The Rathskeller Schnitzel House, Victoria (Downtown)

I am a little confused on the Rathskeller; confused, as to whether I absolutely love the place or find it a bad attempt at modeling itself after a German tavern. Thus, you can see my dilemma. Is it great or horrible?

I digress, the Rathskeller is decorated as what I assume to be a typical German eatery; however, I can't say for sure as I have never been. The waitresses wear traditional dirndl and of course they serve up some pretty traditional German eats.

As for the food - it was good. Nothing extraordinary, but tasty greasy German comfort food. My particular favorite was the bratwurst. Usually, I am not a fan of bratwurst; however, the bratwurst at Rathskeller was simply delicious.  The boot of beer was also quite a treat. I know, I know it is probably a tactic to entice people to spend money their, but I couldn't resist. A boot of beer on your birthday - could there be anything better?

Overall - the Rathskeller would be a great place for a celebration or an after work drink (or two). The food is decent but not pretentious and the service is okay. Hey, they have been in business this long who am I to say they are doing anything wrong...?

Waterstone European Cafe, Langford (CLOSED)

This post speaks to the trials and tribulations of the restaurant business. Some mediocre restaurants manage to be blessed with lady luck and stick around for 50 years and other decent restaurants find themselves surrendering to bailiffs within 6 months. Unfortunately, the latter is the outcome for the Waterstone Cafe.

Having only eaten their once, I am not able to provide a detailed analysis on what troubled this little cafe, but I can take a guess that it was just too hard to compete in an area with multiple Tim Hortons, Starbucks and Serious Coffee's. Not to mention, it appeared to be a tough location to make a go of it.

For the food, they served up some decent grub. I have never eaten German food nor, will I try to baffle you with some profound knowledge of the culture; I will simply say I enjoyed it.

The Jaeger Schnitzel was tender and flavourful, the spaetzle was made fresh to order and the gravy that topped it all was simply delicious. I will say though that their panini's sucked! My son ordered a chicken panini and it was so burnt that it was almost inedible.

Now, I don't think the panini would ruin any restaurant, but unfortunately, limited customers will.

It's too bad, I enjoyed the Waterstone and was looking forward to some homemade pretzels.

Auf Wiedersehen...