Vienna’s much-loved Würstelstand gets UNESCO recognition

The Austrian UNESCO Commission announced this week that the Würstelstand has been added to the national list of intangibleculturalheritage, joining the city’s beloved wine taverns (“Heurigen”) and its famous coffee house culture, which were listed in 2019 and 2011, respectively.

For decades, the Würstelstand has been a gathering point for locals and tourists alike, where the street sweeper, the office manager, the celebrity, and the curious traveler converge over a shared love of Vienna’s signature snacks. The stands, known for their casual yet welcoming atmosphere, have become a symbol of the city's diverse social fabric.

Among the most popular offerings at the Würstelstand are the “Haasse,” a coarse boiled sausage, and the “Käsekrainer,” a smoked sausage stuffed with cheese that melts and oozes out when bitten into, often affectionately referred to as the “Eitrige” or “suppurating sausage.” There’s also the spicy “Oaschpfeiferl,” a pepperoni-style sausage, and the “Krokodü,” a gherkin.

“Sausage stands have a long history in Vienna,” said Josef Bitzinger, whose Bitzinger Würstelstand is set next to the Albertina museum, just behind the Vienna State Opera.

“Originally 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.”

But the Würstelstand is more than just a place to grab a bite. It’s a cultural institution, with a long history dating back to the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The tradition of street-side sausage stands began with former soldiers who set up mobile cookshops after World War I to earn a living. The city’s longest-running stand, Würstelstand Leo, has been serving sausages since 1928. 

The Würstelstand became even more entrenched in Viennese culture in 1969, when regulations were changed to allow for permanent stalls. This shift led to the invention of the Käsekrainer, which, Bitzinger said, is “already a classic”.

The UNESCO designation “honours the tradition, the hospitality and the diversity of our city,” Mayor Michael Ludwig said in a statement.

“This 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 – a meeting place where joie de vivre and culture come together.”

“We have been fighting a long time for this,” Bitzinger said of the new UNESCO designation, underlining the importance of the Würstelstand as “a form of gastronomy everybody can afford”.

“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,” he explained, “That unites people.”