On Tuesday evening we met to cook this German dish called “Kässpätzle mit Schmelzzwiebeln”. It was relatively easy and quick to make with the ready-made Spätzle that we had to just boil and bake in the owen. We used two different cheeses (Emmentaler and Cheddar) on top of the Spätzle and the result was delicious. The girls told me that the form (long or short) of the Spätzle varies depending on whether you live in the east or in the west. I also learned that there’s a specific word for the silence when everyone is busy eating: “gefräßige Stille” 😀
While cooking and eating we discussed the Easter traditions in Finland and Germany. The easter bunny is called “Osterhase” in German. I told the girls that at least in the western part of Finland (Osthrobothnia) there’s a tradition of burning bonfires at Easter. We also talked about Juhannus (Midsummer) and the fact that the amount of light is already increasing fast.
Another interesting topic was bread eating that seems to be quite popular in Germany. I heard that there’s a specific word – or actually two – for the time, when people eat it. The two words are “Brotzeit” (used e.g in Austria and in Bavaria) and “Vesper” (used in e.g Baden-Württemberg). Usually Brotzeit and Vesper take place between breakfast and lunch as a little snack. On top of the bread is usually cheese and cold-cut sausages and it’s served on a cutting board -like tray. The concept of Brotzeit/Vesper sounds really good to me, as I love bread, but the girls told me that they haven’t found the perfect Finnish bread for that yet. In Germany it is more common to buy bread from a bakery and there are much more bakeries.
After eating we played this card game called “halt mal kurz”. The texts in the cards were written in German so I got to practice my language skills while playing. During the game I also learned that “rock, paper, scissors” is “schnick, schnack, schnuck” (or “schere, stein, papier”) and we tried the Finnish version as well. I ended up losing twice in the game but it was still very fun to try!
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