Wine Food Pairing - Breitenau Austria Headquarters

Wine food pairing is giving you a glimpse of our Breitenau Austria headquarters. For winter, it is definitely Florida for us, but BigAl inherited his parents home in Austria just a little over a year ago and it has been nothing, if not an adventure for this American girl as we visit and stay for a few weeks in the late spring and fall!

The lifestyle and the culture is so different from what most Americans live with. The villages are wonderful little jewels that you pass through in a blink of an eye and it seems that all are well maintained and ready for show. Especially considering most of it is old .... I mean really old .... Breitenau, where our house is located was first mentioned in documents dating back to the 1100's ... that's older than me and BigAl put together ... lol!


Things that we take for granted in the US are also different ... for example..... you go grocery shopping and want a shopping cart? You must put a 1 euro coin in the chained lock on the cart and pull it out ... yes, you get you 1 euro back when you return your cart. This is everywhere.

When you complete your shopping ... do you want your items bagged? You must bring you own bags then ... no paper or plastic over here! The first time back when we shop I always forget and have to juggle with my purchases.

Dogs are welcomed in all eating establishments. This is great for Houdini who loves to sit at the table and enjoy his meal along with us ... of course all the dogs are well mannered that come into the restaurants . Water and even sometimes treats are brought out be the wait staff ... many times before we are served!

Now to get REALLY SERIOUS about the differences in countries and talking about something close to my heart .... WINE!

The wine is wonderful in Austria, the Germans even import it and mixed it up with theirs and still call it German wine ... lol! There are vineyards everywhere and wine is served almost like water here.

Another really great thing is that the local wines are extremely inexpensive. It is not unusual to pay only a couple of euros for a wonderful bottle of wine. We even have wine farmers that make the rounds here and deliver! They have been coming to the house for so many years they just pull in and open the cellar windows and stock us up for the next year ..... how cool is that!

We have the "party" room in the cellar that is specially made to hold over 100 bottles of wine and it is all set up like a traditional wine house ... perfect for BigAl, the wine babe and our friends!

It is certainly a different lifestyle over here and I must say, other than my language skills that need a lot of improvement, I enjoy coming over here and spending time. BigAl, of course, is my translator so I know what is going on and so far I have managed to stay out of trouble (pretty much)!

Wine food paring toasts Austria. CHEERS!