A domestic adventure a day

I have to chuckle to myself because it seems like since I'm living abroad I should be writing about museums or tourist attractions or trips to Paris, but instead my "adventures" so far are about food and laundry and shopping. The kids are out of school for several days next week so I hope we'll do a little actual adventuring. But today I'm going to write about cake and a pool and a department store.

I feel like I am starting to get a grasp on the types of products that are sold in the grocery stores here, but with every recipe for which I go out in search of ingredients there are a few things that I just can't find. Wednesday it was chicken broth, canned pumpkin and corn meal. I wanted to make a soup with a chicken broth base, and some yummy pumpkin muffins from the Scramble to go with it. (Well, I can't actually make muffins because there's no muffin tin in our apartment. I was going to pour it into a casserole dish. But today I broke down and bought a muffin pan at the grocery store (and a vegetable peeler) because realistically it looks like we'll be here in this apartment at least another month and can we really go that long without muffins? I don't think we can.) As is typical I went to a couple of different stores searching but wasn't able to find these things.

Back at home I did what I often do, which is google "do they have 'x' in germany?" 9 times out of 10 I will find someone else who has already asked this question and a post discussing it.  Often these food questions are brought up on a site called toytowngermany.com. So here I learned that:

1. There is no canned pumpkin in Germany! Ugh. That makes pumpkin desserts so much more time-consuming to make. What a bummer. And it's heavy, so it isn't really something I can stock up on and bring here. 
2. This was a bit unclear but I think there's no liquid broth or stock here, only bouillon. Once I discovered this, I did find that bouillon is plentiful but many brands are loaded with salt and MSG (same as in the US). I found a "bio" veggie broth that I bought. I can't really read the ingredients, but I do recognize the names of some vegetables, so hopefully it's not poison.
3. There's no such thing as "corn meal" here, like you would buy to make corn bread. There's something like corn flour which I'm not sure what to do with, and something they call polenta which looks kind of like a course corn meal. That's what I bought so we'll see if it works out.

After shopping I met Gani (the wife of the former CTO of Kaufda) for a walk and coffee. I brought Diablo and she brought her sweet little 6 month old boy in a stroller. We strolled for a while and ended up at a cake shop that she had told me about, what a fantastic place to end up! They had so many wonderful sounding choices but I couldn't pass up the apple torte and it was heavenly. We sat outside and chatted and enjoyed our cake and coffee, so pleasant.

Then she showed me that there's a neighborhood market on Wednesdays and Saturdays and we strolled through the market. Cheese, meat, veggies, bread, even dog treats for sale. How fun! I bought a small pumpkin to roast this weekend and puree for my pumpkin muffins.

Finally she took me to a small Turkish market where she likes to get produce. I had asked her where to find hummus, because that's one of our staples at home but I haven't been able to find it here. I bought some hummus and also some yummy Mediterranean spread. 

I headed home to put the groceries away and take care of a thing or two, and then headed back out. My first stop was Karstadt, a German department store. They also sell groceries and I had read that they carry a lot of American products, so I went to check it out. It was actually a full-blown grocery store, as big as many others I have been in. It was very high end and well-stocked. It was more expensive than other stores, but not outrageously so. While I was there I decided to do a little price comparison shopping. I found the women's clothing on the 2nd story and was able to confirm my earlier belief that clothes would be expensive in Europe! Seeing workout tops for 70 euros and sports bras for 35 makes it hard to believe that I found what I really thought was pretty good quality stuff at TK Maxx for a fraction of that. Stay tuned as I visit other stores...

On the 3rd floor was kitchen stuff and I briefly browsed there. 5 euros for a washcloth, 12 for a handtowel, 15 euros for a piece of bakeware, etc. Probably nearly comparable to home. 4th floor was electrical appliances. These we will have to buy, since we weren't able to bring anything electric because the voltage isn't compatible. I was kind of shocked at the prices: 40 euros for a small hand mixer? 35 euros for a hairdryer? I don't need anything fancy, just functional. I'm going to try to visit some flea markets once we get a house and see if I can pick up some of these things used. I mentioned yesterday to our relocation specialist that I had found the prices high at Karstadt and asked her if they are known to be expensive, and she told me that I shouldn't buy electronics there I should buy them at Saturn. I said "Oh good, because I couldn't believe I would need to spend 35 euros for a hairdryer." And she said "Oh - 35 euros? Actually that's about right." Yikes. Incidentally, it seems that hairdryers are the exception to the rule that everything is small here. Look at the size of this hairdryer, and they were all this size except for the travel ones!

I spent too long browsing in the store and didn't leave myself enough time to run an errand that Dan asked me to run! He really wants to swim and asked me to check out a pool that we thought was nearby. I had thought it was close to the department store, but it was actually about an 11 minute walk. When I finally got there I asked hopefully "Sprechen zie Englisch?" but unfortunately the response was head shaking, "Nein". How am I supposed to ask "How many lap lanes are there? When is the pool the least crowded? Is there a Masters program here?" They handed me a pamphlet (in German) and pointed to the opening hours. I reached into my bag and pulled out my pocket dictionary and managed the word "crowded". I took her response to mean either that you can't predict when it will be crowded and when it won't, or that it is always crowded (or maybe never crowded?) Then I threw out the word "coach"? And "Swim group for adults?" I got head shaking, so I think that means there's no Masters program but it could also mean that she didn't understand me. Whew, that was tough.

Then I had to RACE to the U-bahn to take the train to get the kids. I had to get off and change to a different train line after a few stops. Each train station is different and I wasn't familiar with this one. I only had a minute or two to make my connection so I quickly tried to follow the signs to the correct train line. The sign pointed up and there was a packed escalator of people riding up, and a completely open set of stairs to the left of them. I darted to the stairs and began to take them two at a time, but I felt something move beneath me and I wasn't getting anywhere. Oh no, I was running up the down escalator! I seriously don't think it was moving until I got on it. They sometimes have these energy saving escalators here that shut off until they are occupied. Or maybe it was moving but it was dark and I didn't notice? I felt like an idiot as, cheeks burning, I bounded up the stairs as fast as I could, while the escalator tried its best to erase my progress. Thankfully it was a short escalator and I beat it. I got to the right platform just as the train was pulling up.