Schokoladenmuseum!

Today, during our day sight-seeing in Cologne, we visited the Schokoladenmuseum, or Chocolate Museum. I thought I would take today's post to tell you all about it since it was extremely interesting, and I didn't have much in the way of obscure meals today.

The museum began with an exhibit describing how cacao is grown, harvested, made into cocoa, sold, and traded. Many of the tools, shipping methods, and facts about each country that exports cacao were located in this exhibit.

Moving on, we were ushered into a room cordoned off from the rest of the museum by two doors. The second door would not open until we had stepped into the vestibule, with the door closed behind us. We discovered that the reason for this was that we had wandered right into a natural environment for growing cacao, as well as coffee, mangos, and even papayas! It was nice and warm in there, and we had to wait in a second vestibule to leave.

The next exhibit we came upon taught us about the make-up of different grades of chocolate. White chocolate doesn't even have a cocoa mass percentage, while bittersweet dark chocolate has a cocoa mass percentage of 65%. It was also interesting to see the amount of other ingredients that go into making a bar of chocolate.

We made our way into the next room, the biggest room, and found to our amazement that there was a full chocolate factory set up in there! Hello Willy Wonka! ... But where was the chocolate river?! The machinery was extensive! Here is the machine used to roast the cocoa beans during the first stages of production.

There were also mixers, pounders, crushers, stirrers...you name it, we saw it! Here are some more pictures of the machinery!!

At the end of this side of the room, we came upon a cocoa tree, made out of chocolate, resting in a chocolate fountain! Thats as close to Willy Wonka as I think we're going to get today, but there was a woman dipping wafer cookies into the chocolate and handing them out to visitors, so yum!

At the corner of the room, we turned to follow it down the other side, only to find that it was an assembly line, creating the exact chocolate candies that we had received with our tickets at the entrance to the museum. We watched the chocolate get filled in the molds from a large vat that was continuously stirred...

  

The trays were then set into a rack where they rested...

Then, they were passed through a machine that flipped the trays, and knocked the small chocolates onto the awaiting conveyor belt...

Finally, the chocolates were lifted, in sheets, onto another machine that passed them through, into a single file line, in order to get wrapped in gold foil!

The result? A delicious little morsel of chocolate that I would have taken a picture of, had I not eaten it already! :)


The exhibit ended with a large room, made to look like a 1930's candy shop, complete with the mascot of one of the many famous chocolate makers, Sarotti. I like these guys!

In Bruges...and Beyond!

On our full day in Bruges, we had a lot we wanted to accomplish, but there's always time for meals on vacation so we wandered the town, looking for a place to eat breakfast. Breakfast isn't the same in Belgium as it is back home, so when we sat down at Miss Ellie's tea room, and ordered omelettes, they informed us that it was normally a lunchtime menu item. Well, we were both starved (after 13 hours of much-needed sleep), and they were willing to serve it to us anyway, so we went with it! This might have been the best omelette I've ever had! Fluffy, cheesy, and seasoned perfectly, this one totally hit the spot! Our coffees even came with little Belgian chocolates! This place is a winner!!

We then ventured to the bell tower in the center of Bruges for a mid-morning climb and a view of the whole city. After this excursion, as well as a few cathedrals, it was time for a late lunch. We approached one of the many bars with outdoor seating, since it was just lovely outside, and he informed us that they served three things: lasagna Bolgonese, spaghetti Bolognese, and ham and cheese. Well, okay, a spaghetti and a lasagna it is! Along with a beer, this meal hit the spot. I never order lasagna in restaurants but this one was just delicious!

We continued on, shopping and sight-seeing some more but then, I had an idea. The #2-rated restaurant in Bruges, according to TripAdvisor, is a wonderful little tearoom called Bittersweet, and I wanted to make a point of visiting it before we left. They make their hot chocolate in a very unique way, and it is just divine!! They brought us two cups of steamed milk, in Bodum thermal cups. Alongside the milk were two chocolate tulips, filled with thin pieces of more chocoloate. The woman explained what we must do: drop the tulip into the milk, and when it sinks all the way to the bottom, stir, stir, stir! I ordered dark chocolate, and my husband ordered milk chocolate, so our drinks tasted very different. The dark chocolate was richer, yet a bit less sweet with the purer of the chocolate grades. The were both, however, very rich and totally delicious! I don't think any other hot chocolate will ever compare!

My husband also ordered another waffle, with homemade chocolate sauce to pour on top! YUM!!!

A few hours later, we stumbled upon a gathering of bars that we hadn't seen before, and one of them boasted "Moules + Frites" for 10 euros (we couldn't leave Belgium without having mussels, we were told!!). Everywhere else seemed to be charging an arm and a leg for them so this seemed like a great deal! We sat ourselves, as seems to be the custom in Bruges, and ordered beers (of course) as well as two bowls of mussels, one with a garlic broth, and one with the house broth made of beer, and other seasonings. We also got some garlic bread for sopping up the broth. While the broth could have been seasoned a bit more heavily, the mussels were plumb and beautifully cooked! We got a huge bowl of them, along with a small plate of "frites." One more thing we can check off our list: "Moules + Frites."

We finished off our evening with a drink at one of the few bars we found to be "hoppin," full of young adults enjoying a few beers on a Friday night. They were playing good music, and it was fun to have found a local hang-out!

When we woke up in the morning, we headed directly to the train station with our luggage, so we could make the most of our day in Brussels, before catching our train to Cologne this evening. We stopped for coffee in the station, but waited until we arrived in Brussels to get a meal.

Once in Brussels, we were starving and made our way towards one of our destinations, the Mannequin Pis. This small statue of a little boy peeing into a fountain is really one of the must-sees of Brussels! On the way, we came across a lovely little cafe called Le Cercle de Voyageurs. I loved the creative menu, and the place looked interesting so we went in. There was an eclectic mix to choose from, with clever names for each dish as well. I opted for the salmon tartare, made with fresh ginger and green apples. It was served on three giant pieces of hearty wheat bread, and really satisfied my hunger. I found myself looking forward to each bite, especially the sweet crunch of apple which paired so nicely with the spicy ginger flavor, as well as the salmon. My husband had an Indian-inspired lamb dish that was also packed with flavor!

After some sight-seeing in Brussels for the day, it was time to hop on another train, this time heading into Germany! Our first stop in Germany is Cologne, but we'll only be there for a day, so I have a feeling it will be a busy one! We grabbed some sandwiches for the train ride with the hopes that we'd settle in to our hotel with time to get a late dinner once we arrived in Cologne.

We arrived at the hotel later than expected, and opted to stay in-house and eat dinner at the hotel restaurant. Our hotel seemed a little further out of the way than the one in Brugues, but Cologne is also a much larger city. I compare it to staying in Allston, and having to take the green line from the center of Boston to get there! I saw Spaetzle on the menu, and that's what I've been looking forward to! Spaetzle is a boiled dough, similar to pasta, but made by pressing the dough through a spaetzle-maker, or colander, to make droplets, that expand as they are boiled. It is a German delicacy, and this restaurant was no exception. They cooked their spaetzle in a cream sauce, and I chose to have it with veal, although it could have been served with fried champignons, or pork as well. The veal was cooked perfectly, and the spaetzle was delicious! I'm really looking forward to more German food!

Tomorrow, we will explore Cologne, and then hop on another train, heading to Stuttgart! The travels continue! Stay tuned for more European eats! I hope you are all enjoying the trip so far!