The next day, my conference got out in time to get an early dinner. I decided to check out another place in Sachsenhausen: Apfelweinwirtschaft Adolf Wagner. It’s a bit of a tourist destination, but it’s also one of the minority of Frankfurt Apfelweinwirtschafts that actually makes it’s own Afpelwein; most places carry Apfelwein made by Possmann, the major brewery in the area (who makes a good product, admittedly).
Located on the edge of Sachsenhausen, south of the Schweizer Platz shopping area, Adolf Wagner is definitely on the tourist beat, and even with my early dinner time, it was definitely busy. But this made for some phenomenal people-watching, since Adolf Wagner is basically group seating (benches, mostly), and the staff loves to pack people in tightly, and it’s really fun seeing how people from different cultures (especially those with larger concepts of “personal space”) handle that, and being seated with unfamiliar people.
It also means that if you are by yourself (like I was), or in a small group, they can almost always fit you in somewhere. In my case, this meant getting seated at a table three French 50-something women who barely knew English or German…
But the same sort of efficiency that the staff applies to seating is also applied to service: Adolf is definitely trying to move people through there. A mere minute after I was seated, I found myself sharing a large bembel of apfelwein with the French ladies, and having my order taken. All day I had been craving mushrooms (it apparently was mushroom season in Hesse, with most markets having huge displays of them), so I opted for the Jäger Schnitzel (pork schnitzel with mushroom sauce).
And it was quite a good schnitzel: a nice tender pork, a good breading, and quite a delicious mushroom sauce. While I ended up having schnitzel for about half of my meals in Frankfurt, this was one of the best.
As far as the Apfelwein? I could tell that Adolf Wagner made their own, it was a definitely yeastier and more complicated and earthy apfelwein than most of the other joints, and their version of it appealed to me. I would have had more, but I think I already had well more than my share of the large 4 liter bembel that they brought to our table.
