Black Forest Inn – Minneapolis, MN

My small department at work decided to head out to a nice dinner. Since there were people from out of town (some people work remotely), we steered clear of chain places (despite a couple of protests) and eventually decided on Black Forest Inn – a nice German place on Nicollet. I’ve heard a lot of people talk about it, especially the patio, so I thought it would be a good place for a group of eight of us to sit outside and enjoy some awesome German food.

Even though the skies looked like they might not cooperate, we opted to sit out on the patio. We were placed at a larger table in the corner underneath a tree-d canopy. Even if it rained, we might get a couple of drops, but it should be fine, right? We ordered a couple of drinks and set about making some menu decisions.

Right about here is where we noticed all kinds of random sticks, leaves, and bugs falling on our table and in our drinks and in our hair. Some of the ladies were freaking out, but I managed to hide or flick off the table the largest and grossest of bugs before they could see them. I managed to swat a couple of larger bugs out of my boss’ hair before she noticed, but she eventually wondered why I kept swatting her hair out of the way periodically. I wondered how dinner would go with the rain of bugs we were seeing.

No one was really feeling an appetizer, so we just set about deciding on the entrees. I love German food and had to decide between a couple of different schnitzels, and a sausage combo plate. I flipped to the back of the entrees page and found Hasenpfeffer. For those that don’t know, that means rabbit. I’ve had rabbit stew in Rome and it was delicious. So I finally caved and ordered it. As I was ordering it, I realized my boss was sitting right next to me. Yes, my boss who has a pet rabbit at her house (not her kids, HER). Named Houdini. Whoops.

The waiter brought out some bread (simple but tasty) in baskets with those tiny individual plastic tubs of butter. So we chomped on that to soak up the various libations we had ordered. We waited a while longer than I thought we might have to, but the food eventually came out.

I wasn’t sure how this would be served, since I’ve never ordered it in the US before. Frankly, I think I could have passed it off as chicken, but my boss was intrigued enough that she had to ask. So I had to tell her. She was less than pleased. She watched me eat it and asked how it was. She even said she was tempted to try it, but would be afraid she’d like it and then would look at her pet different after that. The meat was very mild and not gamey or anything. It didn’t taste like chicken, despite how it looks on the bones. It does taste a little like pork and is pretty much which meat. It was delicious. It was covered in a brown gravy and served over spaetzle, so I was in heaven (even though I had to keep picking bugs out of my food – really). Despite my hatred of high labor foods (it’s VERY much like chicken bones), this was a pretty good dish. I don’t know that it was phenomenal or anything, but I really enjoyed the flavor. (It’s probably too much to ask for deep fried rabbit strips, isn’t it?)

Right at the end, while everyone was sitting around gabbing, the skies opened up a bit more and the one person sitting under the thinnest part of the leaved canopy got a little bit wetter than she felt comfortable with. So we bailed shortly after that. Not a big deal at all.

All in all, we had a great meal. I heard a lot of people say they really liked it (though a lot of people got stroganoff – the spaghetti of Germany). People were pretty happy with drinks and service, so it’s likely I’ll be back. I know there are a couple of other German places I need to try before I come back here though.

Top 5 things about Black Forest Inn
1. Hasenpfeffer
2. Service was pretty good (even though our waiter was pretty quiet)
3. I heard the Beef Stroganoff was good (that’s not saying much, I guess)
4. Very diverse menu to choose from
5. They have their own parking lot – cha-ching

Bottom 5 things
1. A LOT of bugs dropping from trees on the patio (we weren’t under the covered part so that might have changed things)
2. I had no idea they had breakfasts here or I would have gone here sooner (I should put this in the “good” section, but I’m bummed in a bad way, so here it stays!)
3. Not the most comprehensive girly drink menu I’ve ever seen
4. I hope the whole “rabbit thing” doesn’t end up on my review…
5. Did I mention the bugs?

www.blackforestinnmpls.com