Slowly, but surely, I’ll get the rest of last summer’s travels up on this blog – maybe just in time for me to leave for this upcoming summer’s trip to Europe! But for now, I’m recapping the third leg of my trip – two cities in Austria: Salzburg and Linz!
Saturday, June 15
Thankfully I could get to the Munich Central Station (München Hauptbahnhof) easily by walking from my AirBnB, even with my luggage. I hung out at the Starbucks at the train station for a bit, mainly just to use the free wifi to figure out which track my train was going to be on.
It was a 2 1/2-hour train ride to Salzburg. I amazingly didn’t get motion sick despite having to sit in a rear-facing seat on the train!
After checking in to my Hostel (yay for finding an affordable private room!), I couldn’t really go out to explore yet, because a gnarly thunderstorm promptly rolled in. The nice thing, though, was my hostel room was on the top floor, so I could peek out the window and watched the pouring rain and lightning.
MyIndigo
Finally, a couple hours later, it stopped raining enough to go out. I went to find dinner at one of the vegan-friendly restaurants I had bookmarked nearby. MyIndigo has dishes from various cultures around the world, some of which are vegetarian, vegan, and/or gluten-free. Since I’m a sucker for any kind of curry, I went with the Malaysian Buddha curry with soy nuggets and carrots, with crispy cashew nuts on top. Yum!
Eis Greissler
I wanted to walk around some, before heading back to the hostel. I was just a few blocks from this giant and very steep hill, the Kapuzinerberg. Along the base of it is Linzer Gasse, a pedestrian street with lots of cute shops. One of those shops was Eis Greissler, an ice cream shop that has some vegan sorbet flavors. I was intrigued by the elderflower sorbet, which tasted a lot like lychee fruit, so I got a scoop of that to eat as I meandered my way back toward my hostel.
Sunday, June 16
Sadly, over the course of the night, I quickly got pretty sick. I developed a 100.8 degree F fever (which, for someone who tends to run colder, IS a fever), had body aches and chills. Then by 9:30am the next morning, the fever went away and I actually felt ok enough to go out. I had a tiny bit of a cough, but nothing more than that. The last thing I wanted to do was to waste my time in Salzburg lying in bed.
The Heart Of Joy Cafe
One of the vegan-friendly cafes I’d researched was The Heart of Joy Cafe. I wish I had more of an appetite to get something more substantial (as they have several vegan breakfast dishes), but I only got a soy milk latte and a piece of their Red Cashew Raw Cake (which was vegan and gluten-free!). Both were quite enjoyable and it’s a lovely cafe to relax and eat.
After breakfast, I went walked around this “downtown” area for a bit. Then, the primary reason I came to Salzburg: The Sound of Music tour! (It’s every bit as cheesy as you might imagine, but super fun and informative if you like the movie. Which I do. Let’s just say, I broke our VHS tape of the movie when I was a kid.)
MyIndigo
After the tour was done, I explored Hellbrunn Palace for a bit. Then, because it was Sunday, most restaurants were closed. But MyIndigo was one of the few places that were open, so I went back there for dinner. This time, I got their Indian Dal over veggies. Delicious!
Monday, June 17
My second full day in Salzburg was dedicated mostly to the life and history of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Mozart was born in and spent a fair portion of his life in Salzburg, so the city has turned the house where he was born and the house where he and his family moved to into museums about their lives.
Café Tomaselli
My first stop was to Café Tomaselli, where Mozart frequented. His widow, Konstanze, lived upstairs from this cafe with her second husband for a couple years working on W.A. Mozart’s biography. Their menu, sadly, is not vegan-friendly. The only coffee beverage I could get was their double espresso, which I had to drink essentially black. Which was fine – I was here more for the location, not their food or beverage like most everyone else.
Höfinger Eis
In between walking around Salzburg, I found an ice cream cart along the bank of the Salzach River. Höfinger Eis offers ice cream made from organic and local ingredients. I saw that they have a vegan coconut milk flavor, so I definitely got a scoop. Heavenly!
Wokman Natural Kitchen
Toward the end of the day, after visiting lots of locations related to Mozart’s life as well as the Fortress Hohensalzburg (Festung Hohensalzburg – which dates back to as early as the year 1077 CE), I was ready for dinner. (I had a protein bar for lunch.)
