Rudesheimer Coffee (and Cake!)

Backblip

Spoiled for choice of a blip today as we cruised the Rhine Gorge from Koblenz to Rudesheim, a 65 km stretch of the Middle Rhine Valley with over 40 hilltop castles and fortresses, as well as beautiful medieval towns and stunning scenery everywhere you look. It's an area that has inspired many artists over the centuries and certainly inspired a couple of the passengers who were accomplished sketchers and water colourists.

I'd like to think it inspired me to take some good photos too, but sadly there is room for only one on here! For a change, it's a picture of one of the specialities of Rudesheim, our next port of call. The town is famous for its Asbach Uralt brandy, regarded by many as the premium German spirit and seconded by my husband and his mother!

The brandy is a key ingredient of the Rudesheimer Coffee and its serving is a performance not to be missed:-) A miniature of Asbach is poured over sugar into a specially shaped coffee cup, then the fumes set alight while the sugar is stirred until it dissolves. Then comes strong black coffee, topped off with a huge portion of whipped cream and decorated with chocolate flakes. Stomach problems or no - I just had to try one and it was totally delicious. (I only drank half and my husband finished it off happily - and the cake is his too!!)

The most fascinating street in Rudesheim is the Drosselgasse, a long narrow pedestrian-only cobblestone lane. It's full of wine taverns and restaurants (and tourists!), but has a great party atmosphere and some beautiful buildings. One of the lovely buildings in a different street houses Siegfried's Music Cabinet Museum, a huge collection of orchestral music players, some small and others enormous and extremely LOUD! Quite an experience:-)

It was with great reluctance that we had to leave Rudesheim and continue on our journey and I'd certainly like to return some day.