Because we’ve got Germany on the brain, we couldn’t help but jokingly refer to the beautiful countryside around Derby as the “Derbische Schweiz”, with reference to the nickname given to the national park in Upper Franconia.
Sometimes, though, a joke turns out to have something in it. In 24 hours in Derbyshire we came across:
- a very authentic Bratwurst stand with “Schleswig-Holstein” written all over it
- a shop and cafe for German and Austrian ex-pats with a window display of Semmel Knödel mixes
- two microbrewed, unfiltered, unpasteurised pilsners
- more beer gardens (that is, proper beer gardens, with trees and attractive panoramas) than we’ve ever seen anywhere else in the UK.
Maybe all of that makes up for the time we came across a disconcerting and unexplained red phone box in Goslar?
9 replies on “Die Derbische Schweiz?”
I’m no expert on the Schleswig-Holstein question but isn’t part of it Danish?
I gather (from Wikipedia….) that it’s politically and geographically German, but with a weird local dialect and a distinctly Danish-influenced culture.
wasn’t it annexed during the war of 1864 by the Prussians?
Let me guess…. the bratwurst stall on Derby’s continental market? Tiroler Stuberl in Bakewell? Moravka pilsner? And any one of several dozen beer gardens!
Haddonsman — we weren’t including Moravka, but otherwise, bang on!
So which pilsners and where?! As a local, I’d hate to miss out!
Brunswick Pilsner (excellent) and another *very* flat one at the Brewery Tap beer festival — can’t recall the name, though. Sorry.
There used to be a red British phone box in Langestrasse in a village called Dülken near Moenchengladbach in Germany. After a night out, you’d phone a cab from there and be sure of getting picked up…
I had the Red Rat cask lager there… and the Brunnie Pilsner can be a lovely drop indeed.