Our second day out in Salzburg includes a visit to Mozart’s Wohnhause, where he grew up.

But entry costs a fortune. Instead, we end up spending over an hour in the house’s research library enjoying a Mozart primer narrated by Kenneth Branagh for free.

Swimming in Classical music and Mozart’s love-hate (really hate) relationship with Salzburg, we pop over to his birthplace:

The line is massive and the fees additionally outrageous (for this trip). So we touch the shrine and wander out. We can’t find the writer of Silent Night (another trip). Christmas Markets fill us with a marizpan, chocolate, spice, and orange cookie and wood-worked bowls.

By chance we stumble into a grotto cave cut into a cliff near St Peter’s (founded in 803). And they have a stand serving gluhwein and hot orange punch!

Re-warmed, we pass the world’s oldest continuous restaurant (also 803), and head to St Peters Abbey, possibly Germany’s oldest.  The Romanesque arch weighs heavy, flanked by walls built out of Roman grave stele.

But the interior opens up with Baroque modernity. Mozart’s Great Mass in C Minor premiered here with his wife singing soprano:

https://archive.org/embed/MozartGreatMassInCMinorKyrie&autoplay=1

The space breathes with white light.  Paintings by various masters fill the walls and altars. Cutaways in the plaster reveal intricate Medieval arches painted with colorful scroll work.

Outside, fat flakes fall.

We chase them amidst thousand year old tombs.

We head home for wine awaits. Along the way we find an ancient 800 year old water mill, still grinding grain into fantastic, raisin-filled Christmas brioche.

Back at the hostel we cook potatoes and vegetables and open a bottle of Austrian red.

This €6.44 bottle comes from Nittnaus in Burgenland (a large, eastern appellation).  Zweigelt is its glorious-sounding red grape: a 1922 crossing of St Laurent and Blaufrankish that now covers over 10,000 Austrian acres. We’ve tried Zweigelt in Canada and the Fingerlakes. How will Austria’s terroir play?

Nittnause Zweigelt, Exquisit, Qualitätswein, Trocken. Burgenland, Austria 2010.

Appearance: Although clear, this looks a strong, ruby purple.

Aromas: Tidy, young, and smelling moderately of tobacco, steak, black berry, cherry.

Palate: It’s called “Trocken” and, yes, it is dry, very.  Cold climate high acid, some chalky tannins, and some 13% alcohol, leads to a medium plus body.  Does this feel big because our palates have shifted to so many light wines?

Flavors: run the range from black pepper, to lime, to something vegetal, savory, almost like grilled meat.  But before we forget, a half of dark cherry and toasted oak reminds us this is wine. The length is only medium.

Conclusions: Nittnause’s Zweigelt is twangy, toasty, and a bit too wild. Its aspirational title “Exquisit” misses the mark, but it is interesting and at least good (3 of 5).

The wife finds cocoa powder and we wind down with hot happy mugs.