Don't mess with Gurkhas

[kronckew]

p.s. - the 'continental' breakfast is appaling. cwasssonts (deliberate mis-pelling) are not breakfast, eggs, bacon, and wursts are! along with potato pancakes and apple sauce if you have the time or the granny to make them.

 

[Esav Benyamin]

i recall that dutch (or was it danish ) background babble on trams and busses sounded very english until you heard exactly what they are saying. frisian is probably the closest non-english language to english, you can pretty much figure out what they are saying & visa versa but you need to concentrate.

I was listening to music on shortwave one night when the music ended and the announcer began reading off 4 digit numbers. These would be the new freqs the broadcast would pick up on so I copied them down. Then I realized I didn't know what language they were. It was Dutch. Close enough.

 

[Jens Schuetz]

me too. makes a good side dish with porky things, or in sandwiches with roast beef or pastrami. or the traditional frankfuter. sadly, with all the cultural blending of the EU, germans now eat their wursts with curry sauce. i'm still a traditional german wurst mit senf eater.

Curry Wurst was only limited to the state of Brandenburg and Berlin. Funny thing their Wurst. Doesn't even have any intestines around it. It's just the dough in a squarish shape.
Don't tell this is spreading through whole of Germany now?

Curry Wurst wasn't developed due to recent multi cultural influences. I remember trying one in Potsdam in the 80s and it's probably much older. BTW. Curry in India isn't at all like that German "curry" thing.

I bet in Thüringen / Thuringia they still have proper Bratwurst. It's the best in Germany and and that naked squarish Prussian thing would be laughed at.
Same in Bavaria with their delicious Weisswurst.

 

[Moonw]

p.s. - the 'continental' breakfast is appaling. cwasssonts (deliberate mis-pelling) are not breakfast, eggs, bacon, and wursts are! along with potato pancakes and apple sauce if you have the time or the granny to make them.

Haha!

Is thee a link where I could learn about all these wurst variants, they always confuse me?

 

[Esav Benyamin]

You know how you go into a deli and they have a big board with everything for sale on it? When I was in Darmstadt, we would go into places with a board with all different kinds of Wurst. Stick it on a roll with mustard and sauerkraut and a stein of beer.

 

[kronckew]

Haha!

Is thee a link where I could learn about all these wurst variants, they always confuse me?

Here's the short answer.

Germany, which claims more than 1200 types of sausages or wurst, classifies sausage in two categories: fresh and slicing/spreading sausages.

Fresh sausages include uncooked and cooked sausages that need reheating. These are made of raw pork, veal, beef, ham, egg, salts and spices. They are cooked in water and sometimes lightly smoked. Some fresh sausages are made from cooked ingredients. These include knockwurst and wieners. Bratwurst is a raw sausage that needs to be fully cooked. All fresh sausages need to be refrigerated.

Slicing and spreading sausages are cold cuts and come ready to eat. Some are very firm or hard and can be sliced and eaten in slices or on crackers and bread. Liverwurst is an example of a spreading sausage made of pork liver.

Types of German Sausage or Wurst

Almost all wurst is made of pork, beef or veal seasoned with regional ingredients. The various ingredients in types of wurst distinguish one from the other. Wurst tend to be regional specialties and thousands of varieties exist. Here’s a sample of some of the more than 1200 German wurst varieties.

Bauerwurst: a chunky sausage that's often grilled or cooked with sauerkraut.
Bierschinken: a large slicing sausage made with ham and pistachios
Bierwurst: a slicing sausage with juniper and cardamom
Blutwurst: blood sausage, made with pork, beef, blood and fat, eaten sliced cold or fried
Bockwurst: smoked sausage made from veal and seasoned with fresh herbs, resembles a large hot dog and can be boiled, best with bock beer
Bratwurst: a pale, smoked sausage made of veal and pork, ginger, garlic, nutmeg, one of the sausages that requires full cooking
Braunschweiger: a spreadable, smoked sausage made from liver, eggs, milk
Cervelat: a slicing sausage made of pork, beef, mustard and garlic
Frankfurter: the original, a smoked sausage made of lean pork, salted bacon
Knockwurst: short, plump smoked sausage made of lean pork, beef, spices and garlic, often served with sauerkraut
Landjager: hunter’s sausage, made of smoked beef, needs no refrigeration, comes in flat sticks
Pinkelwurst: made with beef and/or pork, onions, oat and bacon
Wiernerwurst: similar to the American frankfurter, made of beef, pork, coriander and garlic
Weisswurst: white sausage and the Bavarian Octoberfest specialty, a pale, mild sausage made of veal, beef, pork, cream and eggs, often served with rye bread, sweet mustard and Weissbier.

now the long one

German wursts A-Z <-linky

 

[Moonw]

Thank you both, now I've got a bunch of reading to do , to elevate myself from the current position of an ignorant on the topic. Appreciated!

