VIENNA (AP) 鈥� The Vienna sausage stand is a place where the street sweeper, the manager, the tourist and the celebrity converge for the same tasty snack. Now it also has the .
The culture of the humble 鈥淲眉rstelstand鈥� became this week one of the latest additions to the national list of , overseen by the Austrian UNESCO Commission. It joins the Austrian capital’s distinctive wine taverns, or 鈥淗eurigen,鈥� which have been listed since 2019, and the city’s famous coffee house culture, which was honored in 2011.
The W眉rstelstand, which can now point to a history going back generations, is more than just a source of greasy gastronomic satisfaction.
The street stand is known for bringing people of many classes and backgrounds together and has its own distinctive vocabulary.
Meet the 鈥淗aasse,鈥� a coarse boiled sausage, and also the 鈥淜盲sekrainer鈥� 鈥� a smoked creation infused with cheese that oozes out, also sometimes known as the 鈥淓itrige,鈥� or 鈥渟uppurating鈥� sausage. There is also the 鈥淥aschpfeiferl,鈥� a spicy peperoni, and the 鈥淜rokod眉,鈥� a gherkin.
鈥淪ausage stands have a long history in Vienna,” said Josef Bitzinger, whose Bitzinger W眉rstelstand is located next to the Albertina museum and just behind the Vienna State Opera.
鈥淥riginally it was just a bucket with hot water in which the sausages used to swim,” he said. They were sold from “small carriages drawn by dogs and bigger ones drawn by horses, later by a VW bus or a tractor to their spot.鈥�
The tradition goes back to the pre-World War I days of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, when former soldiers set up mobile cookshops to make a living. The city鈥檚 longest-lived stall in a fixed location, W眉rstelstand Leo, has been serving up sausages since 1928. The stands developed into a bigger institution after wider-ranging permission for fixed stalls was granted in 1969.
It was then that the griddle was introduced and the cheesy K盲sekrainer invented, Bitzinger said. “Today that鈥檚 already a classic.鈥�
The UNESCO designation 鈥渉onors the tradition, the hospitality and the diversity of our city,鈥� Mayor Michael Ludwig said in a statement.
鈥淭his title is a recognition for all those Viennese who, with their warmth and their charm, make the sausage stands more than just a snack place 鈥� a meeting place where joie de vivre and culture come together.鈥�
Bitzinger said that 鈥渨e have been fighting a long time for this.鈥�
鈥淭he special thing about it is that it鈥檚 a form of gastronomy everybody can afford,” he said. “Here the general director and, during the opera ball, a celebrity stands next to a worker and the street sweeper who just finished cleaning the street. That unites people.鈥�
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Associated Press writer Geir Moulson in Berlin contributed to this report.
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