July 29, 2011 - Day 3

Berchemeusli

Today we visited my aunts who live in nearby Basel. We then met with Angela (cousin's daughter) and toured the city of Basel. First thing we did was find some lunch (of course!). We purchased some sandwiches from a roadside vendor and headed down to the rhine river to eat. Honestly, these sandwiches were amazing! I think it's the European bread that makes them so incredibly good. My sandwich had tomatoes, fresh mozzarella and mayo - very similar to what we make at the store. But the bread, OMG - incredible. If we could make/get this bread in Mendon, wow ~ we would have a line....really.

We then went to a church which was built in 1400 - Munster Church. All was great until Thomas had us go up to the bell tower. Since I am afraid of heights, it became a problem. I was "plastered" to the side of the church while the rest of the group went even higher. I am not kidding, I was out of mind with fright - being scared of heights is dreadful and uncontrollable. However, I guess if I was smart and stayed on the ground, it wouldn't have been such an issue. From Sara's pictures, the view was breathtaking. For me the height definitely took my breath away - I really didn't appreciate the view.  We stopped at a chocolate store and bought some fantastic Swiss chocolate. We came home for dinner and made berchemuesli - which we are already very familiar with. This meal consists of oatmeal, yogurt, fresh fruit, milk and some sugar. It doesn't look very good - but is really quite good. Our whole family enjoys it and we already eat this back home. Of course, dinner was served with some more Swiss bread. I've decided to buy bread mix to bring home, so that I can put it in my breadmaker when I am craving something European.

July 28, 2011 - Day 2 in Switzerland

Today Rosmarie took Sara to her riding stable and Sara was a given a horseback lesson. Riding a horse is a lot harder than it looks! There were many kittens around the barns, so that was an added bonus to Sara's adventure. We went to the salt water spa after lunch. All of the pools there have salt water, which of course makes you very bouyant. There are many jets throughout the pool area - so you can relax and get "massaged". There is an area called the dead sea pool. There is so much salt in there (just like the dead sea), you easily float on the water on your back. And when you put your ears in the water you can hear music. It was very lovely - however, at first it did remind me of the cave in the Harry Potter book where a bunch of dead people were floating (if you are a Harry Potter fan, you would know what I am referring to). Kind of spooky!

For lunch we had pasta, roasted vegetables with some cheese and cream, and meatballs (ground beef, onion, seasonings, ketchup and mustard). The "meatballs" were very tasty. Dinner was light - tuna (actually made with real fish bought at the store today), eggsalad, home made bread and cheese. We went to a cousins house for dessert which was fabulous - fruit salad, soft icecream, home made whipped cream and an italian cake. I didn't take a picture of dessert, as I didn't want to embarrass our hostess. It was delicious and now I wish I took a picture as they way she displayed the food was really good as well.

July 27, 2011 - Day 1 in Switzerland

We arrived here early this a.m. - 8:00 a.m. Swiss time (2:00 a.m. East Coast). Very tired but happy to be here. We are staying at my cousins home in Rheinfelden, Switzerland known as "the town that has everything". This town was founded in 1130, there are roughly 12,000 people living here. The center of town is very picturesque with a pretty clock tower and midieval archway.There is a very well known spa, in walking distance (Sara and I can't wait to go there).

We had roeschti (prounced rooshtey) - potatoes and onions, along with brotwurst - sausage for lunch which is the big meal of the day. Sara had a side of ketchup to eat the meat with! For dessert, my aunt made Waehe (pronounced Via) which is an open faced pie made with apricots and plums with a pie crust on the bottom and a light egg/bread crumb/cream, sugar, vanilla sugar, salt mixture on top. They served the dessert with more sugar and whipped topping (Sara ate that as well).

Preparing to go

Getting ready to travel to Switzerland for 10 days with my youngest daughter, Sara - age 13. My mother's family all resides in Switzerland (Basel area) and I have been fortunate to go a few times throughout my childhood. The last time we went was when Sara was just an infant. 16 of us flew over together and spent 2 weeks vacationing in and throughout Switzerland. Of course, Sara does not remember any of it and the timing is just right....It's summer, the family is fairly self sufficient (they can operate without mom for 2 weeks!), the busines is running systematically (daily procedures are all in place) and now bags are getting packed. 

While I am nervous about leaving my store for 2 weeks and actually being pretty much nonaccessible, I am really looking forward to seeing my Swiss family, being part of the Swiss culture, eating their food and hopefully bringing home some great European recipes!