On a whim about a month ago, I planned a vacation to Fredericksburg based solely around how much I…read moreloved the brewery when I lived there with my dad 32 years ago, when I was 14. The brewery was the first place I ever had a scotch egg, my dad would get a small beer flight, maybe we'd get a brat, he made it fun. I'm pretty sure it had just opened back then. We got into town, checked in at the Trueheart Hotel, and immediately walked to the brewery because I was so excited. I probably went in to this with the unrealistic expectation that it would be the same as when I was a kid.
It had a great start. The hostess was nice, and our server was, too. I wish we had gotten to sit in the back room with the long tables, We started with the beer flight and a scotch egg. The beer flight was okay. I was expecting really good German beers, mind-blowing, but these were just fine. A pale ale, an IPA, a flat porter were on the list, just not a memorable selection, although the red ale was good. The flight was a good price, though. For our appetizer, I wasn't expecting such a small scotch egg for $9. I mean, it was really small. I've been to several places around my area for scotch eggs, and they're usually $11-12 for two and they're properly sized. But we're on vacation and I wanted nostalgia so fine. It was delicious, and the creole mustard the scotch egg comes with was divine. More on that later. For our meals we tried both schnitzels. I was disappointed they don't have spaetzle, I'm pretty sure they used to. My boyfriend had the schinken and I had the jager. I don't like ham but his was infinitely better because of the gravy. The gravy on the jager schnitzel I got was heavy with some seasoning, maybe sage. It's all I could taste, and I couldn't just push the gravy off because my pork was fried to death. I barely ate any of mine. The sides we got (you get two per plate) were German potato salad, fries, onion rings, and vegetable medley. The fries and onion rings were great, especially when dipping in the creole mustard we saved from the scotch egg. The German potato salad is supposed to be sweet and sour and my boyfriend usually likes it, but this was way sweet, he wasn't a fan. The vegetable medley was good, but seemed really out of place as a side, normally with schnitzel you'd expect green beans or a salad or something, we got broccoli and squash. They did have a side salad, but it was $5. Not sure why a side salad couldn't just replace the two sides for no upcharge. I will say the rolls were awesome.
At the end our server let us sit and hang out for a few minutes, he didn't rush us. We asked if they sell the creole mustard in bottles but they don't, so he said we could pay $5 for a togo container of it. We got probably a cup, so I was fine with that, I really loved it that much. We paid, I noticed he charged us $5 for tarter sauce that we didn't have, figured it was the only way to ring up the mustard. We left with our prized creole mustard. Cut to this weekend when we opened it to make a sandwich, and what we actually got was tarter sauce, so somewhere along the way he'd forgotten what we asked for. We live 200 miles from Fredericksburg, there's no fixing that, but maybe that's on me because I should have checked it. They really should sell bottles of that mustard, it's very good.
Overall, it just wasn't the experience I was expecting. It's not the same, it's been over 30 years so I totally understand, and I did try to be fair with my critique. It wasn't great, it was just okay.
