This week’s small pleasures #483

What a week! From flying half way round the world, moving from early autumn to early spring, dealing with jet-lag, losing and finding our luggage and goodness knows what else this past week has been, let’s say eventful (and that is not talking about what is going on in the world). Regular readers may have caught up on what has been happening in my last two posts (here and here), but here are a few additional small pleasures of the week.

On Thursday, I popped into the church, Skt Petri, round the corner I mentioned on Wednesday, which is an oasis of peace and calm. Not that the area we are staying in is exactly noisy and hectic, but the silence and beautiful light, makes it a wonderful place to visit.

Saturday

We set off early on Saturday morning to take a look at the Portuguese quarter, with restaurants and shops a plenty. We also found the Swedish church (Karl standing outside it below) and the Swedish consulate. From there we walked along the waterfront, heading towards the Elbphilharmonie concert hall, which opened in 2017. It is quite an impressive building from afar and close up, and even has a hotel inside the complex. You can pay to go in and have a look, but the long queue kind of put us off, so we just walked around the area. It is clear why Hamburg has been a major port in this part of Europe for hundreds of years.

We then took the S train back to Altona, and walked down several flights of stairs to the fish market which has been in operation since 1703. This is a massive area of warehouses and other businesses, but of course is at its busiest at 5am rather than lunch time on a Saturday. We stopped for lunch at this little cafe below, which offered fish based dishes such as the fish cake sandwich I had and the fried fish with fried potatoes and mustard sauce. So basic, so simple and so good.

Essen und trinken

Did you know that Germany officially recognises over 3,000 types of bread? No, neither did I, but Karl learned this from a screen quiz on the S-bahn. Yes really…anyway, there is certainly no shortage of bakeries selling all sorts of bread around where we live.

The day we arrived, Tuesday, we were exhausted and stressed and with that special ‘brain fog’ one has after long haul travel. There is a small IKEA not far from where we are staying, and Karl suggested going to the cafe for meatballs. I did not say no as what better comfort food is there?

Anyway, the next day for lunch I went more local with some herring in a dill based sauce on rye bread. I also love these salads you get over here for some reason, and found this one that has been part of my at home lunches this week.

I found a fabulous greengrocer and Turkish food store, with these very neat peas, okra and green beans. It is the sort of shop you could spend ages in, but I keep reminding myself we are only here for a few weeks so not worth stocking up on all sorts of things.

I did buy an avocado, two blood oranges and a lime however, and also visited what I call the local wholefoods store. Why do these places always smell the same, regardless of the city? That warm, herby smell is so distinctive. Anyway, I bought some sausages there, which turned out to be delicious, some lamb’s lettuce, a jar of plumb jam and some potatoes. On Saturday in the supermarket I will be using now we have figured things out, I spotted these trumpet mushrooms which I have never seen for sale like this before.

Simple things

• Seeing a new post from Carol Ann of Fashioned For Joy – one of my favourite bloggers who has returned to the blogosphere.
• Lying on the sofa after a long walk with a cup of tea and a detective novel.
• Being back in Europe.
• Realising we had packed the right jackets (I know…but these things matter!).
• Looking forward to seeing family and friends in the weeks to come.
• Stopping for a coffee and pastry, and managing to talk about the weather in German.

I hope you can all excuse me for not linking up to other favourite bloggers this week. I just need to get into a new routine and plan out my posts a bit. More on what we did today, Sunday, coming up on Wednesday.

Thistles and Kiwis is a Wellington, New Zealand based blog written by Barbara, who likes cats, summer and good food. Thistles and Kiwis can be found on Facebook and Instagram @thistlesandkiwis