Tag Archives: Germany

OMB

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Germany

OMB could stand for Oh My! Beer or October Means Beer or Olde Mecklenburg Brewery  In this case it’s the last one.  Since it is October and the temperatures finally started acting like it’s Fall it felt like a weekend for some German food.

Although I’ve had some of their beer before I’d never been to the restaurant at the brewery.  I checked out the menu online to make sure they had German food on the menu and not just bar food. They did so off I went.

It was a relatively short jaunt up the interstate to find Olde Meck which happened to be within sight of a cider company I visited a while back.  OMB is really more of a complex of buildings and a huge biergarten.  The restaurant is large also with a bar area and at least two seating areas I saw.  One has regular tables and the other has several rows of tables butted up to one another making long community tables.  Outside there is a covered area with picnic style tables and the biergarten which has row upon row of picnic tables to accommodate at least a couple of hundred people.

I got there fairly early and they had the seat yourself sign out and it was easy to do since I was the only person inside.  I’d have opted for the biergarten had the sun been out.  Anyway the service inside was good and I had a menu and beer list in just a minute.  Since it was an option I got a flight of 4 different beers to go with the meal.  For the meal I selected the Teller plate that included two sausages, a roll and two sides.  From the options I went with a regular bratwurst and Nuremburger brats plus sauerkraut and potato salad.

The flight came first and included a handy key in case I couldn’t have picked out the beers on my own.  I started with the Captain Jack, a pilsner that was a perfect option for Bud drinkers.  The food arrived and I had the Mecktoberfest and the Copper with my meal.  The Mecktoberfest tasted a lot like a full bodied version of the pilsner which made it better in my opinion.  The Copper is reddish in color like the name suggests and has a hoppier flavor but not like the overdone IPAs.

Looking at the plate it occurred to me I probably could have used a little color on the plate but what was done was done.  The wursts were good quality sausages, the mustard was a good slightly coarse vinegary style, the sauerkraut was plain tangy kraut served warm.  The potato salad was good but not great and served cold.  I think it would have been better served warm.  The bread was warm though and a bit dense and chewy.  Nice meal that paired well with the beer.

I finished up with the Fat Boy Porter (don’t make the obvious joke, you’re better than that).  It was my favorite of the four having a bolder taste, slightly sweet with a hint of caramel and the higher alcohol content was noticeable.  Nice desert.

Based on the number of seats OMB must be popular at times and certainly has capacity to host large events and the food and beer were worth the drive.  One note for the true German beer aficionados OMB adheres to Reinheitsgebot so they have a few different types of beer but the ingredients are the limited to the 4 approved.

If you didn’t check out the Tell Me More the last time I posted for Germany check it out for a little extra content.

 

 

North to Germany

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Germany

This week we moved from Africa to Europe and I chose Germany as the target country and Waldhorn Restaurant as the establishment.  This was a bit of a cheat as I have been here several times before but didn’t find any place else that really seemed to typify German cuisine.
Waldhorn is a large white building with foliage around the perimeter of the property to lend it some separation from the other businesses and the nearby James K Polk museum.  This particular Saturday they weren’t very busy but there was a meeting of some kind of Mercedes owners club so my Hyundai and a little Nissan were the only non-Mercedes in the parking lot that I could see.  I felt like I should have stopped at the car wash first just so my car would have at least been shiny.  Enough about that.
My impression of the interior of the restaurant is that it has 3 areas with different feels.  There is one section where they have windows on three sides and during the day it has a bright, airy feel to it.  The main part of the restaurant seems darker and heavier but in a good comfortable way.  Finally there is an upstairs area good for groups but not private as it is open to the rest of the restaurant.  It does get you up out of the traffic pattern though.
The staff was friendly and attentive and Paul and his trainee Ashley took good care of me while I was there.

Although Waldhorn was not new to me and I had tried their Jaegerschnitzel and my go to is usually the Schwaebische wurstplatte I had never tried the Wienerschnitzel so that was the choice for the day.  It came with spaetzle and red cabbage.  To accompany the meal I decided to go with a beer sampler to maximize the variety and still be able to drive home.  I tried the Spaten Premium Lager, Warsteiner Pilsner, Warsteiner Dunkel and the Spaten Oktoberfest.

Waldhorn

The wienerschnitzel was thin and tender and cooked a perfect golden brown all the way around.  The spaetzle by itself could have used some more salt but along with a bite of the meat it worked.  The cabbage was a little sweet but complimented the rest of the meal.  Being a good southern boy I could have used a ladle full of that gravy but there was enough to enhance the schnitzel and spaetzle without drowning either.

Oh and the beer.  All four were decent but the Oktoberfest was far and away my favorite of the lot. Neither the pilsner or the lager really stood out.  The dunkel was bitter, in a good way.  That Oktoberfest though was nothing but smooth.

As I was eating I could overhear Paul schooling young Ashley on the finer points of being on staff and he described to her his favorite menu item and you could tell it was not just what he considered the most edible thing on the menu but that he truly liked this particular dish a lot.  That says something when your wait staff is enthusiastic about the food when they don’t have to be.

If you’re in the market for German and in the Charlotte area you won’t do better than Waldhorn.

Here’s a link to their website

http://www.waldhorn.us/

Next week I’m heading east to Asia.