My husband has been nagging me to go back to the Rathskeller literally for years. Let’s just say, it didn’t make a strong impression on me then. And let’s also just say, that may have changed, but not for the better.
We went with my son and my in-laws. They are always game to try somewhere new and had never been. We started with an order of the onion dill bread with herbs and provolone ($9.95). This is a pretty tasty item. It’s a piece of bread that’s cut and seasoned and topped with cheese and herbs. It’s gooey and tasty. Honestly, it was one of the better things we had, even though you really don’t need to order it because you get a nice bread plate with every meal. Speaking of which, my favorite part of this is the warm pretzels in that basket. I truly wished they offered some sort of cheese or even better, beer cheese, to dip them in. The pretzels taste good, but the super spicy mustard they serve it with is so spicy, it’s not even really very good. So let’s just say the strengths of this place mainly start and end with the breads. Ok, and the soup. I had a cup of French onion soup ($5.50) and salad for my meal, because so much pork was being ordered, I knew I could eat off everyone else’s plates. The soup was very tasty. It had the rich beefy stock that you need, plus the onions and cheesy bread. Oh wait, there you go, more bread.
The salad I ordered was the spinach salad ($11.50). It’s a big hearty salad with a ton of spinach leaves. They are topped with bacon crumbles, cheese, hardboiled egg, tomatoes, red onions, and mushrooms. They serve it with a little server of warm bacon dressing. There was so much spinach in there, you really needed to take about half of it out in order to have the right amount of dressing. It was actually kind of hard to eat because the plate was so full, you couldn’t really toss the dressing with the salad much. I kind of got frustrated trying to get it right and gave up and stuck with my soup. I didn’t care much for the dressing either, which had a kind of artificial sweetness to it.
Several people at the table got various forms of the schnitzels. The regular schnitzel ($24.50), the Jaegerschnitzel ($26.50), and the schnitzel cordon bleu ($26.50). Ok, these are all pounded and fried pork tenderloins that are covered (or not) with various sauces—the plain one just comes with lemon, the Jaegerschnitzel with a red wine sauce with mushrooms, herbs and shallots, the cordon bleu, with you guessed it, ham and Swiss cheese. Here’s the problem. The schnitzel is bad. You can dress it up (or not) however you want, but it’s just huge and dry. So dry you can barely cut it with a knife and fork. The cheese and ham were probably the best addition as it added, well, cheesiness. But no one was overly happy, and I am pretty sure my in laws will never return. On the bright side, one of the sides chosen by several, the creamed spinach, was pretty tasty. It was probably the only side dish that anyone commented on. You do have a lot of different choices though. But I would recommend no to schnitzel.
Hubby ordered the wurst plate ($26.95) and contrary to its name, it was actually the best entree. (Haha). It’s a combo of bratwurst, kielbasse, bockwurst, and a German wiener. They steam them in beer and then grill them. Interestingly, they serve them with a couple kinds of mustards—the really hot one and a not so hot one. It makes you wonder why they don’t offer this with the pretzel. He also got the creamed spinach as well as a house salad with blue cheese dressing. This salad was pretty tasty, and I liked this dressing. I would stick with something like this if you’re in a salad mood.
Ok, I know it’s a big deal in Indy, and an historical building/restaurant, but there is very little that would lure me back it. Hubby says maybe a beer and pretzels and that’s about it. And I agree. So are you guys going to yell at me about this one? I’m curious, because let’s face it, the food is just not very good.
The Rathskeller
401 East Michigan
Indy 46204
317/636-0396
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