 3 weeks more.
3 weeks more?
Yeah, sometime more.
Some hanging time more in the vineyard.
They taste pretty good for eating.
Ha ha!
But we love to produce fantastic wines.
Yes, of course.
So, Heinz, we're coming down from Riesling down to Gruner Veltliner.
It must be very difficult working these terraces.
Heinz: It's a real hardship.
Uh-huh.
A lot of exercise.
Joseph: Nice views but difficult.
Heinz: Yes.
But it makes fun.
How many wineries are there here in the Wachau Valley?
Uh, I will say we have around 100 family estates here.
And Gruner Veltliner-- what percentage?
In the valley, we have around 60%.
And we should have a little bit of this with the wine, or...
Yes, yes.
OK. A little bit.
Some laberl, some food.
I like to say the proof of the winemaker is in the wine, so let's try it.
Prost.
Prost.
That's wonderful.
That's wonderful.
Prost and danke.
Gern geschehen.
Joseph, voice-over: After a day of abbeys and wine, my fellow travelers and I enjoy a sundowner of music and drink at Augenstein Castle, which offers a bird's-eye view of the Wachau.
At the end of a long day, an e-bike is an energy-saving way to take in the Wachau.
The section of the Danube bike path between Passau on the German border and Vienna, Austria, is 200 miles, and along the way, you bike through picturesque villages, alongside UNESCO World Heritage vineyards, and by the blue Danube.
And with these e-bikes, it's shamelessly easy.
Whoa!
Joseph, voice-over: I could follow the bike path for another hundred miles, but I board the ship to Brantstatt, and my next stop--Salzburg, the home of Mozart.
Salzburg is the icing on the Austrian cake.
A UNESCO World Heritage Site, its Altstadt, or Old Town, is a maze of pastel-colored buildings, domes, spires, and stately squares.
It's a city of exclamation points with a 900-year-old castle, Mozart's birthplace, and the Dom Quarter, which unbelievably includes the cathedral where the child prodigy performed, the Residenz where princes held court, and several scrumptious museums.
Salzburg is a nonstop feast for the senses.
Along with Mozart and "The Sound of Music," Hohensalzburg, the Salzburg castle, is one of the major attractions of the city of Salzburg.
Now, while the city has only 100,000 people, the castle gets more than a million visitors a year.
It's wonderful to come up and get a beautiful perspective on the city of Salzburg and the surrounding area.
Mozart is Salzburg's main attraction.
He's everywhere.
My guide, Martina Gyuroka, even showed me where he ate, drank, and danced.
Martina: You know, that's the Stiegl-Keller, and we know it for sure-- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, he loved to drink beer here.
Ah.
Now, how many did he have to choose from here in town?
In the Mozart period, we had 13 breweries.
OK. And it's funny because Keller-- that means "cellar"-- normally you go down.
Here you walk up.
Ha ha!
Hope we can walk down later all right.
Prost.
Prost.
Joseph, voice-over: It's easy to drink where Mozart drank.
He lived in Salzburg for 17 years, and it's said he had a fondness for women, rich foods, and beer gardens.
Here on display they have a certificate that proves that Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart danced with a lady on a table.
Joseph: Obviously in Salzburg, places are famous because Mozart drank here and danced here.
[Chuckles] Joseph: If there's something that you can put Mozart's name on it, I've seen it.
Martina: Yes, but the most important detail-- What's that?
The Mozart balls.
They are made of hazelnut nougat cream, green marzipan, dark chocolate, and you can buy them only here.
You can only get them here?
Only here.
You see here are the Mozart balls, the Mozart chocolates.
Mmm.
Delicious.
It is delicious.
Well, but now I'll show you where Mozart began, hmm?
OK!
What a beautiful street.
And look at all the medieval symbols.
Yeah!
They show what the business is.
Exactly.
If Mozart was alive, he could walk down the street and still think it was his Salzburg.
And that's nice in Salzburg.
We protect our architecture.
We don't destroy it.
We protect our heritage here.
These are two very important portraits of the Mozart children because they document the first journey of the Mozart family.
With their father.
Mozart traveled in his life 3,725 days.
He spent 1/3 of his life here in Salzburg, he spent 1/3 of his life in Vienna, and he spent 1/3 of his life traveling in horse carriages.
I love traveling, but that would have been hard traveling.
Yes.
And that's Mozart's clavichord.
He composed, with this instrument, the opera "The Magic Flute."
That's the most authentic portrait that we have from Wolfgang Mozart.
It was his brother-in-law who made it.
And for reasons we don't know, he did not finish the portrait.
Maybe he died before they could finish it.
[Chuckles] We don't know it, but I don't think it.
[Chuckles] Joseph, voice-over: Regensburg, Germany, sits at the confluence of 3 rivers, and while much of Germany was destroyed during World War II, Regensburg's medieval center, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, remained largely untouched.
One of more than a thousand historic buildings, the ninth-century Niedermunster Church can arrange organ concerts for tours and visitors.
Thankfully spared from the war's annihilation is the world's oldest sausage kitchen.
Started in the 12th century to feed workers constructing the cathedral, it's still wowing guests with grilled sausages, sauerkraut, and beer.
We're in the historic sausage kitchen.
I'm with Mrs. Meier.
7 generations of her family have been involved here, since 1317.
What makes the sausages so good?
Mrs. Meier: High-quality meat.
Any spices?
No.
Only salt and pepper.
You have a mustard that you make here.
It's a sweet mustard.
I was told that the sausage here in Regensburg is--is the best sausage in Germany.
I think so.
In the world!
In the world?
Ah, the best sausage in the world.
In Germany.
But the people in Nuremberg-- they tell me their sausage is the best sausage.
