OT The semi-great escape

[Sailorsong]

This afternoon I decided to make the trip to the German Restaurant I had found in Alabama that is about 2 hours from me.

The weather was great for the trip and I took a back roads route through farm country. It was a really enjoyable and relaxing trip with almost no traffic along the way until I got with 20 miles of my destination.  Saw lots of wooded areas punctuated with farms and their crops of corn and beans.

I arrived at the restaurant at just after 5PM the perfect time to have dinner. It was located in a mall area and nicely decorated. The waitresses all worn German style clothes which help the atmosphere quite a bit. So I was really getting into the mood for some great German food. I ordered the WIENER SCHNITZEL , German potato Salad, and a garden salad with ice tea to drink,. While the garden salad and potato salad were good, the veal was not very tender at all ( had to cut it with a knife). I also had hoped that the potato salad would be the sweet version, but instead it was the vinegar version. So I was kind of disappointed with the place after all. I guess those people that reviewed the restaurant on-line had not had a real authentic German meal before.

But even with the disappointment of the food the trip was still enjoyable. Total time around trip was about 5 hours.

Dennis

[Mike_Shuswap]

I was stationed in Germany in the early 70's and the one dish I really loved is goulash soup.

As a young Canadian soldier I occasionaly over inbided on the very good beer in that country, and goulash soup would sober me up in an instant!

Much to the disapointment of a friend and I, they don't serve goulash soup in the Frankfurt jail....another story...another time.

Cheers

Mike

[doublevision1]

oh darn it, that's disappointing.  You could probably whip up something much better in your own kitchen.

[Sailorsong]

Michelle,

   Thank you. I am of German decent and my grandmother lived with us when I was a kid. She made the Sweet German Potato Salad all of the time and it was a favorite of mine. The other dish she made all of the time ( which I liked but got tired of) was Stewed Prunes. It is basically Prunes, Water and Cinnamon ( but it has to be the stick form or you will spend the next 5 days in the bathroom as my mom found out one time). I'm not sure why that is.

Spetzel ( which I can't spell either) is a noodle made from potatoes. I once made a business trip to German and stay in a German hotel. No one in the hotel spoke any English so luckily my boss spoke the language or I would have starved. But the meals were something to enjoy over and over. We would leave work about 7PM and get to a restaurant around 8PM. We would then spend the next 3 hours eating course after course of food ( must have been about 10 of them) before heading back to the hotel.

Dennis

[michelleislay]

too funny!  terrible to get vinegar when you are hoping for sweet...

drive sounds like it was fantastic though, thanks for taking me virtually along on the journey!

i once volunteered overseas and one of the girls i met, who was also a volunteer, was german.  she made me some fabulous food...my favorite being spetzle?  no idea really how to spell it but it was some type of homemade noodles in the most wonderful savoury sauce....mmmm!