I was wandering by a restaurant called Wokman Natural Kitchen that happened to be on my list, but I hadn’t necessarily planned on eating at. But this older Asian woman waved me over to sit down and take a look at the menu. I obliged and found that they did have a number of vegan options, Vietnamese and Asian fusion dishes. Also, curry. (Have you noticed that I like curry?) I decided to get their Tofu & Vegetable Yellow Curry over rice, and it was one of the yummiest yellow curries I’ve had in a long time.
Uncle Van Natural Kitchen
After walking around a little bit more, looking for locations relevant to Mozart’s life, I found that I was still hungry. I stopped into Uncle Van Natural Kitchen, a fast casual build-your-own dish Asian fusion place. Like Chipotle, but with rice or noodle dishes. They are 100% gluten-free, lactose-free, and have a good number of vegetarian and vegan options. They had a tofu summer roll, and that was perfect to satisfy me.
Tuesday, June 18
Cafe Fingerlos
My final day in Salzburg was hot. Upper 70’s, low 80’s F. I wanted iced coffee, but I learned the hard way that Austrians don’t do iced coffee. It is a strange concept to them. So, when I went to Cafe Fingerlos and asked if they could make a soy latte iced, I still got a hot soy latte. They didn’t have many vegan food items, but I was glad they at least had soy milk.
GustaV
GustaV was one restaurant that kept coming up during my research for vegan-friendly places to eat in Salzburg, so I’m glad I was able to come eat here before I left (they are closed Sundays and Mondays, and had already closed when I arrived Saturday). It’s apparently the first vegan cafe & bistro in Salzburg!
I was there early enough to still be able to get breakfast (well, they serve breakfast until 4pm), so I got The “Hearty” One breakfast, which had a savory tofu scramble made with veggies and option for gluten-free bread. A tad salty for my taste, but filling. Just what I needed.
After eating at GustaV, I picked up my luggage from my hostel and headed to the train station. Off to Linz!
Front Food
After meeting up with my friend in Linz and dropping off my luggage in her office, I went in search of dinner. I walked quite a ways to Front Food, a fully vegan burger joint that also has wraps, hot dogs, and snacks – also all vegan! So many options! But I went with the “Big Chiiesy,” which consisted of their vegan patty, vegan cheese, tomatoes, onions, pickles, iceberg lettuce, ketchup, and mustard on their burger roll.
I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me before, but I realized here that there was good chance I didn’t have to eat gluten-free. Wheat in Europe is different from the wheat in the United States. Many people have said that they have no problem eating wheat in Europe when they can’t in the U.S. (Note that this does not include people with Celiac disease. Only those with gluten intolerance.) So, I ate the gluten-full burger from Front Food. And I felt fine. Huzzah!
Oh, the burger? Reminded me a little of what I vaguely remember of the Whopper from Burger King (which I haven’t eaten since I was, like, 12 years old). Not bad. It’s also worth noting that this cost me WAY less money than I expected, having just come from Salzburg where everything is quite expensive.
Eisdieler
On the way back to my friend’s theatre, I stopped at Eisdieler, an ice cream shop in Linz that has some vegan flavors. A little pricey for locals, I’ve read, but I was on vacation and just had a cheap burger, so I was fine with splurging a little on vegan ice cream.
One of their vegan flavors was the Black Ice Cream. It’s a super intense dark, dark, DARK chocolate ice cream. Did I say intense? It’s intense. Delicious.
After my ice cream, I saw a semi-staged concert version of the musical, Chess!
Wednesday, June 19
La Fiesta
After walking a bit to get me some coffee (I managed to get an Americano with soy milk), my friend and I went to a vegan-friendly Mexican restaurant in Linz called La Fiesta. Many items on the menu were vegan, but they also had a lunch buffet. The guy working there was happy to show me which items were vegan.
We happily tried a little of everything that we could, and seeing that I love Mexican food, my tummy was happy.
Naturbackstube Honeder
On my way back to my friend’s apartment to get my luggage, I stopped at a bakery that had traditional Austrian country breads. Naturbackstube Honeder. With my discovery that I can eat European bread, I decided to splurge. Austrian bread has many varieties, as I quickly learned upon stepping inside. I got three – the Vital Weckerl (poppy seeds, sesame, and six other seeds), the Salzstangerl (“salt stick,” essentially), and the Mohnflesserl (a braided bun with poppy seeds).
I ate two of them on the train to Prague. The third one I ate the next day. Not only did I feel fine after eating them, I was in a kind of bliss from being able to a) eat bread again and b) eat freaking delicious bread! I’m drooling thinking about these.
Stay tuned for my next post, with the food I got to eat in Prague!