 

[kronckew]

Thank you both, now I've got a bunch of reading to do , ...

most welcome.
that should read 'reading and eating to do'!

 

[Moonw]

most welcome.
that should read 'reading and eating to do'!

Most deff.!

We had a trip planned to Austria and great plans, but my wife caught such a bad flu that we stayed home with nothing but the dogs to cheer us up. I'll try the next time to find some wursts while I am there. And won't skip the yearly trip to Germany, where we have dear friends.

 

[kronckew]

i found vienna a bit bland architecturally, even the old imperial palace looked like an office block. the food however, is to die for. i could (and did) spend days at the Prater with the giant ferris wheel, the Wiener Riesenrad. the beer garden there serves good wursts with kraut and Kartoffelbrei.

the prater livens up at night and is a nice park with attractions during the day. get out of vienna into the country for more sights. a day trip on the Railroad to to salzburg and the festung is well worth it, weather permitting. the view from the festung is amazing. ( i have family in wiener neustadt, about 30 k south of wien.

where did you go in germany? i've got more relatives there in hamburg & munich. the german cities are more interesting than vienna itself, lots more twisty little side streets, old fascinating buidings, shops and you stumble across knbidfe and gun shos, antique shops, etc as you wander. and the hofbrau hausen of course.munich oktoberfest of course. some great wine bars on the south-east side of the river. hamburg is cool too. a port city evenn tho it's quite far inland on the elbe. lots of canals. got plastered in the war (killed a fair number of kronckes there) but rebuilt nicely. last time i went to berlin, the wall was still up. some interesting evenings there as i ws in uniform along with a bunch of other midshipmen, had an east german agent try to slip a polish cadet in our class a mickey. it did not turn out well for the east german. luckily our guy was BIG and te commie under-dosed him. our resident polock beat the crap outta the east grman. then the MPs arrived. they also beat the crap outta him and told us who he was & what he likely was trying to do. they didn't bother us tho. i recall the bar/night club had good dunkel lager and schwartz bier.

oh, i forgot, had the other half of the langos last nite, diluted the leftover garlic spread with more sour cream and added some chopped shallot from last years crop when i fried the bacon chunks. wunderbar!

bbq baked beans and whole grain basmati rice (with sausages & bacon of course) tonite tho. in about a half hour or so. (it's 18:07 at the mo.)

p.s. - trying to wean us back on track, just found that there is a nepali restaurant in gloucester, about a 20 min drive. will need to try their take-aways. maybe is should bring my kothimora. maybe get a discount? might need spiral to bail me out if the cops stop me tho.

 

[Moonw]

Thanks for the tips, again much appreciated ! That meal looks DELICIOUS!

I'll just need to buy myself some langos tomorrow .

I gravitated mainly around Frankfurt, then Stuttgart. Was very curious about the Hohenzollern Castle, which we got a chance to visit. Everything was fascinating but of course the Armory was what peaked my interest, even though it wasn't very ample. I might design my next visit after I research what castles are known from their weapons exhibits. Some of the old specimens look lighter than I would've imagined - I guess too much Hollywood brainwashing , where pieces of steel don't pay tribute to gravity, nor people to fatigue .

 

[Esav Benyamin]

Look at some of the old plate armor and you'll see, most of those mighty heroes weren't very big.

 

[Jens Schuetz]

Look at some of the old plate armor and you'll see, most of those mighty heroes weren't very big.

That's for sure when looking at medieval German armor. Makes me believe that the Germans you see pictured in Roman movies also weren't as huge as shown or were the Italians even smaller 2000 years ago?

 

[kronckew]

...Some of the old specimens look lighter than I would've imagined - I guess too much Hollywood brainwashing , where pieces of steel don't pay tribute to gravity, nor people to fatigue .

many 'real' antique weapons were lighter than modern reproductions. we tend to over-build. as you said, who wants to carry extra weight around in the field that isn't necessary. they were used to stuff that occasionally broke & bneeded repair rather than building it twice as heavy and being unbreakable.

there is a theory that the knights were not all that much smaller than us, they ate fairly well. the small fancy display armour was likely made for teenagers & outgrown & thus hung up on display.they then had more practical field armour that actually got used, and broken, lost in battle, etc. so not so much survives. lots of armour in the tower of london & the royal armoury would fit the average man today. king henry 8th was over six foot. his armour survives and is huge. he had quite a few sets made too. the average man got smaller about the end of the 16- 17c possibly due to disease, the plague, bad diets, etc. & started getting better in the 19th c. a lot of skeletons of knights and nobles were identifiable and measured to come to that conclusion.

