Hamburger Fischmarkt

Wow!  It's been such a long time since I've posted that I almost forgot my login password to this blog!  It really is sad that I haven't been consistently updating my blog.  You guys have been missing out on so much in our lives.  We've been BUSY!  What's worse is that I haven't been providing statuses on how much Vaiosina has grown in the last few months.  No worries though...I plan on catching you guys up.  I also plan on giving this blog a little makeover, but let me just get to business for now.

Malu is out of town due to yet another TDY.  So it's me and my little bug for now.  We spent most of the weekend relaxing at home.  This evening, I just wanted to get out and do something fun--not to mention, I had nothing planned or cooked for dinner. 

The Hamburger Fischmarkt has been going on downtown for the last week or so.  Not too sure what the story behind this festival is, but I did some Googling.  The original Hamburger Fischmarkt (Hamburg Fish Market) is a 300-year old market located in the city of Hamburg, which is six hours north from where we live.  Hamburg is Germany's second largest city with an 800-year old harbor that is one of the largest ports in the world and the second busiest in Europe.  The fish market is a huge open-air market showcasing all kinds of seafood, fruits, nuts, flowers and teas from all over the world.  It sounds a lot like the Pike Place Market in Seattle to me.

Anyway, the city of Stuttgart brought the some of the sights, sounds, and definitely the tastes and smells of the Hamburger Fischmarkt in the form of a festival right in the middle of downtown.  As with any festival located in downtown, it was crowded and a pain in the butt trying to maneuver Vaiosina's stroller in and around it.  However, it was fun and we had some really good eats.  Despite some drizzling, the weather was comfortable (although breezy) and I managed to enjoyed myself.  I think Vaiosina enjoyed herself as well.  There's not much complaining once you give this little girl a cup full of ice cream :)

In this picture, we're nearing the entrance to the festival.  I tried my best to get a shot of those flags that said Hamburger Fischmarkt.

Fried seafood galore!  Calamari, fish sticks/nuggets/paddies, shrimp, mussels...you name it!

They even had shrimp scampi.  See that big pan?  It was filled up with scampi.  Yum!

What's a fest without beer?  Here's Sina enjoying her ice cream next to this mini bar.

Okay, so these kinds of sandwiches are sold everywhere around here.  I believe they're herring sandwiches.  The fish is served sashimi style (ugh..raw!), with sweet mayo, pickles and onions. There is nothing or no one on the face of this planet that could possibly convince me to try one of these.  What do you think?  Would you try it?

Our dinner a.k.a. "heart attack waiting to happen."  I didn't finish it all, but it was delicious!

Strawberry wine.  I held off on this for obvious reasons :(

A ship bar.  Too cool!

So that fruit basket...there was a booth where these guys put out about 20 or so baskets and tossed all kinds of fruits into them--grapes, plums, nectarines, pineapples, apples and oranges.  You see it's filled to the brim....we got it for 10 euro (which is like, $12).  What a steal!  Truth be told...I really wanted the basket.  Vaiosina loves those grapes!

We called it quits after about two hours.  And only in Germany (or maybe in all of Europe) will you run smack dab into a completely different festival on the way back to your car.  We did some browsing for a while then made our merry way home.

Like I said, I'm extremely behind in posting, but will do my best to get you guys caught up to speed!  I kind of hated that I was in such a blogging funk.  Time to get back to it!

Happy Sunday everyone!