The most interesting of the hostelries in Nuremberg, the town of good beer and little sausages, are the houses where the fare consists almost entirely of sausages, sauerkraut, and beer. The most celebrated of these is the Bratwurstglocklein, a curious Bratwurst- little tavern stuck like a wafer on to glocklein, the back of the Moritzcapelle. It Glockengasse looks more like a doll’s house than a real building. It has a brown tiled roof, in which are many little windows with green and white shutters. Some of the tables and chairs seem to have overflowed from inside, and are set out on the cobble stones before its doors. Little oleander trees in pots give a pleasant touch of cool colour to the space before the building. The glass of the windows is that glass which resembles the bottom of bottles. The interior is panelled with dark wood, which is almost covered by old prints and old pictures, all having some reference to the place or to the celebrities who used to be customers. The drinking-mugs of these celebrities, and fine old pewter tankards hung upside down, also form part of the decorations of this miniature eating house. The entrance to the eating room of the inn is through the kitchen, and the company sit at narrow tables eating little sausages, the pleasant smell of which comes pouring out through the open windows. In the tiny kitchen a buxom cook and her assistants cook pan after pan of the thoroughly German delicacy. The sausages are cooked all day long, and are made twice a day so as to ensure freshness. The sausage which is eaten in the evening had not come into existence before mid-day. The bell from which this u little 1 88 The Gourmet's Guide to Europe bell of the Roast Sausage ” takes its name is hung on a wrought iron bracket on the stone buttress jutting from the chapel which forms one end of the diminutive tavern. The late Mr. Bastard, who was my collabo- rator in the first edition of this book, translated for me the doggerel rhyme which some unknown poet wrote in honour of the establishment. It runs thus — “ Not many noble strangers Can possibly refrain, When once they’ve ate our sausages, From eating them again. And it usually strikes them, If they have not yet found it out, That these sausages are splendid When they’re mixed with sauerkraut. The only thing they rail at, When they fain would criticise, Is to wish the little sausage Were a little larger size.” Built about the year 1400, this tiny hostelry is one of the most ancient, if not the oldest, refreshment house in the world. Hans Sachs, Peter Vischer, Albrecht Dttrer, Wellebald Pirkheimer, Veit Stoss, and other celebrated men in Nuremberg’s history in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, all drank the beer and ate the sausages of the little inn. Hans Sachs seems to have been the best customer of this galaxy of great men, for his name is held in the greatest honour in the little house of the little sausage, where he is regarded as a tutelary saint. Two other houses there are entirely devoted to the cult of the sausage. One is the Brathwurst Roslein Brathwurst t^ie goose market, and the other the Roslein, Brathwurst Herzle in the Herzgasse. obstgasse The Brathwurst Roslein has panelled rooms, and its adornment is similar to the older estab- lishment in that there are rows of beautifully kept German Towns 1 89

AI-modernized reading of the original text

The most interesting of the hostelries in Nuremberg, the town of good beer and little sausages, are the houses where the fare consists almost entirely of sausages, sauerkraut, and beer. The most celebrated of these is the Bratwurstglocklein, a curious little tavern stuck like a wafer on to the back of the Moritzcapelle. It looks more like a doll's house than a real building. It has a brown tiled roof, in which are many little windows with green and white shutters. Some of the tables and chairs seem to have overflowed from inside, and are set out on the cobble stones before its doors. Little oleander trees in pots give a pleasant touch of cool colour to the space before the building. The glass of the windows is that glass which resembles the bottom of bottles. The interior is panelled with dark wood, which is almost covered by old prints and old pictures, all having some reference to the place or to the celebrities who used to be customers. The drinking-mugs of these celebrities, and fine old pewter tankards hung upside down, also form part of the decorations of this miniature eating house. The entrance to the eating room of the inn is through the kitchen, and the company sit at narrow tables eating little sausages, the pleasant smell of which comes pouring out through the open windows. In the tiny kitchen a buxom cook and her assistants cook pan after pan of the thoroughly German delicacy. The sausages are cooked all day long, and are made twice a day so as to ensure freshness. The sausage which is eaten in the evening had not come into existence before mid-day. The bell from which this "little 1 88 The Gourmet's Guide to Europe bell of the Roast Sausage ” takes its name is hung on a wrought iron bracket on the stone buttress jutting from the chapel which forms one end of the diminutive tavern. The late Mr. Bastard, who was my collaborator in the first edition of this book, translated for me the doggerel rhyme which some unknown poet wrote in honour of the establishment. It runs thus — “ Not many noble strangers Can possibly refrain, When once they’ve ate our sausages, From eating them again. And it usually strikes them, If they have not yet found it out, That these sausages are splendid When they’re mixed with sauerkraut. The only thing they rail at, When they fain would criticise, Is to wish the little sausage Were a little larger size.” Built about the year 1400, this tiny hostelry is one of the most ancient, if not the oldest, refreshment house in the world. Hans Sachs, Peter Vischer, Albrecht Durer, Wellebald Pirkheimer, Veit Stoss, and other celebrated men in Nuremberg's history in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, all drank the beer and ate the sausages of the little inn. Hans Sachs seems to have been the best customer of this galaxy of great men, for his name is held in the greatest honour in the little house of the little sausage, where he is regarded as a tutelary saint. Two other houses there are entirely devoted to the cult of the sausage. One is the Brathwurst Roslein in the Obstgasse, the goose market, and the other the Brathwurst Herzle in the Herzgasse. The Brathwurst Roslein has panelled rooms, and its adornment is similar to the older establishment in that there are rows of beautifully kept German Towns 1 89

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