Genre: GERMAN, BAVARIAN
Where: SCHWABING (see map below)
Atmosphere: ★★½
Food&Drinks: ★★
Service: ★½
Vegetarian: ★½
Price: 25-30 €
Mountains of salt, mountains of sugar.
ABSOLUTELY NOT!
I will try to state it once more keeping calm and peaceful: Dear Germans, risotto is NOT a side dish. There is no such a thing like meat on a risotto bed and you shall never ever do that again unless you are awarded a Michelin star or, as an alternative, you spent two years of your life in the house of a Lombardy granny cleaning her floors every day: Then, and only then, you will be allowed to cook the unique exception from the rule: Ossobuco alla milanese. In the meanwhile, the matter is pretty simple: Risotto with Steinpilzen (porcini mushrooms) is one dish, Kalbsfilet (veal filet) is another, Kürbis (pumpkin) risotto is one thing, chicken legs are another. You cannot just put one on top of the other, the flavor does not add up exactly like you would never put ice cream on your Schnitzel, even if separately they taste good.
Atmosphere ★★½: Another typical Bavarian restaurant. I am starting to get used to wood panels on the walls of these restaurant, next time I will have to remember to ask what their original function was (isolating from the cold? Absorbing part of the sound waves produced by Bavarian crowds? Protecting heads and bones of people during drunk fights?). Georgenhof is divided into two rooms,; we were sat in the smaller one which was anyway very loud. Posters of old theater and opera pieces cover the upper part of the wall, left clear of the mysterious wood panels. The nice vintage style is disturbed by the presence of a projector. The lamps are hanging down from the high ceiling and the result is a poor illumination of the table and of the food. I hate when it is so: You are just impeding one of the four senses one can enjoy food with. A gypsophila bouquet decorates the tables. Toilettes are aseptic aseptic and clean.
Food&Drinks ★★: My general comment on the menu of Georgenhof is summarized in the introduction to this review, there is not much to add considering the Bavarian nature of the menu. I would just like to add a minus for the lack of vegetarian options. My personal pick (notice that dishes are in general much more expensive than this, the Kalbsfilet hits the 26,50€):
Jonas homemade Maultäschle with long cooked onion (★★, 13,50 euros). Jonas, whoever he is, made the damn Maultaschen (a kind of huge ravioli filled with meat or vegetables) himself, so they must be good -I said to myself. After being scolded by the germans at the table (Maultaschen are not a Bavarian classic, they come from Swabia!) I concentrated on the plate in front of me: The thick and rustic dough was hiding a huge filling of mixed pork meat and herbs that was way too salted to be enjoyable. The long cooked onions were perhaps the best part of the composition, bringing a bit of relief to the tongue tormented by the salt. The liter of vinaigrette in the side salad was the last straw for my taste buds. I felt in good company when also my table mates declared the excessive saltiness of their dishes. When I saw a dessert involving beer I could not help but ordering it, ready for a disappointment: Apfelkücherl im Augustiner-Bierteig gebacken mit Zimtzucker und Vanilleeis (★★★, 6,00€), that is apple donuts cooked (read: deep fried) in an Augustiner beer dough with cinnamon sugar and vanilla ice cream. The result was well above expectations: The light acidity of the big piece of apple was balanced by dough and sugar and finally brought to a delicate end by the vanilla. Avoid this dessert if you do not like extra-extra-sweet, there is enough sugar to draw the lines of a football field (see from 00:44). I found out (against my will, see the Service section) in Georgenhof what a Russe (3,80€) is: Weiss Bier plus lemonade, too sweet for my taste. The beer brand of the restaurant is Augustiner, definitely one of my favorites (3,60€ half a liter).
Service ★½: Who follows a bit this blog or has been to a Bavarian restaurant already knows the dress code for waiters and waitresses: Brown leather pants and chess button shirt for him, Dirndl with wide neckline and blonde braids for her. What was lacking here, though, was the typical Bavarian warm treatment. In the specific, none of us ever ordered the Russe, but the waitress could not accept it and would not leave the table until somebody decided to drink it. At the end, in order to overcome the 60 seconds impasse with us staring at her and her looking at us without speaking, I decided to make her win and got the Russe, but this left an unpleasant feeling for the rest of the night. Also the rest of the service was not perfect. It was slower than average, but not when it was about refilling our beers (the waitress also brought away my beer when it was not finished, these are things that break my heart), and when we asked for some bread (there was none on the table), we were given two-three half slices for the whole table.
Not everybody knows that… Wikipedia is the queen of fun facts: “On 22 October 2009, the European Union recognized Maultaschen (Schwäbische Maultaschen or Schwäbische Suppenmaultaschen) as a “regional specialty” and remarked that the dish is significant to the cultural heritage of Baden-Württemberg. This measure provides protection to the integrity of the dish, mandating that genuine Maultaschen are only produced in Swabia, a historical region that was incorporated into the modern German states of Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria.”
Conclusion: Many people go on telling me that I only had bad luck when I went to Georgenhof, but my advice is still: Do not let the fancy website catch you!
Georgenhof
089 340 77 691
Open: Mon to Sun 10h00-01h00
http://www.georgenhof-muenchen.de/
Eat in Munich 