of course peasants didn't eat so well and were usually smaller than the nobles. they also tended not to wear metal armour if they joined the levee. bowman were fed and paid better too.

another thing, museums usually do not have a clue about displaying armour, armour was made to flex and move, expand and contract. most armour is displayed with it's weight making it look shorter than it is, like those collapsable cups where the sections slide over each other. i've even seen armour displayed with greaves tied onto the shoulders as if they were pauldrons.

link

link2

 

[Thomas Linton]

We have suits of adult armor in the Cleveland Museum of Art with complete provenance. Some of the suits it look right for today's typical Scouts.

According to the Surgeon General of the Army, the tallest ethnic group drafted into the U.S. Army for WW I were American Indians at an average of 7' 7.5".

Here's an antique suit of armor for you, if you have the $$ and are about 5'2" https://www.1stdibs.com/furniture/m...Rj3Ymknjtz-rQqZbrKDval5sxuUwDPNBuyBoCe87w_wcB

 

[kronckew]

that's exactly one of the suit of armour i was talking about the lower bits of that suit go on your knees, not the floor, they've accordioned the leg armour. those segmented pieces are meant to flex and move up & down. the plate was meanbt to be worn over padding and mail. if the armour is 5'2", add a couple feet for the, er feet & lower legs & he's a pretty tall hussar. skinny tho.

p.s. my brother in laws back in alabama were all over 6 ft. the shortest was 6 ft. 6 in. the tallest 7 ft. 6 in. - half alabama blackfoot tribe. heck, even one of my my sister in laws was 6ft. 1 in. my wife was the runt in the family at 5'9". (not counting granny who, at 5'2" if you stretched her on a rack, was the meanest, toughest person in cullman co. and had the biggest heart.)

 

[Moonw]

Look at some of the old plate armor and you'll see, most of those mighty heroes weren't very big.

I guess nutrition and hard work, less exogenous hormones and little to no health care kept everyone smaller indeed.

 

[Moonw]

many 'real' antique weapons were lighter than modern reproductions. we tend to over-build. as you said, who wants to carry extra weight around in the field that isn't necessary. they were used to stuff that occasionally broke & bneeded repair rather than building it twice as heavy and being unbreakable.

there is a theory that the knights were not all that much smaller than us, they ate fairly well. the small fancy display armour was likely made for teenagers & outgrown & thus hung up on display.they then had more practical field armour that actually got used, and broken, lost in battle, etc. so not so much survives. lots of armour in the tower of london & the royal armoury would fit the average man today. king henry 8th was over six foot. his armour survives and is huge. he had quite a few sets made too. the average man got smaller about the end of the 16- 17c possibly due to disease, the plague, bad diets, etc. & started getting better in the 19th c. a lot of skeletons of knights and nobles were identifiable and measured to come to that conclusion.

of course peasants didn't eat so well and were usually smaller than the nobles. they also tended not to wear metal armour if they joined the levee. bowman were fed and paid better too.

another thing, museums usually do not have a clue about displaying armour, armour was made to flex and move, expand and contract. most armour is displayed with it's weight making it look shorter than it is, like those collapsable cups where the sections slide over each other. i've even seen armour displayed with greaves tied onto the shoulders as if they were pauldrons.

link

link2

Very intriguing to say the least!

 

[Jens Schuetz]

On top of the small or small looking armor comes the small door height in buildings from back then.
Maybe easier to defend if the attacker has to bend down or more stable if the walls get pounded by catapults or canons?
Or just smaller guys in general?
If I look at my generation and their parents and grandparents there is a big trend. People seem to have been smaller in the past. Now I guess that trend wasn't linear and people just 150 years ago didn't have much better food and medicine than people 400 years ago.

Let's see if there are some statistics in the web. I'm sure archaeologists must have looked at some skeletons for example to get such data.

Edit:
http://ourworldindata.org/data/food-agriculture/human-height/

Seems like the average height today is 10cm / 4 inch bigger than in medieval times. Not really hobbit but of course more of them would have been hobbit then today assuming a normal distribution of height.

 

[kronckew]

isee about a 6 cm. (2.5 in.)difference from the period 500-1500, with dips in the plague and war centuries that were probably nutritional. again, the common man represented most of that difference, the nobility was taller 'cus they ate better.

noble residences had huge doors, if we went by them, the nobles must have been ten footers
the pope obviously was biggest of all, a good 12 feet i'd say!