Dinner in Fussen

So after we settled in to our new room, we decided that we wanted to get some grub. We were, after all, in Bavaria. We planned on a pretty early night and a relatively early morning. The early night wasn't much of a problem as nearly nothing in town was open other than a Woolworth's on the main drag and a handful of restaurants.

So we went walking into town in search of some good Bavarian nourishment. The woman at the guesthouse had told us of a restaurant with good Bavarian food that was cheap, so we figured we'd try it out. We also wanted to briefly use the Internet, so we started at an Internet cafe we had read about in Rick Steeve's Germany book. Let me mention that the Rick Steeve's book in general is surprisingly quite good. I had read some less-than-stellar reviews, but I think his book offers great value. He outlines a lot of do-it-yourself tours that are quite interesting and informative and he provides a good mix of what most tourists would want while including things to try if you want a more authentic experience.

Anyway -- the Internet cafe was a little strange. The Wifi was 2.50 Euro for an hour. To use one of their computers, it was 2 Euro for 2 hours. Strange and probably unnecessary. But whatever.....so goes life.

After the Internet cafe, we walked around and windowshopped in the closed stores for a while and then made our way to a place called Römerkeller (Roman Cellar -- oddly enough a Bavarian restuarant). We were the only 2 non-Germans in the place -- which is always a good sign. We got menus and started to peruse them, looking to sample the local specialties.

I knew that I wanted some sausage and some sauerkraut -- it's been 3 weeks since we arrived in Germany and I haven't had any sauerkraut. But I also hunted the menu for anything else local that looked appealing. Let's note here that the menus are normally in German, so my knowledge of food words is steadily increasing. I've learned that "cheese" is "käse". So when I saw "portion of leiberkasse mit pommes frittes und ei" on the Bavarian specialties list in a "lighter meal" section, I thought that would make a great appetizer. A portion of local cheese with french fries and an egg. Sammy said that must have been what she saw someone else eating and she'd take the egg. It sounded like a good start.

Well, for those of you playing along from home, you've probably already noticed the distinct difference in spelling between "käse" and "kasse". That extra "s" and the absence of the two dots above the "a" aren't from a falty keyboard or other operator error. The error was all mine. When two pink things resembling large hamsteaks came with the french fries, I was a little surprised, but not too concerned. Clearly I had made some mistake. I cut a bite off of the hamsteak. The consistency was weird. It kind of tasted light and airy like tofu with the taste of fried bologna. Then it hit me. I remembered the more important half of that word. Say it out lout to yourself. The "ie" sounds like a long, "ee". Leiber. Now say the "er" like it's pronounced "air". Lee-bair. Sounds a little like what I remembered it to be.......liver. I pulled out my German phrasebook and found my fear to be accurate -- this was a pork-liver meatloaf that I had ordered. Honestly, it didn't taste that bad. But I couldn't shake the stigma of eating liver long enough to eat more than a second bite. I felt a bit like an idiot when I had cleaned the entire sausage -kraut-mashed potatoes platter, and all of the french fries, and exactly two bites of the two huge liver meatloaf slices. But whatcha gonna do? Ooops. Lesson learned -- don't start thinking that you're hot stuff and start ordering without double-checking with the dictionary. That moment kind of brought me back to two Canadian guys we had met in the Ecuadorian rainforest. They were kayakers from somewhere in the wild north of Canada that had come to Ecuador for a great kayaking adventure in the rainforest. They didn't speak a bit of Spanish -- and they weren't in a place where ANYONE really spoke much English (other than other expat rafters and kayakers). They told us that dinner each night was a complete surprise -- they never knew exactly what they were ordering. Except they seemed to happily accept that and chow away. I couldn't do it with the liver.

Thanks to the fact that German restaurants will clear your plates and leave you with your drinks until you have turned to dust unless you stop the waiter or waitress again, we had plenty of time to digest and forget about the liver before I got the woman's attention again so we could order an apple strudel -- and an excellent decision it was.

After dinner, we strolled back down the walking trail to our guesthouse. It was pretty and romantic. By the time we got back to the room, we passed out within minutes. We were still exhausted.