Autumn’s Here!

Well, there’s no hiding it, Autumn is here, the leaves are changing into all the fabulous hues of the season and so it was time to start an Autumn sketchbook page.Here’s the start, some rose hips and a walnut leaf. At this time of year, I spend a lot of time raking leaves and collecting the thousands of walnuts my tree produces (and with stained brown hands from the husks!).Not to mention the hundreds of apples which are very small this year. Funny, the larger apples are all pecked, a single peck and on to the next, I feel I've landed in apple hell. I've made apple puree, tried apple jelly (not enough pectin so it’s apple syrup), eating apples, making apple cake but still that apple tree is the gift that keeps giving. 

One of the pleasures of Franconia in Autumn are the so called ''Häckerwirtschaften or Heckenwirtschaften'', usually after the grapes for the new wine are harvested, the vintner’s open little huts, or little gardens where you can drink wine and eat local specialities (sometimes in the cellars of their homes. In Franconia a '' Häcker or Hecker is a winemaker, so a Häckerwirtschaft is a Vinter pub. We've got 4 in our town and they open for about 2 or 3 weeks in Spring and Autumn; always one after another, so here’s what you get!

We've got local ''Rotling wine'' on the right, (a mix of red and white grapes) and on the left, the milky looking liquid which is '‘Federweißer'', literally translated this means feather white, but it is a partially fermented new wine, which is at the start of the season paler and bubblier and over a couple of weeks becomes thicker, yellower and stronger, the Federweißer season is very short and you can buy it fresh from the vintners often in 5 litre containers the only problem is the danger of exploding! The Federweißer continues to ferment in the container and so it’s best drunk straight away. 

The savoury platter is the traditional food of the wine harvesters, a local sausage and cheese variation, here we've got Leberwurst (like paté), Red and White Pressack (this is like black pudding, or at least the red one is, I'm always surprised how squeamish Germans are about haggis and yet they eat blood, brains, heart and virtually every part of pigs you can imagine without batting an eye!). There is a dried ham a bit like Serrano and then gherkin; you can see the cultural divide with how my husband and I shared the platter ….. mine is the plate with the cheeses. Local bread, slices of Emmentaler and another dish called Gerupfter, or Angebazter or Obatzter depending where you come from in Bavaria. It's usually a variation on Camembert mixed with soft cheese, sometimes there’s butter or raw eggs mixed in and then salt, pepper, lots of dried paprika; onions are either in it or served like here with it, it's a beer garten favourite, salty and very savoury, it makes you very thirsty, so the beer or as here, the wine keeps flowing! I'll say ''Prost!'', here’s to Autumn!