But the people who comes with ships from Nuremberg here and already tried the sausages in Nuremberg, they said that here are better.
OK. Well, but-- Our sausage, I like it.
Ha ha!
Well, here I have it-- Regensburg sausage, the sweet mustard, and now comes the big test.
Mmm.
Very good.
Have they ever tried Nuremberg sausage?
[Speaking German] OK, wait a minute.
Which sausage do you like best?
[Speaking German] They like this much more.
[Laughter] So at least here in Regensburg, this is the best sausage in the world.
All: Prost!
Prost!
Joseph, voice-over: To get to the end of my line, the ship must transverse the many locks of the Rhine-Main-Danube Canal to the ancient Roman town of Nuremberg.
Nuremberg's Kaiserburg was the center of imperial power for the Holy Roman Empire, established by Charlemagne in the ninth century, since 1050 A.D.
Here the empire's important conferences, gathering, and pronouncements and even crown jewels were kept.
One of the reasons that the Nazis wanted to associate themselves so closely with Nuremberg was to co-op those historic credentials.
The first empire lasted a thousand years.
The dream of the Third Reich was to do the same.
Fortunately, they did not.
Unlike Regensburg, Nuremberg was leveled during the war.
Noted as the city of Nazi Party rallies and the racist Nuremberg laws, it was a symbol of the Third Reich and a prime target for obliteration.
After the conflict, the Palace of Justice became the site of the famous Nuremberg war crimes trials and along with Courtroom 600 is now a memorial.
Memorium Nuremberg Trials is quite an extraordinary place.
I mean, there's the actual courtroom, and then here in the exhibition space, we sit surrounded by the, uh, accused, declaring themselves not guilty.
What was the original purpose of the Nuremberg trials?
The original purpose was more than only showing the personal guilt of these defendants.
It was showing the German population and even the world what had happened in Germany between '33 and '45.
What do you hope that people who come to the memorium of the Nuremberg trials take away from it?
This is a very important, uh, time period, and we don't want to repeat this kind of history ever again.
If you forget the past, then you're doomed to repeat it again, and we can say "never again," but you can't say "never again" if you don't know what happened, and I think the German people and the German government should be commended for not trying to sweep this away over the years but to actually establish places like this and preserve even horrible concentration camps, where man's inhumanity to man reached incredible proportions, so thank you very much.
Thank you.
Joseph, voice-over: Gratefully, not all of Nuremberg's attractions are linked to wartime horrors.
The city's ancient walls still stand, and its UNESCO World Heritage Old Town is decked out with cobblestone streets, artisan shops, historic buildings, and monuments, including the clock tower of the Church of Our Lady, which draws crowds for its noontime mechanical display.
And in market stalls and open-air restaurants, you can sample its culinary icon-- the Nuremberg Rostbratwurst.
Are you the Ph.D. of sausage, doctor?
Ha ha ha!
Not really.
I'm a lawyer.
Expert in bratwurst law.
The ingredients are pork meat.
You can use whatever spices you want as long as you use marjoram.
Joseph: How long have they been making Nuremberg Rostbratwurst here in Nuremberg?
It was first nominated in 1313.
What makes it so special?
It would be easier to taste it.
Are we eating it correctly?
Almost.
This horseradish is perfectly correct, but mustard... No mustard.
should not be here.
Only horseradish, and no wine--beer.
Yes.
Mandatory.
Danke.
Prost.
Prost.
Guten Appetit.
Perfect.
That's perfect.
The people in Regensburg think their sausage is the best sausage in the world.
As the Director of the Society for the Protection of the Nuremberg Rostbratwurst, what would you say to them?
I mean, uh, they're not bad.
"They're not bad."
They're not bad.
That's what you would say to them?
Yeah.
This is good.
I'm not telling you which one is better.
Find out for yourself.
Thank you for joining me on my European river adventure.
The Danube is a 1,700-mile avenue that rivals the Champs-Élysées in offering a never-ending array of fascinating and eye-catching attractions.
Along its watery trail, a mosaic of magnificent cities, quaint villages, fields and forests unfold, and each stop reveals a piece of Europe's ongoing cultural tale.
So much has happened here, and the past continues to affect the present.
For me, it's that long-view historic perspective that makes a European journey a trip worth having again and again and again.
Till next time, this is Joseph Rosendo, reminding you of the words of Mark Twain: "Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness."
Happy traveling.
Announcer: "Joseph Rosendo's Travelscope" is made possible by... Emerald Waterways.
It's been said that if experience is the best teacher, then travel is the best experience.
River cruising seeks to immerse travelers deep within a culture while moving gently through it.
With Emerald Plus, in-depth cultural experiences are included on every European cruise.
Emerald Waterways.
And No-Jet-Lag-- jet lag prevention.
For a DVD of today's show or any of Joseph's "Travelscope" adventures, call 888-876-3399 or order online at Travelscope.net.
You can also email us at TV@Travelscope.net or write us at the address on your screen.
Joseph: Now that we've explored Europe's imperial cities together, learn more at Travelscope.net, where you can follow my worldwide adventures through my eMagazine, blog, podcast, and on Facebook.
Stay in touch.
888-876-3399 or TV@Travelscope.net.
I think that is enough to make some people feel like they've gone to heaven.
We're going to cool it off?
Yeah.
It's called tempering.
So, what we're gonna do now is we're going to pour into these polycarbonate forms.
Take the card, and you're gonna pour it off.
OK. Whoo hoo!
And tap on the side of the bowl.
You're gonna push.
What is this we're putting in here?
It's actually marzipan.
There's a really good almond- producing area here in Hungary.
This is the coup de grace.
The finale.
Yeah.
Ha!
Mmm!
Wow.
Mm- hmm.
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