Germany - Where can I get the Best and most authentic Weiner Schnitzel?
 

I will be visiting Germany (Frankfurt and Heidelberg) in a few weeks and would like to know the best restaurants to get the best and most authentic German Weiner Schnitzel?

Weiner Schnitzel is Austrian.

I thought it was Austrain but my parents lived in Germany for 2 years back about 30 years ago and they use to eat Weiner Schitzel and they said it was much better in Germany that in the U.S. so I thought maybe some German restaurants had it.

I believe it's "Wiener," not "Weiner." This particular type veal dish as we know it today did originate in Austria, though the general idea of breaded, flatten veal had been around for a long time in many places before the Austrian version was developed.

There are now localized "authentic" versions throughout Germany and Austria. Alas, I don't know where to get the best wiener schnitzel in the Frankfurt/Heidelberg area.

I have been to Germany a couple of times and have visited most of the major "tourist" cities. Believe me, "schnitzel" is on every menu! Most restaurants offer pork rather than veal. Be sure to try the local wursts. One city's can be very different from another's. Enjoy your trip!

I have always believed that good weiner schnitzel can be found in virtually any town in Germany.

Having been there more than 30 times, I can tell you that very few restaurants would survive in the smaller, non-touristy towns unless their food was excellent or above average. Germans can be the most critical people in the world. They absolutely need to be served good food at reasonable prices. If they can't find it, they will not patronize that restaurant.

My recommendation would be to get into a smaller town away from tourists. Don't expect better than average schnitzel in a train station restaurant, at the airport, or near any tourist trap. (Although sometimes you will get lucky, the prices and service may be dissapointing.)

I remember going to a WeinerWald in Munich last October walking home from the Octoberfest, and the food there was quite dissapointing, relatively speaking. Should have eaten at the Augustiner beer garden. The food there has always been excellent.

We ate at the Andechs brewery outside Munich. Didn't have schnitzel, but if they serve it there, I am sure it is excellent.

We ate along the Rhine between Frankurt and Assmannshausen at Bernard Barth's backyard restaurant and it was really quite good. So was the wine, the beer, the scnapps, etc.

We did have an excellent piece of schnitzel at the Golden Bear restauant in Berchtesgaden. I can't remember ever having a poor piece of schnitzel in Germany or Austria.

Had some great food in the small town of Elmau, about 35 minutes from Kufstein.

Ate plenty of good meals in Assmannshausen. I am thinking that the Hotel Krone along the Rhine probably serves pretty good schnitzel.

I do prefer having the schnitzel served by itself on the plate. One of the problems I have with german meals is that so much is piled onto the plate and things like cucumber salads, cole slaw, or red cabbage sometimes runs into on onto the piece of meat.

Other than that, you won't be dissapointed. Follow the locals or ask the locals at the hotel you are staying at.

Have a great time. I just cancelled my reservations for Austria and Germany. Decided to postpone until the fall.

Mark

Although Weiner schnitzel is common throughout germany it is most prevalent in the rhineland phalz region. I would suggest a place that is not so frequented by tourists but is also not a fast-food schnitzel place. Look for a nice restaurant laid back from the touristy areas. Any german restaurant puts Schnitzel on the menu.

Please, it's 'Wiener' Schnitzel! :)
Rufus is absolutely correct.

weinen = to whine!

Has this fabulous dish, when well prepared, anything to do with whining? :-?

weinen= to cry

to whine= jammern, quengeln

calm down. wiener/weiner can just be a typo. It's easy to mix up if your not thinking about it. It sounds like this is more of a spelling argumant.

Wiener Scnitzel is indeed Austrian, but may be found everywhere in Germany (and other places in Europe apart from Britain where you get bad looks if you ask for baby cow that's had it's throat cut and hung upsidedown).
Wien is Vienna.

Jack, don't think there's any need for anyone to calm down--didn't see any notes indicating anger or agitation. Just giving people information.

Really, is there such a thing as BAD Wiener Schnitzel? I know there are some places that don't cook it well, but in general, almost every Gasthaus makes some version of it and very rarely is it bad! Make sure that you try the Jagerschnitzel and Rahmscnitzel for variations.

I make it at home all the time (one of my most requested meals) from a receipe that a German friend gave me. Very simple to make - I use Pork cutlets (thin sliced), coat them with egg then bread crumbs (unflavored crumbs). I then saute the cutlets in BUTTER and a splash of white wine (these two ingridents are the keys I think!). The wine can be any kind - whatever you prefer to drink. You just saute the cutlets till they are done and then serve with Spaetzle (also VERY easy to make if you have a press) and RottKraut.

Seriously, how INauthentic can this simple dish possibly get?????

Suggest you stay away from the tourist parts of the central city and go out a little way. If you go to a German traditional restaurant you should get good Schnitzel. The Schnitzel is always a veal meat, not pork.

This is a tough crowd! In Heidelberg just go to the old town. I think there is a place called OLD Heidelberg. We had a good meal there on 2 different trips. They will have your schnitzel...but then bad schnitzel is harder to find than good in Germany.

Here is a suggestion from someone who lives in the vicinty. While staying in Frankfurt you should travel along the Rhine River (highway B42) between Eltville and Ruedesheim Im Rheingau. If you like good wine and good food you will find it on this side trip. The view is lovely also.

Just got back from Heidelberg. There is a great new(ish) place with excellent food - including schnitzel... It's called the Kulturbrauerei. You have to walk all the way down the Hauptstrasse, through the CornMarkt, past the Red Ox. You take a left down there and its on a small side street. Very very good. I had a salad with marinated turkey that was to die for... Enjoy.

