Latest news with #WienerSchnitzel
Yahoo
a day ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Beer Hall 'Permanently' Closing After Nearly 50 Years
A beloved restaurant in the Houston area announced it permanently closed its doors over the weekend. Rudi Lechner opened his German-inspired beer hall in 1976 before he retired and the restaurant was purchased by Jay Luchun. "I made sure not to change anything about Rudi's, from the menu to the staff and especially the name," Luchun told Westchase Today, a quarterly community publication, in 2018. "Many of the restaurant's loyal workers have been there for 20 years or more. I feel a responsibility to keep them employed." Now, nearly 50 years after its opening, Rudi Lechner's is shuttering its doors. "After many wonderful years of serving the community, Rudi Lechner's has permanently closed its doors," read a statement from the restaurant Sunday, via the Houston Chronicle. "We want to express our deepest gratitude to all of you who have supported us over the years. It has been an incredible journey filled with memorable moments, delicious meals, and the joy of sharing our culture and hospitality with you." The restaurant reportedly apologized to those impacted by the sudden closing. In a post on Reddit, the Consulate of Austria emailed members that its monthly Stammtisch—an Austrian-themed dinner—at the restaurant was canceled following Rudi Lechner's sudden closing. In the email, the consulate revealed that the owner of the Rudi Lechner property was "looking for a new restaurant operator who may also invest in renovating the place." Rudi Lechner's described itself as a casual, and 'gemuetliches' German-Texan restaurant, that is all about Sausages, Wiener Schnitzel and great German Beer and Wine."Beer Hall 'Permanently' Closing After Nearly 50 Years first appeared on Men's Journal on Jun 2, 2025
Times
3 days ago
- Business
- Times
How to find the perfect summer city break for under £350
July is the perfect time to snap up a city break. While holidaymakers flock to the Med, prices in northern Europe can remain surprisingly reasonable and the good weather makes it easy to enjoy sightseeing, alfresco lunches at pavement cafés and picnics in city parks. Less than two hours' flight away, Berlin has toasty temperatures in the mid-20s, ideal for discovering the capital's pop-up beach bars, lake swimming and beer gardens. You'll stay in five-star style at the privately run Hotel Palace Berlin in the heart of City West. Three nights' room only, including flights from Luton, costs £338pp with easyJet, departing on July 13. A small under-seat bag is included — you can add a 15kg checked bag for an extra £57 return and add breakfast for £50pp. The S-Bahn S9 train runs every 20 minutes from Berlin Brandenburg airport and takes about an hour to Zoologischer Garten station, a five-minute walk from the hotel (£4; The hotel has an upmarket meat-focused restaurant, an in-house patisserie and a lobby lounge serving local specialities including Wiener schnitzel, and a gin bar with 150 gins and DJs performing each weekend. An 800 sq m spa has a Finnish sauna and large swimming pool, while modern rooms are decorated in shades of blue-grey and chocolate brown with statement leather headboards, large desks and smart tiled bathrooms. The Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church and the Bikini Berlin concept mall, with its up-and-coming brands, international food market and art exhibitions, are both on the hotel's doorstep ( while all the main sights are within a 45-minute walk away. And you can hop on the Line 100 bus to Alexanderplatz to reach the iconic Brandenburg Gate (£10 for one day's travel; The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, the lavish Berlin Cathedral and the Fernsehturm — the distinctive TV tower that looms over the city — are all walkable from there (£21; The domed Reichstag Building designed by Norman Foster also has knockout city views, but visits should be booked in advance (free; From there, stroll down the grand boulevard Unter den Linden to the Unesco-listed Museum Island, which celebrates its 200th anniversary this year and is home to five museums, including the Alte Nationalgalerie for works by Monet and Renoir (£10; If it gets too hot for sightseeing, grab supplies from the deli at Fredericks ( then find a shady spot in the 519-acre Tiergarten Park where you can rent rowing boats or order a German lager in the fairylight-adorned lakeside beer garden. Other great suntrap spots across the city include Ku'damm Beach on Halensee Lake, which has cocktails, sun loungers and wild swimming, and Badeschiff, a 30m-long barge-turned-outdoor pool floating in the middle of the Spree River with city views, hammocks and an adjoining sandy beach (£7; This article contains affiliate links, which can earn us revenue • Return Luton-Berlin flights, departing on July 