Schnitzelwirt Schmidt The Joint Neubaugasse 52 1070 Wien +43 1/5233771 http://www.frommers.com/destinations/vienna/N8195.html Cliff Alter Schwede! This place was by far, the best value in terms of cost per gram of food served. The place itself was kind of attractively gritty, in that upon entering, you knew immediately (apart from the name of the joint) that it was not in competition with Café Central. I went with the Garlic Schnitzel, Carolyn had the traditional Schnitzel Wiener Art, and Max went haute couture with his Pariser Schnitzel. Sarah’s was another order of magnitude cooler though, and she’ll tell you about it herself below. Alas, we have only our full-bellied memories of hers; we somehow neglected to photograph it for posterity. Sarah Ok, Cliff covered everything above perfectly. Which allows me all kind of room to wax rhapsodic about my metric buttload of Schnitzel. It was a Schnitzel Cordon Bleu – with ham and cheese. First off, the thing was hanging off both sides of the plate! and it was heavy, to boot. I know this because we ended up taking three quarters of it home and it turned into breakfast for me the following morning and lunch for both Cliff and I that afternoon!! A Schnitzel (for those who don’t know already) is a pounded cutlet of veal or pork (generally) that is then washed in egg and breaded and pan-fried. Because of this, it’s usually pretty thin – say half an inch cooked. This creature that I ordered was easily a little over an inch thick. Why? Because of the stack of ham – equal in thickness to the schnitzel itself – adorning it! The most important part, of course, is not its size or weight, but that it was delicious. So much so that I was able to keep eating it for the next two meals! Here’s the most unbelievable part. Three of us had beers, we all ordered a full-size meal, we all took home leftovers and we spent less than 10€ per person!! In a city where everything seems a little expensive, if not blatantly overpriced, this place is a fantastic value.
Sternbräu The Joint Griesgasse 23 5020 Salzburg Austria Cliff Started off this trip through Austria correctly; that is, with a nice Schnitzel. This place had great big portions of traditional Austrian cuisine in what looked to me like traditional Austrian decor. Nothing fancy or high-falootin. And we were all happy with our stuff. I’d come back here again. The neon sign, nearly visible across the river, gave me doubts as we approached, but they were unfounded. Our waitress was friendlier than most, so that was nice too. Sarah This place was outstanding! We found it in the Frommer’s Austria that Carolyn brought us and we were not disappointed. It’s in the old city area, about a three-minute walk from the house in which Mozart was born. There might be more than one dining room, as the one we were in looked sort of small. The place was decorated with lots of murals depicting the history of the area and old dark wood and brass around the booths. The service was wonderful and the beer was worth writing home about. But the best part was the food! Big portions for small prices and the quality of the ingredients and preparation was outstanding. I had the Schweinebraten (pork roast) with Semmelknödel (bread dumpling), a dish I’ve had several times since moving to Germany and I can easily say this is the best permutation I’ve had yet. Don’t miss the Sternbräu if you’re ever in Salzburg!
Gasthof Humler Hof The Joint Fam. Kirchmair Nößlach 483 A – 6156 Gries am Brenner Phone: +43 – (0)5274 / 87 500 Fax: +43 – (0)5274 / 87 500-22 http://www.humlerhof.com/ Cliff I thought it was really nice of them to serve us lunch at an obviously weird hour — we were the only ones making use of the restaurant (must have been smack in the middle of the big break between normal lunch and dinner hours). The Schnitzel with mushroom cream sauce was nice, and though I would have preferred fresh mushrooms to the canned ones, it was still pretty good. And the home-made Spätzle was excellent. We discovered some very nice views of the area on our little stroll after lunch: Sarah We stopped here for lunch on the way home from Italy. It was close to two o’clock and most restaurants in these parts (especially in small towns like this one) close between lunch hours and dinner hours. So we were pretty surprised that this place was open. They had a salad bar set-up, which is really unusual. Unfortunately, many of the offerings were kind of wet – drippy lettuce, asparagus swimming in marinade, etc. Cliff and I had the same thing and as he mentioned above, the homemade Spätzle was really good, Schnitzel and sauce were nice, too bad about the canned mushrooms. I personally think the most impressive thing about this place was the view!