A fun joint , full of happy middle-aged beer-drinking Germans (and on a tuesday night!). If you…read morehave never been to a real German beer garden, and just imagined it in your head, the Hofgarten is pretty much the exact depiction of what's in your head. My German friends strongarmed me into trying this place. I teetotal , so the beer and schnapps offered are wasted on me , but I was hungry. Apparently this is "palatinate " food - a region in Germany . The host came by the table - an affable , if eccentric fellow. He seemed pleased that folks from Texas had found his little pub. They don't serve fancy food here - no sauerbraten or schnitzel. It is almost all salads, sausage, and hunks o' meat . My friends demanded i order a dish with the ominous name of "sow's stomach" but they assured me it was not actual stomach. They told me it was a rarity - hard to find outside the fabled Palatinate. I ordered the day's special - a. "Sow's stomach" cooked with chestnuts. The dish proved to be a thick round slice of assorted pig bits, somehow welded together into a sort of giant sausage. Unfortunately, the chestnuts, baked right into the pig bits, were bland and not particularly tasty. They didn't lend a "chestnutty" flavor to the meat either. If i get this next time, it's sans nuts. It came with a heap of excellent rotkraut and another heap of excellent sauerkraut. I give it 4 stars anyway because my wife loved her salad, and they gave me no flak about my peculiar drink order. They even refilled it (though i suspect they charged full price for the refill, as is normal in Europe). It wasn't my favorite place jn Germany but surely worth a visit. Even more so if you like beer (unlike me ).

Alte Burg Gasthaus is the oldest cider house in Germany, situated inside the Dreieichenhain (three…read moreoaks grove) castle ruins. Although the castle ruins are older and many of the village buildings are also older, the cider house came to be in the 16th century. You definitely feel part of history when you eat or stay here. We overnighted three nights in one of their rooms which was very comfortable. We had a flat with two bedrooms and three twin beds, and a specious living room. Note that the house is old so the beams are also warped which means some of the doors won't open all the way as the structure has changed. This adds to the charm. The amenities are a little dated, but if you don't mind the little things you'll be comfortable here. There was wifi, the place was clean and the service was very friendly. On our first night we dined on traditional Frankfurter specialties such as the Schnitzel with Frankfurter green sauce, which is a sour creme sauce that is blended with 7 local herbs, a few of which you simply can't find in the US. A little while later we shared sour cheese (Handkäse mit Musik) on dark caraway seed bread. All the while we had the locally fermented dry Apple Wein.

Great setting, super vista and Württemberger Wein on the menu. The starting conditions could have…read morehardly been better. Oh, and did i mention someone claiming (I would argue in hindsight without any merit) being the oldest place in Germany to serve apple cider, or as the folks here in Hesse would say "Äppelwoi"! First the good: Seated on Beer tent benches in the driveway of a gingerbread house, covered with a canvas that rivaled the roof of Denver's airport (just more colorful) it seemed quite promising. and did I mention the vistas ,check out the pictures). I wanted to play it safe and ordered head cheese preceded by a beef soup. The soup made me to postpone my annual physical as I seriously feared my doc would - rightly so - diagnose a sodium poisoning (needless to say, my doc was also quite upset about the reschedule thing) and the "presskopf" (head cheese completely failed the test: too much meat, virtually no cartilage and absolutely no gelatin! Oh, bummer! You come for high expectations, stay for the ambience and I suspect won't come back. Or maybe you do for the great company and folks you meet who joined you at the beer tables. This Yelp is driving me nuts. My changes, corrections and best jokes don't show.

Must visit! Lovely…read moresetting in an old fishermen's hut 30min south of Frankfurt. The Markklösschensuppe in Rinderbrühe (bone marrow dumplings in beef consomée) was delicious. The Čevapčiči with French fries were ok. I found the Čevapčiči a bit dense, but well seasoned! The seasonal brew, a hefeweizen and Helles from Büble Bier, were well above average. The tipping point to a 5-star rating was, shortly before I left, hearing the chef pounding a Schnitzel in the kitchen! That's a sure sign of fresh preparation. The morale: don't write a review before leaving the place. And eat more Schnitzel!