13• Three nights' room-only at Hotel Palace Berlin ( Feeling flush? If you're inspired but you've got more cash to splash, you could try: Located in a former 19th-century bank on a quiet street in Mitte, Hotel de Rome, a Rocco Forte hotel, has bags of character, with a spa and 20m lap pool in the basement bank vaults and an opulent ballroom in the cashier's hall. Rooms are more simple and neutral, with dark wooden furniture, navy accents and mosaic-tiled showers. There's an excellent Italian restaurant on the ground floor with a candlelit terrace, plus one of the city's best (weather-dependent) rooftop bars offering spectacular views over the river and city skyline beyond. Museum Island and the Brandenburg Gate are both within a 15-minute walk. Details Three nights' room-only from £637pp, including flights and hold luggage ( The privately run 41-room boutique hotel is on busy Oranienplatz in the heart of the city's Kreuzberg district, known for its creative history and now home to several galleries, music venues and theatres. The hotel continues the tradition with its own stage and literary salon, and hosts free performances from Berlin artists most nights. Rooms have solid hardwood floors, silk curtains and handwoven Iranian rugs, and some have views of Oranienplatz. An all-day restaurant with a fireplace and open kitchen is a popular spot with locals, while the bar serves soul food dishes and spirits from local Berlin Three nights' B&B from £905pp, including flights and hold luggage (
Forbes
16-04-2025
- Politics
- Forbes
What's In A Name? When It Comes To The New York Strip Steak The Political Connotations Matter
A 16 oz. New York Strip steak at Duke's Chophouse in Rivers Casino. (Photo by John Carl ... More D'Annibale/Albany Times Union via Getty Images) It would seem to be one of the more mundane facts of history, but food names have long carried political implications. Italians insist they created the first breaded meat cutlet under the name costoletta alla milanese, but the Austrians say their cooks created it under the name Wiener Schnitzel. Baked Alaska is called Omelette norvégienne in France; during World War I, out of anti-German sentiment, American cooks changed sauerkraut to 'liberty cabbage'; in World War II, the soup vichyssoise (created at New York's Ritz-Carlton) was re-named 'crème Gauloise' as a rebuke to the Nazi-allied Vichy government in France. And in 2003 the U.S. House of Representatives changed the named 'French fries' to 'freedom fries' in its cafeteria because France opposed the Iraq war. Wiener Schnitzel (Viennese Schnitzel) and Wine served in a tradtional open air restaurant in ... More Unterloiben in the Wachau. (Photo by: Martin Zwick/REDA/Universal Images Group via Getty Images) Then last month Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick proposed on X that the 'New York strip' steak be re-named 'Texas strip,' because 'Liberal New York shouldn't get the credit for our hard-working ranchers.' Noting that New York has more dairy cows and Texas more beef steers, 'Just because a New York restaurant named Texas beef a New York Strip in the 19th century doesn't mean we need to keep doing that,' and said the Texas Senate 'will file a concurrent resolution to officially change the name of the New York Strip to the 'Texas Strip' in the Lone Star State,' asking restaurants and grocery stores to do the same. Full of Texas gumption, Patrick went on to say that 'We want this to catch on across the country and around the globe. In a world filled with serious issues that we address every day at the Texas Capitol, this simple resolution will help better market Texas beef.' As of now, the bill, Resolution 26, has been referred to Water, Agriculture & Rural Affairs, which seems unlikely to fast-track it. This is from the state that passed a law that requires all vehicles have working windshield wipers but does not require that vehicles have windshields. HOUSTON, TEXAS - FEBRUARY 5: Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick (Staff Photographer/Houston Chronicle ... More via Getty Images) The beef cut in question has long been called simply a 'strip steak,' which is a boneless, marbled, tender cut from the short loin. The USDA has a long list under its Standards of Identity of beef cuts, ranging from primal brisket to prime loin to primal shank to primal sirloin. Primal short loin is cut from the hindquarter between the pinbone of the primal sirloin and the small end of the rib. A porterhouse includes the top loin, the tenderloin and the tail and retaining the 'T-bone'; the tenderloin is also called 'filet mignon,' 'tournedos' and 'chateaubriand,' while the 'club steak' has no tenderloin or flank attached and is often called the 'Delmonico steak.' (More below.) The 'strip steak' or 'strip roast' contains the top loin muscle and bones, called in some parts of the country 'New York strip,' in others 