Brauhaus Schmitz

Back from New Orleans!

But before I get into the food, I need to talk about last week’s visit to Brauhaus Schmitz. Friend Jon’s birthday was last week and we were supposed to celebrate at Village Whiskey, Jose Garces’ newest spot. VW was supposed to open on Thursday at lunch.

But it didn’t. The opening got pushed to Friday. People. I’ve been looking forward to this spot opening up for MONTHS. We were supposed to go for Miriam’s birthday in JUNE.

Sigh.

So now we needed a new place to go. Conveniently, Joy Manning posted her two newest reviews, Oyster House and Brauhaus Schmitz. The vote went for Brauhaus, so away we went!

Two very important things:

1) I kept looking around at various points and exclaiming “I really like this place!” It had a great vibe and they were totally cool with our large table with its rotating group. Our server was attentive without being pushy. We ordered beers and food throughout the night and there were few missteps.

2) Dr. Lindsay took home the award for quote of the night, when she stated the following after tasting the whitefish spread:

“If bacon were a fish, that’s what it’d taste like.”

So, so true.

Food!

Miriam and Justin got the potato pancakes and fries with curry ketchup, respectively.

I tried the fries and loved the curry ketchup.

I ordered the Geräucherte Fischplatte (fish plate!) to share with the group.

The smoked salmon was pretty standard, the white fish spread was…well, see the above quote, I think you can figure out how delicious that was, and the smoked trout was fantastic. Also delicious: pickled red onions. Mmm.

Miriam got the Sachertorte for dessert and the bite I had was awesome. A while later, while we were still sitting around with our beers (I had the Köstritzer Schwarzbier, fabulously dark but not bitter), I decided to order the Schwarzwälder Torte, forgetting that I never, never like black forest cake. Never.

This was no exception. The top and bottom cake layers were dry and the frosting tasted like refrigerator. The middle part was ok.

Had I remembered my black forest dislike, this would have been a perfect night. Regardless, I’ll still be going back here. I’m bummed I found this at the end of the summer, but I can’t wait for the upcoming cold nights with a big beer and some wurst.