With the sad closure of Strandcafé, Vienna’s top spare ribs location, dining by the Alte Donau has lost a lot of its attraction. The remaining restaurants are by and large overpriced, overcrowded or simply bad. Yet, the last time I was googling for the latest news regarding the Strandcafé’s fate, I stumbled upon the restaurant’s name I had never seen before. And guess what, a quick glance at its menu revealed it had a Brettljause. Obviously, at the first opportunity, I was there.
Perhaps I reached it at an off-peak time, but my first impressions were very favorable: not too many people, a pleasant view, a menu with rather standard but not too basic dishes, and fairly reasonable prices. The Brettljause, too, looked very attractive: the thin slices of Speck, ham, salamis and cheese were neatly arranged on a smaller than usual board, creating an illusion of volume. And hallelujah, it had non-wrapped butter and a full egg on it. Two half-eggs, to be exact.
It is a pity that all the ingredients tasted as if they came straight from a supermarket, where they spent the last few days in a fridge in an already sliced form. It was probably a quality supermarket with a well-working fridge, because the taste was completely fresh, but I could not help longing for something more.
All I got at the end, though, was a nice relaxing hour in the sun, a couple of very welcome cold beers, and a desire to try some of NEUERWirt’s other dishes next time.
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