a slice of Germany - Brauhaus Zils

I haven't made A Slice of Germany post in such a long time! For a while now I've been relying on Marius to take pictures with his little pocket sized camera, so I can skip the hassle of my huge camera considering I'm usually wrangling Iris most of the time anyway. Well, from now on I am not allowed out of the house without my camera - for that simply makes for NO blog posts! Unacceptable. 

This Slice of Germany Post has been in my queue for many months now. These photos were taken during the summer, while the sun still shone his face. If you've been reading my blog for a while, you'll know that Marius and I really enjoy all that beer has to offer and we consider it one of our hobbies. We search out local breweries and have even started brewing our own beer!

Bräuhaus Zils is a lovely little brewery which is quite close to us. They serve traditional German food and have at least three varieties of beer available. We haven't been back since, but this is a nice reminder to make our way there again! 

Information outside the restaurant.

The entrance.

 The special of the day.

Summer flowers.

Coloring with great attention to detail.

My love.

Yum!

We ordered a hefeweizen (wheat beer) and a dunkel (dark beer). 

Apfelschorle (apple juice with carbonation).

Experimenting.

German-style onion soup - with chicken broth, onions, cheese, herbs and country bread.

Iris loves her bratwurst!

Delicious sauerbraten (sour roast).

Oooh!

Ice cream is very serious.

The view of the patio from the back stairs. 

Dried hops tied to the railing.

Inside - the bar and beer brewing going on in the background.

a slice of Germany - Schloß Café

I've decided to introduce a new feature to my blog - A Slice of Germany! I plan to document and post all about the beautiful and interesting places we visit during our time here. I'll likely mostly feature restaurants, as enjoying food is something of particular interest to me! I hope not only to share a bit of our life here, but also to document our experiences for us to look back on. 

The town of Malburg is a short 30 minute walk from where we live. It's quite a workout to walk anywhere in our town or near it, as we are located in the base of a valley, thus lots of hills! I admit that lately I've found myself to be in the best shape I've been in years with all the uphill walking both ways I do every day! We initially had planned to walk into the next town over and then return home, but I decided we should walk around a bit to see if we could find a restaurant our landlady had recommended to me. 

We ended up at the peak of a steep hill, atop of which is the castle of Malburg, which we didn't visit that time around. However, sitting right below it was a small café and we decided to check it out! They had a fairly simple menu with appetizer type plates of meat and cheese, small sandwiches, cake, ice cream and all sorts of refreshments. It looked like the sort of place that people of the town frequent after church, as we were there on a Sunday and it was full of well dressed people when we arrived. 

Since we'd already eaten lunch, we ordered some of the most divine cake I have ever tasted. It was so light and yet full with the flavors of chocolate, cherries, sweet liquor and whipped cream. On a similar note, I should mention that Marius and I are self-professed beer connoisseurs and it's quite an intense hobby for us. We ordered a beer called Kasteel Donker, a quadruple style which is brewed in Belgium. The name Kasteel, which was world-class delicious albeit sweet for our palates, also translates to "castle" in Dutch. The staff were lovely and helpful and I am simply amazed that we live just a 30 minute walk from a place like this. I will never tire of the simple pleasures of Europe. Since moving here, I've been bombarded with requests for pictures of our new home - those will be coming soon! For now, enjoy the photos I took of this wonderful little café in the town next to us, Schloß Café. 

The sign translates to "Castle Cafe. Coffee + Cake. Beer Wine ice Cream"

look alike.

One of the first restaurants we visited in Germany was a place that's locally named "The Truck Stop." However, it's really as far as you can possibly get from what Americans would think of when they think "truck stop!" There are huge indoor and outdoor dining areas, a brand new playground for the kids, and pastures all about the area where deer are raised! (Unfortunately, some of them do end up on the menu, but at least they are pampered by visitors until then...) Marius ordered a schnitzel, while I experimented by ordering something completely new to me - sauerbraten! Iris shared from our plates, and was most interested in the fresh pasta that came along with my meal. 


I snapped a few quick pictures of her eating, and of her and Marius playing with her new lacing toy. I laugh every time I see these photos because the two of them look alike so much, and even wear  identical expressions in each photo!

After we finished eating, Iris got a huge kick out of watching and feeding the deer! 

This has been such a lovely summer so far!