SCHWEINSHAXE sounds like a Teutonic expletive. It is a bit near the knuckle, actually – the pork knuckle bone. The meat on my £13.50 main tears off in great shards, soon soaked in red cabbage juice, an accompanying pot of apple and horseradish quite overwhelmed. The bone finally bare as an Alpine outcrop. Time for another swig of Pilsener Urquell, unpasteurised Czech beer freshly arrived by tanker after a 16 hour journey from the brewery in Plzen. A weekly commitment to the spirit of beer-loving endurance.
Albert’s Schloss, self-styled Bohemian Pleasure Palace, doesn’t do things by halves and that’s its strength. Who wants minimalism when you are living a Schnapps-fuelled Grimm’s Fairy Tale, wolfing portions that might poleaxe a Bavarian blacksmith? Well that’s the dream.
So Gruss Gott and Vielen Dank to Joel Wilkinson and his Trof team and their Schloss partners, Neil McLeod and Roy Ellis, creative free spirits from the Revolution bar stable.
On the evidence of the wackiest Manc launch party in recent history they had succeeded in creating a whimsically gemutlich outpost of Mitteleuropa with a touch of Herr Disney. And if it’s a bit Kitsch, well who invented Kitsch?
But how would an evening at Albert’s pan out without the girls dancing on tables, the fire juggllng, the band that put the funk into Rundfunk? On a regular night out would I warm to the stag’s heads over monumental fireplaces, artfully strewn skis and cuckoo clocks and all that fiendish ingenuity with reclaimed pine? Above all, would the food be more than trencherman ballast? The reputation Germanic cuisines are tarred with.
So on our return visit we ordered Schweinshaxe, Sauerbraten with Potato and Cheese Sformato after starters of Flammkuchen, Albert’s Beer and Onion Soup and Blackened Padron Peppers (not a central European staple as I recall but…). Somewhere along the line I missed out on Pretzels, Sauerkraut and Schnitzel but that would have left no room for Passion Fruit Pavlova and Black Forest Molten Souffle. Yes, I did have trouble in fitting into my lederhosen for flugelhorn practice the next day.
OK, it’s not subtle food but you don’t expect that. Yet the big meat dishes were more delicately presented than their equivalents in Munich, at traditional Wirtshauser such as the Augustiner Keller, where I’ve never finished a plateful.
The Flammkuchen, a pizza variant associated with Bavaria and, above all, Alsace, was spot on. I would have gone for the regular topping of speck, gruyere, pickled red onion and creme fraiche (the Schloss adds white truffle oil, too), but my partner’s choice to share at £7.50, with Cremini mushrooms, Cambozola cheese, artichokes, rosemary and capers, was a splendid nibble as we appreciated that gorgeous benchmark Urquell ‘Tank Beer’, £4.80 for a pint, schooners £3.20.
I prefer my padrons crisper and with that occasional chilli from hell kick. These, at £5 a bowl, were limp and oily.
The beer and onion soup (£6), laden with molten gruyere was a gloopy treat. Not so far removed from French onion soup, it was equally satisfying.
Our waiter recommended the Sformato to bulk up the carb count and it worked a treat with more gloopy cheese and a whisper of truffle adding oomph to this baked mashed potato souffle (£7).
Of the red in tooth and claw mains I marginally preferred the Sauerbraten (£16) to the Schweinshaxe despite its accompanying rosti being soggy and greasy. Basically it’s just a pot roast that has sat for a good few hours in a marinade of wine, herbs and vinegar – hence the Sauer – then slow cooked. The Schloss version gets it just about right.
We accompanied it with an organic Austrian red, Sepp Zweigelt, good value at £20 for its burst of juicy, spicy blackberry fruit. We drank a couple of cocktails with our pavlova, deciding £160 for a Big Pornstar Sharer probably wasn’t appropriate; the next table was indulging in the frozen cocktail list – ‘Albert’s Posh Schloss Schlusch’. As cuckoo as a clock, Albert’s is a fun addition to the boom strip Peter Street has become. Just don’t dance on my table when the Tank Beers are lined up.
Albert’s Schloss, 27 Peter Street, Manchester M2 5RQ. 0161 833 4040.
