Q&A: A Taste of German Christmas Markets

Marc Mueller/European Pressphoto Agency

A Christmas market in Munich.

As a boy, the chef and restaurateur Hans Röckenwagner looked forward to late November, when the Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas market) would open in his home village of Schliengen, in northern Germany.

"Everyone in town went," he said. "It was a tradition, a sign that Christmas was finally here."

He remembers munching on gingerbread cookies shaped like Santa, with tiny ceramic pipes baked into them, while his parents toured the red and ivory stalls for local crafts. In 1985, he left Germany to open a restaurant in Venice, Calif., and for 20 years he passed the holidays at work, too busy to return home. As a small consolation, every late November, he changed the menus to include a traditional German dessert.

In 2006, while back at a Weihnachtsmarkt in Berlin, he paused before biting into one of his favorite gingerbread cookies. He didn't want the experience to be a disappointment, compared with what he remembered as a child. His conclusion: "Some things remain perfect in memory and in fact."

Below are edited excerpts from a conversation with Mr. Röckenwagner, who will be opening his latest Los Angeles restaurant in January, about the ambience and flavors of the Weihnachtsmarkt.

Q. What does it feel like to walk through a Weihnachtsmarkt?

A. It's just a jolly atmosphere. You might say, "I'll just go in and check it out," but then you get drawn in. You'll walk by a stall where people are making knives with beautifully carved wooden handles, or a cart where on top there's a wood-burning oven, and you can see dark, crusty flatbreads, covered with cream and speck, baking inside. This is called rahmbrot. And all of the buildings are designed to capture the season. Some of these little villages have two-story-tall nutcrackers and windmills that turn. You're surrounded by people making crafts, choirs singing and the smell of glühwein, which is prevalent throughout the markets.

How does glühwein taste?

If you love red wine, you're going to love it. If you love sweets, you're going to love it. It's a mulled wine, made with cloves, cinnamon, cardamom, sugar, oranges or apples. It's warm and addictive.

One of the most famous drinks is called feuerzangenbowle. They take a gigantic sugar cube, soak it with liqueur and set it on fire. As it burns, it drips into a vessel of mulled wine, and that's the drink. Funnily enough, beer is not so big at the market; don't forget, we just got done with Oktoberfest.

Which traditional foods are common?

Stollen is very traditional. It's a Christmas bread that's been filled with rum-soaked raisins, almonds, candied fruit and butter, then coated in a powdery sugar. Some say the bread's shape resembles a baby, or the Christ child. In Dresden, where they make it best, they'll bake one so large it has to be transported to the market by carriage horse.

Then we get to the pièce de résistance, the Elisenlebkuchen. This is a gingerbread, made with less than 10 percent flour. The objective is to only have high-grade ingredients: honey, spices, dried nuts, butter. This comes more from the Bavarian side of Germany. It's served on the same type of wafer that's used in communion. You see, in the past, they didn't have things like Silpats, so they'd slide these wafers underneath a sticky dough to keep it from clinging.

Any rare dishes to look for?

Occasionally there are open fires and you might see someone making baumkuchen (tree cake). It's basically a cake that's roasted like chicken on a spit. They suspend a tube over a fire. As the tube heats up, it's brushed with dough in very thin layers. Once the first layer is done, they brush on another and so on, until you have, easily, 60 layers. When it's finally cut, the slices have rings, just like a tree.

What about sausages, are there regional varieties?

Yes. How much time do you have?

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