Coffee culture is different around the world. Hier in den USA we drink a lot of Kaffee, roughly 1,130 Tassen im Jahr. Die Deutschen, on the other hand, come in at a mere 430 Tassen im Jahr. That isn’t to say, however, that Germans do not enjoy their Kaffee. They enjoy their Kaffee und Kuchen almost every day.
They have something we do not: Kaffeezeit. Around 15.00 every day, the nation stops for eine Tasse Kaffee. Ok. Not literally. Not everyone and not everyday. But it is recognizably deutsch.
If you live and work in Germany, there are two phrases you are likely to hear on any given afternoon:
Pausen sind heilig. (Breaks are holy.)
Kaffee und Kuchen. (Coffee and cake.)
Because if you are going to stop every Nachmittag for eine Tasse Kaffee, you are going to want something to go with it.
Grab your Kuchengabel and explore what cakes you might come across in different regions across Germany while practicing your Deutsch. Make sure to scroll within this presentation to see the Kuchen. You can zoom in and out on the map, as well, or click on a number to go straight to that cake.
Kaffee und Kuchen
Now that you have toured Deutschland with your Kaffeetasse and Kuchengabel, you can practice some of the vocabulary related to Kuchen below. Simply drag the German word to the correct image and see how you did. Click here for a full screen version of this interactive activity to practice German.
If you would like more German practice, this post on learning colors with a tour of Berlin is a great next stop! And don’t forget to subscribe if you would like to be notified when my next post comes out.