'Kansas City strip,' and 'shell' in others. Got all that? QUEMADO, TEXAS - JUNE 13: Farmer Jose Esquivel surveys his field of cattle on June 13, 2023 in ... More Quemado, Texas. Ranchers and farmers have begun culling their cattle herds due to drought and high costs in the region, threatening a potentially steep climb in prices for the country's supply of beef. (Photo by) None of which Patrick seems to have taken into account. His claim that Texas raises a lot of beef cattle––4 million cows and heifers––ignores that they account for only 14.6% of all beef cows in the U.S. Even so, most of those cows are slaughtered outside of Texas: Nebraska slaughters more than 20% , along with South Dakota, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado. A 'cut' refers to the part of the slaughtered cow and has nothing to do with where it was raised. Delmonico's, opened in 1831, is the oldest restaurant in the U.S. and still thriving in downtown New ... More York. The Delmonico steak has a distinct history, dating back to Delmonico's restaurant in downtown New York in 1831, where it still stands. 'Del's' was a Gilded Age influencer whose multi-page menus were copied by competitors, which included the Delmonico steak, Delmonico's potatoes gratin, lobster Newberg, Manhattan clam chowder and Baked Alaska. In those heady days of Diamond Jim Brady and Jay Gould, Delmonico's would roast a 150-pound baron of beef for huge parties, and they still have roast prime rib on the menu with Yorkshire pudding. For its steaks they use only USDA Prime beef fattened on grains like corn to give them more marbling and richer flavor. Since the kitchen gets its beef from various sources, there's no rationale for changing its eponymous name. According to the current head captain, Branko Vinski, 'A Delmonico steak is cut from the short loin, between the sirloin and the ribs, which is the most tender and flavorful cut.' According to the restaurant's history, Dining at Delmonico's contains the recipe for making its famous signature steak. 'We use a boneless 20 ounce prime ribeye steak that has been aged for at least six weeks. It is finished with what we call 'meat butter,' a herbaceous compound butter.' A 'Kansas City Steak' usually refers to a short loin with the bone. The current fad in steakhouses is the ostentatious 'Tomahawk,' which is a ribeye with a six- to eight-inch long bone handle, for which you pay in weight, despite all its meat being trimmed from it. It would seem that Lt.-Gov. Patrick has his work cut out for him, not least at a time when there would seem to be more important legislation to consider in the state. 'In a world filled with serious issues that we address every day at the Texas Capitol,' he wrote on X, 'this simple resolution will help better market Texas beef. That's good for the Texas cattle industry. The Cattle Associations sure liked the idea.' Of course, no one else anywhere––not least the other beef producing states––could care less about this kind of silliness. Perhaps Patrick would have more luck changing the name 'London broil' to 'Texas broil,' even though the name has as much to do with London as Canadian bacon does with Canada.
Forbes
26-03-2025
- Forbes
The Tourist Hops From Place To Place, While The True Traveler Re-Visits Places Full Of Fond Memories
I have a friend who has enough time and money to travel as she wishes and over a lifetime has visited more cities and countries than anyone I know. She budgets her time to spend exactly one hour touring the Louvre, 45 minutes to eat at a trattoria in Rome and two hours to sun bathe on a beach in Bali. Then she comes home and sticks colored pins into a map of the world for all to see. Yet she never returns to anywhere she's ever been. London? Done it. Tokyo? Been there. Rio de Janeiro? Seen it. She will rave about a restaurant she was at twenty years ago but never seek to eat there again. As a food and travel writer I try to be careful about recommending hotels or restaurants, even sights, I haven't been to in the last few years, and I remember being appalled at how Vancouver, BC, which once had a marvelous low-lying cityscape and background of stunning forests and mountains, had on my return been made over with walls of high-rise buildings of no distinction blotting out much of the view. Bangkok was once called the 'Venice of the East' for its extensive canal system, now almost entirely paved over in exchange for. . . high-rise buildings. Though I'm still trying to cross off cities on my bucket list, the older I get the more I realize I won't be able to set foot in every country on earth. Yet I am also more than ever eager to return to places I have visited in the past, perhaps several times. The pleasure of travel, staying in a hotel and eating out is not only about seeing new things but about revisiting what you loved about a place. This could be based on a romantic memory