With more than a little time to kill, Miguel suggested we head out to Leavenworth for a brat and beer bacchanal. Sounds good to me.
I drove to Miguel's house last Friday, and we headed out at 9 am. First stop: Mickey D's for a little breakfast. I rarely, rarely, rarely go there (I think it's the one of the worst of the big fast food places, 2nd only to Dairy Queen), but I do like the occasional Egg McMufffin or Filet o' Fish. Bags of garbage delivered, we hit the road and ate as we drove.
I've only been on Highway 2 during a non-snow season 3 times before, and each time I head out there, I'm always amazed at how beautiful it is. River and mountain scenes, small towns barely clinging to existence, and depending on the time of year, leaves turning color before dropping to the ground.
We pulled into town and got parked at 11:30. Let's get this party started... Let's eat! The first place we found that could satisfy our beer/brat urges was a place called Munchen Haus. I ordered Helga's Giant Kelbassi (1/3 pound, Polish, Beef & Pork). It came with a small order of German Potato (What would Dan Quayle do here?) salad. I was given one of those funny little vibrating coasters and was told it would let me know when my order was ready. To order a beer, I was instructed to walk around the corner, into the patio, and order from the bartender there. Doing as I was instructed, I walked into the patio and ordered a fantastic beer from Hirschbrau. I don't remember what it was I ordered, but it was quite tasty.
When I was alerted to the fact that my dog was ready, I walked over and picked it up. It was huge, and looked grilled to perfection. The beauty part in all this was that they had the biggest selection of mustards I've ever seen. If you know anything about me, you know I love my condiments! They all sounded so good, but there are only so many condiments you can put on a dog before it overwhelms the link. I went with three different flavors, one one each side of the bun, and one stripe down the middle. I sprinkled some onions over the top of the entire dog, layered on some sweet relish, a quick squirt of ketchup, and a nice healthy layering of sauerkraut! Now THAT'S a dog! It was, in a word, fantastic. Through the various layers, I could taste the individual mustard flavors, and found them to be some of the best mustards I've had. The beer was equally good. I don't remember what we paid for this meal, but it was money well spent.
After stuffing ourselves, we walked around the town. Lots and lots of places to shop or eat, but not much else. I guess in a small town that has made itself into a bit of Bavaria, it's not surprising that most businesses are geared completely around tourism. We walked to the end of town and looked down into the valley were a small river flows past town. We could see people in the park down below us, and people wading in the river. With the mountains as a backdrop, the entire scene was idyllic.
OK, enough of that crap, let's get back to the eating and beer drinking. Where to go, where to go...
Ah, let's head on up to the Italian place for a beer. It seemed the entire building we found ourselves walking toward was geared mainly to the Italian side of things. We walked into a meat shop that closely resembled some of the shops we saw while we were in Italy in 2003. We left the meat shop and headed up the stairs to the Italian restaurant. Nobody there. Strange, but it was a little off the beaten path. Plus, who goes to eat Italian food in a German town? We got seated at the bar, and ordered a couple beers. Nothing out of the ordinary, but they were good and cold. Feeling a bit bloated, we passed on appetizers, and eventually got our bill, paid, and departed for parts unknown.
Back out into the 92 degree heat. It was definitely warm, but not miserably so, and the winds kept things comfortable. We walked to the main square (if you can call it that), where artists of various flavors displayed their work (mostly photography). We cruised through some of the stores that caught our interest, but nothing compelled either of us to buy anything. This went on for a while before we decided to get more beer and possibly a bite to eat, though neither of us was hungry.
Are next haunt was a restaurant that is located in the basement of one of the buildings on the main drag, Andreas Keller Restaurant. Upon entering, we stood and waited to be seated. And waited. And waited. And waited. We could see 3 other parties seated in a space that could hold quite a few folks. There were a LOT of empty tables. The waiter looked at us (the waitees), and indicated that he'd be with us shortly. Define "shortly". Finally, he gathered us and seated us in a booth, handed us a couple menus, and disappeared. We peeled the menus and were appalled at the prices. I can see slightly higher prices in a tourist town, but these prices were ridiculous. Given that we weren't all that hungry, it came down to ordering smallish portions, so as not to damage our innards or our wallets. I decided on the Red Cabbage, Miguel ordered the German Spatzle with mushroom sauce, with each of us selecting a beer worthy of our sophisticated palates. And then we waited. And waited. And waited. Finally, a staff member came by with some plates, forks, and a tub of what appeared to be stone-ground mustard. OK, that's all well and good, but what if we didn't order anything that required the mustard. Do they through it away, or do they take it back to the kitchen and scoop it back into the big mustard bucket? And then we waited some more. I told Mike we should leave, which he was willing to do, but I said let's give them 2 more minutes. 4 minutes later, we decided to beat feet and Mike stood up to go, when the waiter started heading in our direction. Damn! Now we were stuck. We should have just told him we were leaving, but we stayed. He took our order and, suprisingly, it wasn't too long before we had our beer and "food". My red cabbage was a pile of mush. I've had pleny of red cabbage in my day (and I love it), but it's never been mushy. This slop was barely a step above baby food in terms of its consistency. I didn't expect a huge portion (and in this I was not disappointed), but for $4, it was severely over priced (even if it had been properly cooked). Miquel's portion of spatzle was no larger than my red goo, and to charge $5 for noodles and an extra $2 for mushroom sauce, was beyond the pale. This is the kind of restaurant that can screw their customers over because they are likely first-time (and last-time) suckers. Tourists from far away places will likely never make it back to town, and any tourist that does make a return visit to Leavenworth, would likely never come back to this pathetic excuse for a restaurant. When the waiter finally returned with our bill, he circled our table 3 times within a 5-minute period, presumably to make sure we weren't skip out on paying the tab. It was this final treatment that fried my ham. Oh, and as it turned out, we didn't order anything that required the mustard they brought out to us. What do you think they did with it?
Cut loose onto the streets of Leavenworth once more, we continued to walk up and down the streets, occasionally stopping into any store that looked interesting. Once in a while we'd see a dog that would seem nice to meet, so we'd strike up a conversation with the owners and get to meet some cool pooches. As we walked past one store, I looked in to see custom pancacke griddles. One had snowflakes embossed in them (all the same design snowflake), so that wasn't too interesting. Right next to it, there was a pancake griddle that had the heads of 7 different zoo animals. Knowing that the wife likes pancakes, and we'd soon have a boy to make them for, I had to have it. For $32, I thought it might be a little more expensive than what I might pay if I were to order it directly from the manufacturer, but I wanted to bring it home with for the wife. (I did check the price when I got home, and I would have paid $35 for the pan, plus whatever shipping charges I might have incurred. Shockingly, I got a better deal in the tourist village).
If you've been to Leavenworth for more than 4 or 5 hours, things start to seem a bit repetitious. With the day winding down, we decided to grab one final beer before heading out.
We headed back to the place where we started our day. We skipped right past the hot dog spot, and walked up to the bartender. I asked the gal behind the counter if they had beer XYZ and she said she didn't think they did. One of the employees went to check to see if they had any kegs in the back, and when he returned, he reported that they had, in fact, run out. Oh, well. I ordered another beer (not nearly as tasty), and after consuming our pints, we got back on the road.
All-in-all, it was a great afternoon, with only the one unpleasant experience at the Andreas Keller Restaurant.
The traffic was light, and we got back to Miguel's house around 8:30. After saying our good-byes, I pointed the wagon in the direction of home and pulled up to the house at exactly 9 pm. It was a long day, and I was beat.
Oh, and the wife loved the pancake pan.