To SIMPSONC510,

Thanks for the reminder that Bernard Barth's backyard restaurant is in Eltville, or in the town next to Eltville.

Quick story about Bernard Barth and the kindness that he extended to us last October.

I made plans to get off the train on the way from the airport in Frankfurt to our rooms at Burg Gutenfels in Kaub. I was told that Eltville is the oldest town on the Rhine. Decided to have lunch in that town. (I had read about Barth's restaurant in one of the travel books.)

Got to Eltville around noon, thinking that it was a big enough town to accomodate us. Wrong!! Everything was closed until 2:00 or 3:00 that afternoon.

We were all set to leave when one of the guys in my party saw the name Bernard Barth on the side of a building near the train station.

We walked across the railroad tracks thinking that we could eat and drink with him. Turns out that he wasn't open for business until 4PM. Well, after some coaxing by an old woman who lived across the street from Bernard, we knocked and knocked until we finally woke him out of a deep sleep. Reluctantly, Bernard came down and let us into his backyard. He proceeded to serve us beer after beer. Bitburger, I think. At 2 Euros a 1/2 liter. Included a small tour of his wine making operation and also gave us plenty of samples of the schnapps and the wines that he produces. It turns out that Bernard Barth's primary job is grape grower and wine maker. He has a small restaurant as well.

We must have sat in his backyard for 3 or 4 hours. Before we left, Bernard was sitting with us and partying a bit. It helped that I speak German pretty well, but the rest of my party were communicating with him as well. Excellent person. To anyone looking for an out of the way place to eat along the Rhine, my recommendation is Bernard's place.

Looking for confirmation from SIMPSONC510 that Bernards restaurant is in Eltville. Are you familiar with the place?

Thanks

Mark

Hi,

THE place in Vienna for wienerschnitzel is Figlmuller (with an umlaut).

See http://www.timeout.com/vienna/rest/1.html

IRA- I hate to disagree with you but the wienerschnitzel at Figlmuller's (with an umlaut) in Vienna was the worst I ever had. It looked very large, but was mostly fried bread crums. Maybe it was the cook's night off but I will never go there to eat again! I even complained to RS since he touts it also but of course they blew me off...

Hi Kenny,

That was a bummer. We enjoyed it.

We were just in Austria and thought the wiener schnitzel was like a big chicken nugget -- nothing but a big piece of breaded fried meat. And we searched high and low for veal -- it was largely pork.

we were in Israel in 2000, and interestingly, there was schnitzel all over the place there. Perhaps derived from the European Jews who were fortunate enough to survive and migrate there after the war?

BarbaraF wrote
>..we were in Israel in 2000, and interestingly, there was schnitzel all over the place there. Perhaps derived from the European Jews who were fortunate enough to survive and migrate there after the war? <

Ummmm, no. The schnitzel in Israel is derived from veal or pork. Besides the people who migrated after the war are much too old and tough to make good schnitzel.

There is an Austrian place called EDELWEISS on Schweizer Str. in the intertesting Sachenhausen district in Frankfurt. The schnitzel was very good as was the goulasch soup - it was a cozy place to spend an evening in Frankfurt. There is a good apple cider place across the street called Zum Wagners that I thought was pretty good as well. I ate a boiled beef dish with a green sauce that is a regional dish in that part of Germany. I would go back to either place again. Hope this helps.

In Vienna, I had a variation of Schnitzel - Schnitzel Cordon Bleu! It was very good but very rich! I looked for it when I was in Germany last year and could not find it. I did have great Schnitzel in Heidelberg at a restaurant that was also a brewery, in the heart of the old town - can't think of it's name but it was on the main drag with several other restaurants. I'm sure you'll recognize it from that description! :)

Please note: Whenever you find "Wiener Schnitzel" on a menu in Germany or Austria, it will, and must be, made of veal (it is, actually, the law). Very often you`ll therefore find written on menus: "Schnitzel Wiener Art" which means: Schnitzel made like a Wiener Schnitzel. This will be a Schnitzel made of pork. Some posters complained about their Schnitzel consisting of mere breadcrumbs. It is, however, the pride of the viennese cook to flatten the Schnitzel as thin as possible. Originally, the Schnitzel must not be deep-fried, but made in a saucepan with one finger high pork-fat (of course, only a small difference to deep-frying). Traditional side dish is a light potato-cucumber salad with vinaigrette (no mayonnaise). These days, it is most often served with french fries and mixed salad.

"Weiner Schnitzel" is neither German nor Austrian. "Wiener Schnitzel" is both. Where to eat the best Wiener Schnitzel - according to my experience - would probably be in the Alpine region. The worst places would likely be in northern Germany.

You will also see pork "wiener" schnitzel served as "Wiener Schnitzel vom Schwein." We've seen that on the menu in Germany and Austria.
I don't know where is the best place to have it, but we've had very good pork wiener schnitzel in central Germany (the Bochum area), Muenster, Nuremberg, central Austria (the Steiermark) and Vienna.
FYI, there are two stores here in Brussels that serve freshly prepared Wienershnitzel--one (the veal version) is a store/charcuterie specializing in central European food near the Merode metro station and the other is called Urbanus, near the Chien Vert tram stop (tram lines 39 and 44) and serving the pork version...if you are in Brussels and get a hunger for German food or beer, those are the places to go!