in Lisbon, a trek through gorgeous scenery in Switzerland or a perfect meal out in a Louisiana bayou. There might well be disappointments in such returns, as when a ride is removed at Disneyland that I thrilled to when I was ten years old, or a restaurant in Copenhagen who switched from traditional Danish cooking to a menu of molecular cuisine. And sometimes the memory is fogged by finding a favorite room in a historic New England inn isn't nearly as comfortable as it seemed or the food much good at all. Sometimes it might not matter: if only I could find the third-floor walk-up room in a Parisian pension where I spent three blissful days with a wonderful Oklahoma girl I'd met at a museum in New York, I'd experience as much joy as in visiting my boyhood apartment in the Bronx. Indeed, time being fleeting, rather than search out the hot new vegetarian eatery in Vienna, I take much more pleasure going back for the perfect Wiener Schnitzel and tafelspitz at Plachuttas Gasthaus zur Opera. I would never visit Venice without hoisting a bellini cocktail and eating the wonderful risotto con seppie and tagliatelle gratinata atHarry's Bar. And were I in Taipei I wouldn't miss a chance to visit Night Market with endless stalls serving up exotica that includes 'Stinky Tofu.' I don't really care about eating Japanese food in Milan or Italian food in Mumbai. I don't even really care to eat Sicilian food in Rome or Niçoise food in Alsace. I want to seek out the best a particular food culture has to offer. Back in 1977 for our honeymoon, my wife and I drove across American and back in a leisurely fashion (fourteen weeks), and, given our modest resources, stayed in small hotels and inns of regional charm, getting educated about the different styles of barbecue from Lexington, Kentucky, to Lockhart, Texas. We attended crab boils in Maryland and boucheries in Louisiana. And although it will never be repeated, I count as one of the finest meals of my life for a breakfast at a misty hanging lake in Colorado with Basque cowboys who cooked up campfire pancakes, bacon, lamb chops and pots of strong coffee. I yearn to return to eat tacos in the Mercado in San Miguel Allende, Mexico, and the extraordinary rich vegetarian fare at the truck stop named Sharma Dhabu in Jaipur. In Paris I have at least six bistros and brasseries I always frequent and usually order the signature dishes like the beef tartare and frites at Montparnasse's La Rotonde and the Dover sole at Le Dome, the pig's trotter at Au Pied de Cochon at Les Halles near the Pompidou Center, and the cri spy sweetbreads at Chez Georges on the Rue de Mail. Settings that haven't changed much in decades are always a draw for me because what I liked about them on my first visit has been retained on successive visits, like the downstairs cave-like dining room at Botin in Madrid, the barebones décor of La Campagna in Rome, the Teutonic trappings of The Berghoff in Chicago and the refreshed and now pristine dining room of Galatoire's in New Orleans. As everyone knows, fondly remembered dishes stay with you always, so I rush to eat them again at places that haven't changed the recipe in decades, like the lasagne alla bolognese at Trattoria dal Biassanot in Bologna; the huge portion of choucroute in Le Tire-Bouchon in Strasbourg; the frozen hot chocolate at Serendipity 3 in New York; and the Irish coffee at the Buena Vista Bar in San Francisco. You might have noticed that many of these places I've mentioned attract large numbers of tourists––who keep them thriving––which doesn't concern me as it does when American abroad insist on visiting another iteration of Hard Rock Café in Buenos Aires or Del Frisco's steakhouse in Las Vegas. I, too, was a tourist once, and I did search out the most heralded hotels and restaurants abroad, at first very cheap ones recommended by the guidebook Europe on $5 a Day(which was wholly possible back in the 1960s). I wanted to eat where Hemingway ate in Paris, like Brasserie Lipp, and where Sam Spade at in The Maltese Falcon––John's Grillin San Francisco. I tried to dine at as many restaurants and stay in as many hotels as I could afford in the James Bond novels and films, from '21' Club in New York to the Danieli Hotel in Octopussy. I know that once a hotel or restaurant appears in a movie, whether the Plaza Hotel in Home Alone 2, or its Oak Bar in North by Northwest they become as iconic for tourists as Vienna's Ferris wheel in The Third Man and Sacher Hotel in the same movie. But like my friend who only visits any place once for a peek, those sights may not beg a second visit. Those that do become personal favorites make re-visiting them, staying in the same room and eating the same dishes may well be the most rewarding part of a true traveler's itinerary. For the receptive heart and soul traveling is not about pins on a map but about the remembrance of the best of things past.
