Today on Food on Fridays we take a look at a couple of  special summer treats. First up: a Summer Pretzel.

As I’ve mentioned in the past,  none of the bakeries around here make any kind of standard German style Berliner doughnut this time of year. But just as the weather starts heating up in summer, there appears in one of the bakeries a confection they call a Sommerbretzel, “summer pretzel”. The only bakery that makes them also makes the best soft pretzels and bread near us, but their sweet pastries are often a bit of a disappointment. That may be why we hadn’t gotten around to trying them in previous years. We took steps to correct that a week ago when we bought one:

Sommerbrezel, “Summer Pretzel”

As you can see, it looks like a pretzel, except it’s a pretzel that has been covered in granulated sugar like a doughnut. The taste isn’t quite that; there’s no salt on it, which is good, but the dough still is chewy like the standard pretzels.  But the taste is sweet; I don’t know if that’s only due to the sugar-coating, or if the dough is also sweet by itself in this style pretzel. It was interesting, but not my favorite. But it’s something a little different for when you’re craving a pretzel but also something sweet, I guess.

Anyway, that’s one type of summer special treat that we’ve only seen here. In Bolzano they did have regular soft pretzels, but I never saw a Sommerbretzel there.

No, the main summer treat in Bolzano is, of course, gelato. 🙂 But that wasn’t all we enjoyed in summertime. In fact, some of the summer treats were quite healthy, because the fruits we got at the Piazza Erbe outdoor market there were amazing.

I mean, one of my favorite “everyday expeditions” was heading over to that market, cloth shopping bag at the ready, to see what my favorite fruit vendor had selected to stock that day. In my Life on a Gelato Diet book, I describe how “Hanna” (the pseudonym I gave the fruit vendor in my book) always picked out the choicest fruit for her stand, including delectably succulent strawberries that often tempted tourists to misbehave:

Hanna carries all kinds of fruit from all over the world. …  Many times on the signs she’ll add comments about the fruit; for example, this summer the signs next to the strawberries promised that they were “flavorful” and “sweet,” in both German and Italian.

Actually, in German one of the things it promised was that they were “aromatisch”. I’m not sure if that word conveys exactly the same idea of “scent” that its English cognate, “aromatic,” does. But if it does, that may help explain why Hanna is constantly having to remind people that her other signs — in German, Italian and English — prohibit touching and smelling the fruit.

When I first started going to the market, I thought Hanna had put “don’t smell” on the sign as a kind of joke. But no, I have now witnessed people attempting to stick their noses right in the baskets to take a whiff of the merchandise on display. It drives Hanna crazy; apparently there are a fair number of people each day who do that — or try to — despite the sign. This, in addition to the people who want to poke and prod everything, and/or disturb the carefully piled pyramids of peaches, etc. by selecting from the bottom of the pile. Being an outdoor fruit vendor here has its challenges.
— From Chapter 7, “Fruits and Veggies” in Life on a Gelato Diet

I’ve been selling a photo I took of some of Hanna’s strawberries for a while on Red Bubble as a postcard or print. But today I am unveiling something special: a special line of cloth tote bags with some of my favorite photos from Bolzano. Including, of course, a shopping bag with the strawberries photo. 🙂 Note that clicking on the photo of the tote bag will take you the Red Bubble website where you’ll find more information about the 3 sizes of bags available, the prices, and how to order:

Here are a couple more designs I’ve put up so far.

“Pretty in Pink” bag

Life on a Gelato Diet bag

Click here to go to see all 6 of the current designs in my “Life on a Gelato Diet” tote bag collection. Check them out and let me know what you think.  Then order a bag and take it on your next everyday expedition. Just a thought. 🙂