Ribsing Again

Here come my second spare ribs for today. Normally, I do not like “double features,” but my lunch four hours earlier was quite small and disappointing and besides, one does not miss a chance of dining at Südtiroler Stube. Considered one of the best restaurants in Seefeld, the Stube is almost always full, and getting a table without a reservation is a lucky sign. I was looking forward to something special.

What I got was not special at all, though in some ways the opposite of my experience at Wildmoosalm. Whereas my earlier ribs had no marinade but a passable dip, these ones had a strong honey-based topping but no sauce. A choice of a side dish was included in the price (I went for roasted potatoes which were like Tiroler Gröstl without meat), but otherwise there was no salad, no Pfefferoni, not even a sad little slice of a cucumber.

As long as the bites I took had some topping, the taste was OK; I would have preferred a tiny bit of chili to make it spicier, however. The few non-topped bits tasted of plain pig and lacked salt (the latter being an easily fixable problem). As for the service, it was friendly and efficient but slightly over-familiar, which must be fine for the restaurant’s mostly touristic clientele.

If life brings me to Seefeld again, I can see myself revisiting the Stube and ordering something different. For some reason, spare ribs are a very popular dish in this skiing town – during my stay, I saw four restaurants having it on their menus. But I have a feeling that Tiroleans are not very good at cooking them. Stick to a Gröstl or a Knödel instead.