Oktoberfest!

8 thoughts on “Oktoberfest!”

1. I like the dirndls with the Texas (boot) additions! And those hats – I’m with you Sarg till the hats – I’d have to be pretty drunk before I wound don one of those ;-)

   Ein Prozit! y’all!

2. Oh, Bill – those weren’t even the most … um … embarrassing hats. I may do a feature next week on Oktoberfest and Wurstfest hats. Some of them are … well, more embarrassing than those shown. I guess it’s the beer goggles effect.

3. I do love a girl in a dirndl.

4. My sister and her German-born husband were in San Antonio several weeks ago on business. They ate at Oma’s in New Braunfels, which is the closest they got to Oktoberfest.

5. Hope they had a good time, Gringo – Oma’s is OK, I guess. They advertise heavily along the IH-35. I think there are probably good German restaurants farther into downtown New Braunfels. For my money, I think the best two German places are in Fredericksburg – the Linden Tree and the Auslander. They’re opposite each other, on Main Street. I have a couple of local friends who have taken German tourists to the Auslander, and they were falling all over each other with joy and delight at how good and gemutlicheit it is!

6. That was pretty much their reaction to Oma’s- “OK I guess.” They did purchase some strudel to take out, but they were not gushing about the place. When you grew up on Mutti’s cooking,there are more exacting standards.

   I have heard that Germans, when exposed to the German spoken by Fredricksburgers of German descent, have considered it rather old-timey, archaic. The way their grandparents spoke. Similarly, some places in Latin America use second person singular grammar which was abandoned in Spain hundreds of years ago.

7. Gringo – in Pennsylvania among the ‘Pennsylvania Dutch” (really Deutsch) there have been German linguists go there because their dialect is similar to the 16th century

   So it is with the Texas Germans – whenever you left – that is how the dialect stays –

   Sgt Mom – I thought the name “Auslander” was a bit strange for the name of a restaurant – means literally “foreigner”

   My area of CA is crying for a good German restaurant – used to be one that had the best schnitzel – had gemutlichkeit – but one of the partners got in the habit I’m told of following single women patrons home and propositioning them. The other partner thought that was “not a good thing” and had to close it.

   But – they have the best schnitzel this side of Munich – a good schnitzel dinner with spaetzle, and Spaten Optimator dark beer.

8. They’ve had German linguists come to Fredericksburg too – because of the dialect preserved, although most of the native speakers of it these days are 80 and up. Yes, ‘auslander’ does mean ‘foreigner’ … Alas, being on Main Street, the food is variable (according to Urban Spoon), but it was very nice, the last time we were there.

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