Regional Cuisine

Each federal state has its own culinary identity. The diversity is enormous — a legacy of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which fused Bohemian, Hungarian, Italian, and Balkan influences:

Tyrol & Vorarlberg

Hearty mountain cuisine: Tyrolean Gröstl (fried potatoes with leftover meat and a fried egg), Kaspressknödel (cheese dumplings, fried or in soup), Schlutzkrapfen (Tyrolean ravioli with spinach-curd filling), Moosbeernocken (blueberry pancakes). In Vorarlberg, Alemannic cuisine dominates: Käsknöpfle (Spätzle with mountain cheese), Riebel (cornmeal, sweet or savory).

Salzburg & Upper Austria

Salzburger Nockerln, Bosna (the Salzburg sausage in white bread with curry and onions — a cult snack), Kasnocken. In Upper Austria: Linzer Torte (considered the oldest cake in the world, recipe from 1653), dumplings in every variation, Mühlviertler cream soup.

Styria

Pumpkin seed oil is Styria's green gold — dark green, nutty, thick, drizzled over salads, soups, and even vanilla ice cream. Styrian fried chicken salad (warm salad with breaded chicken), Sterz (cornmeal or buckwheat, fried), Verhackertes (chopped bacon as a bread spread).

Carinthia

Carinthian Kasnudeln are the emblem — artfully crimped dumplings with curd-potato-mint filling. Crimping is an art passed down from generation to generation. Also Reindling (yeast bundt cake with cinnamon, raisins, and brown sugar), Carinthian Laxn (lake trout from Lake Millstatt).

Vienna

The Viennese cuisine is a universe of its own: Schnitzel, Tafelspitz, Goulash (from Hungary), Palatschinken (from Bohemia), Buchteln (from Bohemia), Powidltascherln (potato dough with plum jam), Beuschel (offal), the Würstelstand with Käsekrainer (sausage with melted cheese, a Viennese cult) and, of course, the entire pastry tradition.