There is something about most hotel restaurants. First, you go there with almost no expectations. Second, you leave generally happy. Third, you don’t really feel like returning. Heuriger am Belvedere is unfortunately no exception. It’s a reasonably nice restaurant, the service is good, the food is nothing to complain about, but there is a feeling of being in a momentary “come and go” place that almost all hotels suffer from.
It’s not a true Heuriger either, with wooden tables and chairs not being able to offset the exorbitant prices for wines. At 12.5 euros the Brettljause is not cheap either, but at least it provides some return on investment in terms on quality if not quantity. Unfortunately it’s cheese-free: the wooden plate contains only Speck, a couple of types of ham, a long smoked sausage cut into small pieces and several thick slices of a strange soft paprika salami with huge lumps of fat inside. An extra plate contains two spreads – a rather plain Schmalz and an OK sausage spread – in addition to horseradish, baby corn, pickled cucumbers and three very hot paprikas. The Brettljause is served with a basket of different types of quite fresh bread.
The lack of cheese aside, there was nothing especially wrong about the Jause, and on a warm day and in a nice garden of a real Heuriger it would have appeared significantly better, even unusual, but in a hotel’s restaurant almost in the city center it looks almost inappropriate.
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