128 CultureShock! Austria
you taste the creamy ice cream, you’ll understand why.
We promise that you’ll return again and again to try each
and every exotic flavour. If you want more than a simple
ice cream cone, the selection of ice cream dishes and
sundaes is so broad that it’ll take you at least one summer to
sample them all. A popular dish is heisse Liebe (literally
‘warm love’), creamy vanilla ice cream smothered with warm
raspberries and garnished with loads of whipped cream. Not
to be missed!Health and Diet
The average Austrian diet, which is high on meat, fats,
starches and sweets, and low on fish and vegetables, may
be blamed for the high rate of circulatory disorders and
heart disease. It used to be quite common to compliment
an overweight person by saying, “You’re looking healthy.”
This attitude probably arose out of the years of hunger and
hardship characterising the world wars. Today, however,
the younger generation is more concerned with body size,
although not necessarily with their health.Meal Schedule
Breakfast
Breakfast is usually eaten very early in the morning, between
6:00 and 7:00 am, as most Austrians are early risers. A typical
breakfast consists of a few of the following: bread, butter,
marmalade, cold cuts, paté, softboiled egg, cheese, yogurt,
müsli, coffee, tea and hot chocolate.Gabelfrühstück
For many people who work, this is an important part of the
day. Work schedules are such that many people start and
end work early. For those who return home in the early
evening, a big dinner awaits. Therefore, they pass up the
traditional afternoon coffee break with pastry. But rather
than go a whole day without something sweet, they stop for
Gabelfrühstück, literally ‘breakfast eaten with a fork’, around
10:00 am. This snack, consisting of coffee and a pastry, tides
them over until lunch.