My week in Vienna is spent in never-ending delight. My beloved friend Dani Wadia showed me her city as we walked endlessly among old buildings, royal palaces, cobbled pedestrian streets, and by the blue Danube. Really, Vienna would have been boring and different without this amazing woman, with her penchant for the offbeat, the quirky and the utterly enchanting.

But what we enjoy most is visiting different cafes, and enjoying Viennese Cafe culture, so classic and so famous.

As a tour operator for decades, Dani seems to have quite a ( traditional Parsi) nose for the most charming and fun things to do. She disses some of the most famous coffee houses, instead showing me her favourites, perhaps lesser known and far less touristy.

This one cafe ( see photo above ) was tiny and so quaint, close to my apartment, in the local park. We sit in the garden and sip our drinks as the wind whispers through the kastanien / chestnut trees and pine cones fly about desperately doing their business of spreading far and wide. You could actually get hit by a flying pine cone!!

The cafe is a wooden pavilion with a sloping roof and turrets, well planned for the snowfall in deep winter.  In good weather you sit outside in the pale sunlight, listening to the tall trees sway to their own music, leaves dancing and singing softly in the chilly breeze.

Not bad, I have made it to Austria in spring when everything is warmer and sunnier and blooming after a white winter.  April-May are cold months but beautiful, and mostly we have super weather. I am able to see Europe in bloom, catching the brief tulip season, pots of them overflowing, across Amsterdam. Here in Vienna,  gardens everywhere are beginning  to blossom. The city is bright and sunny, the Danube really is blue. I am really lucky with the weather.

But back to cafes!

Demel’s is quite a landmark, of course, enticing, and worthy of its name. Demel’s is also awfully touristy and overhyped, and Dani declines to eat the Sacher torte there. Do I want to spend so much on an overrated Sacher torte? Not when a local is telling me otherwise.

In search of a sacher torte, we decided not to eat one at the OG Cafe Sacher either.  The sacher torte’s history is rather unromantic. It was just a regular cake, coated in jam and iced in chocolate because this helped it travel well in an era when creamier, delicate concoctions could not have survived long journeys by horse-drawn carriages.

Still, a visit inside Demel’s, three whole centuries old, was unmissable, and I love the old fashioned interiors and touches. Demel’s is a pretty cafe, of course, with old wooden interiors, lavish gold trim to keep us tourists excited, so fin de siècle and reminiscent of what coffee houses looked like in the nineteenth century. After all, Vienna was the cultural and diplomatic capital of Europe for a greater part of history.

Dani’s favourite Cafe Central, relatively new, is further down, in the old city centre. There is a queue to get in but we wait patiently. The cafe is spread out over three city palaces, specialising in patisserie, coffee and wine. The inside is grand: large vaulted ceilings and a stunningly old world interior. Formally attired waiters, creamy drapes framing large picture windows, snowy white table cloths, gilt mirrors and royal portraits elegantly create a beautiful space. In the centre of the hall are glass cabinets of their enticing confectionery. The pianist works his magic on the exquisite Bosendorf grand piano, keys tinkling gently.

The menu is extensive, filled with breakfast pastry, Viennese favourites for dining in and a huge selection of coffees and hot chocolate. Vienna is famous for a wide range of coffee beverages served in tall glasses, infused with traditional liquers and topped with luscious whipped cream, in various flavour pairings. Just think cherry brandy, hazelnut, rhum and more in your coffee.

It was rather splendid to be sitting in such a historic place, imagining the years bygone, with writers and diplomats, families and poets all gathered here, sipping coffee and biting into the viennoiserie; the rustle of the daily newspaper, the clinking of delicate china, snow falling outside the large windows overlooking the street.

At Dani’s urging I decide on the epic Kaiserschmarm over the Sacher torte.  Honestly, I could come here  every day and still not tire of sitting here, people watching and eating my way through their menu.  They serve classic viennese food as well, starting with an early lunch service.  I would love to go back in a proper Vienna winter and dine there while the snow falls outside. Dani insists I have an overly romantic view of the harsh, brutal Vienna winters. I roll my eyes, convinced otherwise.

The Cafe Gerstner, another 175 year old jewel, is well reputed, especially for large parties in their private ballrooms.Of course, Empress Sisi is present here too, decorating pastries with her beautiful visage. She has a large asian fandom who traipse to the SIsi museum and are gaga about all things Sisi.

All the local cafes are old, a balance between classic and modern, and most have local patronage. Each one is distinct from the other. 

Café Gerstner has it’s own unique charm.  The interiors are chic and quirky.  Their speciality is their champagne, and it really is quite decadent to sip pink champagne and nibble on pastries in the middle of the day, lounging in red velvet booths! They have a wide array of chocolate on offer, and it definitely a place to pick up gifts to take back home. We are, quite literally, cafe hopping and I love it. Vienna is the OG cafe culture city, way before Paris sought to monopolise it.

Retro fitted and more like a Parisian cafe with spacious outside seating, Cafe Museum is away from the city centre hustle and bustle. I love the bright red leather banquettes and the red velvet interiors. The food is delicious  and the cold coffee, more so.  My large glass of cold coffee is generously topped with real whipped cream, not the soy kind. Our salad is lovely too, the fish making a nice change from schnitzel, wurst and meat.

Local people come here, there is nothing for tourists except lots of local flavour.  I need to do cafes with a larger group so we can taste a little bit of everything.  There’s only so much one can eat alone, Dani is a nibbler. I love snooping around the inside and taking photos.

There! I have added epic cafes to my list of gardens, bookstores and libraries to skulk around when abroad. ( That said, Parisian cafes are tourist traps serving reheated croissants. Italy has amazing, amazing old cafes tucked away in plain sight)

Try the offbeat when you are in Vienna. I have been urging Dani to do private tours but she laughs it off.

More adventures to share, Vienna was such a revelation.