In April, we visited Luxembourg and fell. in. love. The city is absolutely beautiful and so picturesque up on the mountain. We loved the food and the people we met. We enjoyed venturing outside of Luxembourg city to Echternach, Joe’s familial home town.
Food
I loved the food of Luxembourg. It’s a peculiar mixture of German and French cuisines, and is quite unique. I love the heavy, saucy, creamy, old-world style foods, so I thoroughly enjoyed it. We visited a brewery and had bouneschlupp, a green bean and ham soup, followed by Kniddelen for me, which is a giant version of spaetzle, and Wainsaucisse for Joe. The kniddelen were superb, but I love noodles and cream sauces and bacon. The wainsaucisse was by far the most interesting meal we had. It’s like German sausages covered in a French creamy herb sauce. It’s… confusing. And so very heavy. But of course, delicious.
Bouneschlupp 
Kniddelen 
Wainsaucisse 
Light-beer/dark-beer
Later in the trip, we visited a nice, fancy restaurant and had some more modern visions of traditional food. Joe had a dish of sliced ham, also somehow covered in a cream sauce. Delicious, heavy, sleep-inducing cream sauce. I, on the other hand, enjoyed one of the most delicious dishes I have had anywhere in the world at any time. I once again went with kniddelen. But this time, instead of bacon, they were topped with foie gras. I cannot describe how decadent every single morsel of this meal was. Also, weirdly, the mashed potatoes at every restaurant were astonishingly good. Like, I want to know how they make them because they are unlike anything I’ve ever had.
Kniddelen with foie gras 
Ham and cream sauce
The other thing Luxembourg is famous for is their baked goods. We enjoyed a lovely breakfast one morning at the famous Oberweiss patisserie. The photos at the link here are definitely worth looking at if you enjoy photos of immaculately constructed pastries. And who doesn’t, really? I had a mille feuille, which is one of the words I can’t ever pronounce. Joe had a croissant, as he is averse to dairy products and pretty much everything is made of whipped cream. And his mom had a very decadent chocolate cake. The pastries were so delicious, as tasty as they were beautiful. On another morning, we went to the Laduree, technically a French patisserie. We had the most fancy breakfast with beautiful tea dishes and silver tea/coffee pots. We enjoyed some croissants and French toast. But Laduree is most famous for its macaroons, so we picked up half a dozen of those for the train ride to Paris.
Chocolate cake 
Mille feuille 
Laduree breakfast
Scenery
Luxembourg city is beautiful. It’s on top of a mountain, and fortified with historical city walls. It’s a beautiful mix of modern architecture and old castle-y walls and views for miles. It is a banking power, so the city is quite wealthy and everything in the old town is immaculately clean. It’s this pristine, almost Disney-like version of a European city. It isn’t yet super popular with tourists, so it’s calm, peaceful. It is going through a housing crisis, with rents and housing prices skyrocketing, and most of the people who live in the city at this point are not native Luxembourgers. But it isn’t crowded.
The spires of the palace. 
Overlooking the city below
In the town, we walked through tiny, winding streets of upscale shops. We window shopped some very fancy porcelain. We walked to the Grand Ducal palace. It’s unique in that it’s in the middle of town, no surrounding gardens or walls or fences. It kind of blends in with the other buildings, and you wouldn’t realize it’s a palace. My favorite part of the palace is that it’s covered in intricate wrought iron (I would guess?) spires on tops of all of the roof points. It looks like a fancy cake or pastry.
Church in Echternach 
The bridge to Germany
Looking out from the city, there are miles of beautiful villages just outside the city walls. It’s almost a direct drop down to little houses with little square garden plots. Everything perfectly square, everything manicured and perfect. We ventured out to Echternach, a small village on the German border. It was also quaint and quiet and beautiful. We visited a very lovely church and walked across a bridge into Germany.
Returning to Luxembourg
And now…. Now I am fortunate enough to get to return to Luxembourg. I leave in 21 days and will be there for 1 month. I’ll write about my preparations and packing soon!
