Christmas Market Crawl Day 3: Wolfenbüttel

I know what you’re thinking: “How the heck do I pronounce Wolfenbüttel?!”

It’s volf-en-burr-tel, FYI.

But now we’ve got the tricky name out of the way, let’s talk about how awesome this town and its Christmas market are.

After a short train ride from Goslar, we stepped out onto the chilly train platform and made our way to our hotel. We had some work to do and wanted to unpack and relax for a little while, so we did just that in our hotel, meaning we only saw the town as dusk was falling. Which, in actual fact, was the perfect way to see it.

We entered the main town square (where the Christmas market has been held every year since 1585) and fell in love with the pretty coloured buildings that surrounded the stalls and the small-town vibe of the market itself. It was immediately apparently that, for as pretty and quaint as Wolfenbüttel is, it is relatively unknown. Which is surprising, really, as it’s the home of Jägermeister.

Yep, that’s right – this picturesque town is the birthplace of millions of messy nights out. Who would have thought?

What The Markets Are Like / What We Did

We were excited to see some stalls here selling food and drink that we’d never seen at any of our previous markets and we loved that we didn’t have to push past anyone to get in a queue, either. When we returned to the markets for a second time later in the evening, we were greeted with carol singers (one of my favourite things at this time of year) and there was music playing at several of the bars around the square, which added to the festive atmosphere.

There was a lovely big Christmas tree in the centre of the square that we (of course) took an obligatory selfie in front of and we made friends with a couple of the stallholders who were intrigued to learn more about the Anglo-American couple and Basset Hound that had wound up in their little town!

What We Ate and Drank

We enjoyed some great food at the Wolfenbüttel Christmas market, including some culinary firsts for us. We sampled some fried cauliflower covered in cheese sauce and I devoured a plate of Schupfnudeln (rolled potato noodles sauteed with sauerkraut and bacon).

Scott ate a wild deer sausage (sorry, Bambi) and, after having promised Holly we would give her a bratwurst on her travels, we finally fulfilled that promise, to which she was eternally grateful. In fact, the owners of the stall selling the wild deer sausage even saved an extra one for Holly because they were so taken with her. Pretty sure it was her snazzy Christmas neckerchief that sealed the deal on the freebie.

To drink, we enjoyed some hot apple punch with slices of fresh apple in (and little forks to fish it out with), but our favourite stall of all was also the busiest one – the Feuerzangenbowle one. As you know by know, this is one of our favourite drinks at the Christmas markets, but the guy who runs this stall has been at the market for 30 years and makes a big production of tasting the bowl of mulled wine and then adding more rum, which makes the crowd cheer. Actually, I’d say it was one of our favourite mulled wine stalls of all the markets we’ve been to.

Where We Stayed

We stayed in the Parkhotel Altes Kaffehaus, which was around a ten minute walk to the Christmas markets and a five minute walk from the train station. The hotel houses an historic wine cellar which is now the venue for the hotel restaurant and, although we didn’t dine in there, we snuck in for a little sneak peek and it was definitely atmospheric and inviting. We had a lovely big room and enjoyed a big breakfast spread the next morning which included some of my favourite soft cheeses and breads. I’m sorry we didn’t get to experience a bit more of the hotel and its facilities (hello, sauna!) but it was a great base for us in the town.