One of the biggest changes that came with studying abroad, other than the language, customs, and country of course, was the amount of cooking I have done for myself. At school I never cooked, this was due to the combination of amazing (not really) food served at Valentine Dining hall, the almost complete lack of kitchens on Amherst campus, and the availability of wings from the Hangar. Here in Heidelberg I have access to highest rated mensa in Germany, but there are no wings, and I have my own kitchen in my apartment. Partly because I wanted to expand my culinary abilities and partly because it pains me to pay for my food by the gram, I began cooking on a regular basis.
Now I didn't start cooking here, (luckily or I wouldn't have made it past October) I began learning to cook at home before coming to college. The skills that I learned while crying over onions in the kitchen at home, and making dinner for the family are the only things that stand between me and starvation (or takeout.)
When I arrived at my apartment it was completely empty other than the furniture, I say this because a few of my friends arrived to apartments with kitchens already full of utensils and dishes. This necessitated a shopping trip as the first order of business. I headed out of the Altstadt and down to Bismarckplatz where I stopped in at the Woolworth's. Here I found a couple cooking knives, a set of utensils, a spatula, a cutting board, some tupperware, a frying pan, a pot, and a strainer. Everything that seemed necessary as the basics for any meal.
I now had everything I needed to keep myself fed, except for the food. I got lucky on a Thursday walking on Plock and ran into a small farmer's market on Frederick-Ebert Platz. After looking around I found a few things I would need for the semester, and for dinner. There was a stall selling spices in bulk where I found some essentials. Most of the spices were easy translate but there were some there that I am still not exactly sure what they were. But I bought some garlic, basil, oregano, cumin, curry and pepper, what seemed like a good basic set of spices.
When I got back to my apartment it was time to cook my first meal. I had stopped at a grocery store and picked up some rice, potatoes, chicken, and a container of some cream that seemed halfway between whipping cream and sour cream. I cooked up the chicken and potatoes while boiling the water for the rice, when they were finished I added the cream and and a good bit of curry to make curried potatoes and chicken... over rice. So it wasn't a very creative meal, or very extensive... but it was my first meal in Heidelberg.
Now if you may have noticed a glaring omission in the list of items that I purchased at Woolworth's and if so you have high reading comprehension, but yes, I did forget to buy plates or bowls.
So I ate my first meal out of tupperware:
