Austrians love their sausages and are fiercely proud of their homegrown wurst. However, this has not daunted Englishman Richard Holmes in his quest to get locals to love his bangers too.
“I started doing it because I really missed British sausages from home,” the 31-year-old said, as he demonstrated his sausage-making technique. “That and fish, a nice bit of cod.”
Based in Vienna, he sells his handmade “Britwurst” creations to a growing number of restaurants and shops and at markets — although not yet to Austria’s ubiquitous sausage stands.
Photo: AFP
However, looking the archetypal British butcher with his blue-and-white apron, chunky forearms and sausage-sized fingers, he said it has been a struggle to get established.
The worst thing, he said as he minced great pale chunks of pork — “shoulder for the taste, ’coz it’s got the good fat” —- was the “absolute nightmare” of Austrian bureaucracy.
“Rules are rules at the end of the day, but I really struggled with them a lot. At one point I thought, this is too much, I’m going to give up on this,” the Essex native said.
Photo: AFP
You cannot just turn up in Austria and start making and selling sausages. The authorities needed documented proof that Holmes knows what he is doing.
So he went back to England for a weekend sausage-making course and returned armed with 50kg of sausages in his suitcase — and the vital piece of paper.
To get a business license, Holmes went to see the “Master Butcher of Vienna,” who did not know one end of a British sausage from another, but who allowed him to operate.
The proviso though from this wurst overlord was that he would not “tread on the toes” of local producers by selling Austria-type sausages like the kaesekrainer (with melted cheese inside) or bratwurst.
Not that this restriction has cramped his style. Alongside the standard British favorites, Holmes has innovated, using anything from pistachios to jalapeno peppers to add a twist to his creations.
However, Holmes said his main selling point is not that his sausages are British, but they are a quality, all-natural product, unlike the cheaper end of the local market.
“If you visit a wuerstelstand you’ve got no idea where they come from,” he said. “Your typical frankfurter from the supermarket has all sorts of stuff in it.”
His meat comes from local, free-range pigs that are slaughtered at Hoedl Fleischerei, Vienna’s last butcher that kills on site, and which then makes the sausages to Holmes’ recipes.
Down at Vienna’s Karmeliter market where Holmes is every Saturday, he is doing brisk business. Only about 10,000 Brits live in Austria, plus roughly 1,000 Irish, a third of them in Vienna, so Holmes cannot rely just on expats. Indeed, a majority of his customers are locals.
“He doesn’t use any additives, it’s not industrially manufactured and it’s handmade. And he does these interesting combinations. It’s absolutely fantastic,” said Nilufar, a regular local customer.
“British sausages have a totally different taste and structure to German and Austrian one. And, of course, the English breakfast is famous. He’s got a nice little niche here,” Markus said.
However, not everyone is impressed.
“British cooking? No thanks,” said a passing pensioner, disgusted.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”