Top 10 Must-Try Foods In Germany | What To Cat In Germany

Germany. Sausages spitting over charcoal at a Christmas market. A warm pretzel the size of your head, butter melting into the coarse salt. Pork knuckle with crackling so hard it knocks against the knife. Eaten under chestnut trees with a liter of cold lager. German food is built for cold evenings and long tables. Heavy on the pork, the potatoes, and the mustard. And it is far better than its reputation admits. From street-corner snack stands to wood-paneled beer halls. Here are the 10 things you need to try in Germany. Number 10. The Brezel. Germany's pretzel. A knot of soft dough with a deep brown glossy crust, fat and chewy at the belly, thin and crunchy at the arms, scattered with coarse salt. Bavarians have been baking them for centuries, and they take the shape seriously. That mahogany crust comes from a quick dip in lye, a chemical you'd otherwise find in soap, which turns completely harmless in the oven. Split one open and spread it thick with cold butter, a butterbrezel. And you'll understand why bakeries sell them by the basketful every single morning. Eaten at any hour, breakfast with white sausage in Bavaria, an afternoon snack with a cold lager, grabbed from bakery counters and train station kiosks all over the country. Number 9. Sauerbraten. A pot roast with patience. Beef soaked for days in vinegar, wine, and spices until it's tender enough to fall apart under a fork, then braised in a dark, sweet-sour gravy. Many Germans call it their national dish. In the Rhineland, a horse meat version became a regional classic, and a few traditional restaurants there still serve it that way today. That long marinade is the whole trick. The sourness cuts through the richness, and in the Rhineland the gravy is sweetened with raisins, a combination that sounds odd and works completely. A Sunday lunch classic with red cabbage and potato dumplings, served at traditional site-down restaurants. Slow food, never eaten on the go. Number 8. Käsespätzle. Short, ragged egg noodles. Scraped fresh off a wooden board straight into boiling water. Layered with sharp mountain cheese and buried under slow-fried onions. It comes from Swabia in the Alpine South, where it counts as a full meal, not a side. Think of it as the mac and cheese the Alps came up with first. Stretchier, sharper, and topped with onions cooked until they're nearly black and sweet. A cold weather regular in the south. You'll find it in mountain huts after a hike, and on nearly every traditional menu in Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg. Number 7. Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte. Black forest cherry cake. Layers of chocolate sponge, whipped cream, and sour cherries, finished with dark chocolate shavings. What makes it grown up is the Kirschwasser, a clear cherry brandy, brushed right into the sponge. Germany's most famous cake by a mile, copied around the world. Though the copies usually skip the brandy, which is exactly the part that matters. Under German law, a cake can only be sold as Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte if it actually contains Kirschwasser. An afternoon ritual. Germans stop for Kaffee und Kuchen, coffee and cake, around 3 or 4 o'clock, and this is the slice to order in a proper café, especially in the black forest itself. Number 6. Schweinshax. A whole roasted pork knuckle. Its skin blistered into crackling so hard the knife knocks against it. The meat underneath soft enough to pull off the bone with a fork. It arrives at the table looking like a prop from a medieval feast. It's the beer hall showpiece. Order one in Munich, and half the room glances over. The contrast is the point. Glass-crisp skin, then rich, giving meat. Dinner food, built for a beer hall table with a potato dumpling and a big glass of lager. Even locals treat it as a sometimes meal, not a Tuesday habit. Number 5. Kartoffelpuffer. Grated potato pressed into flat cakes, and fried in bubbling oil until the edges turn to golden lace. Crisp at the rim, soft and steaming in the middle. Depending on the region they go by Reibkuchen or Reiberdatschi, but the pan hisses the same everywhere. The classic pairing is sweet. A hot, salty pancake dragged through cold applesauce. That hot and cold, salty and sweet swap is the whole appeal. Germans will happily queue in the snow for it. In the Rhineland, stalls often serve them with Reubenkraut, a dark sugar beet syrup, spooned over the top instead of applesauce. Market food above all. You'll smell the frying oil drifting across a Christmas market or town fair before you find the stall. Though plenty of fry a batch at home on lazy weekends too. Number 4. Doner Kebab. Seasoned meat shaved off a turning spit, packed into warm flatbread with salad, onions, and a garlicky sauce. The sandwich version is believed to have been created by Turkish immigrants in 1970s West Berlin. And Germany has claimed it hard ever since. This is what Germans actually eat late at night. Berlin alone has well over a thousand Doner shops, and locals argue fiercely about which one is best. Any hour, but its true home is after dark, ordered at a takeaway counter, and eaten standing on the street. For many Germans, it's a weekly habit, not a novelty. Number 3. Schnitzel. A cutlet pounded thin, coated in breadcrumbs, and fried until the crust puffs and ripples away from the meat. In Germany, it's usually pork, plate-sized, and often drowned, happily, in creamy mushroom Jägersauce, hunter's sauce. Order a Wiener Schnitzel, and by law it must be veal. The pork version has to be labeled Wiener Art, meaning Vienna style. The crust does the selling. It should crackle when your fork goes through, then give way to juicy meat. Kids grow up on it. Adults never grow out of it. The everyday backbone of German pub and restaurant menus, lunch or dinner, if a place has a kitchen, it almost certainly has a Schnitzel. Number 2. Currywurst. A grilled pork sausage, chopped into bite-sized pieces, smothered in a warm ketchup-based sauce and dusted with curry powder. Invented in Berlin in 1949 by snack stand owner Hertha Hauer, who, the story goes, traded with British soldiers to get the ketchup. Hauer later trademarked her secret sauce under the name Chillip, and took the exact recipe to her grave. Germany's favorite street food and a genuine cultural symbol, Berlin even ran a whole museum dedicated to it. Fast, simple, eaten standing up with a tiny wooden fork. Lunchtime fuel and midnight fuel alike, served with fries at snack stands called Imbiss. Germans put away hundreds of millions of them every year. Number 1. Bratwurst. Of course it's the sausage, Germany makes well over a thousand kinds, and this is the one at hand's the world. Pork, finely spiced, grilled over charcoal until the casing snaps, tucked into a bread roll far too small for it, with mustard and nothing else. Nuremberg was already regulating the quality of its bratwurst back in 1313, and the little finger-sized Nürnberger is still made to strict rules today. Every region defends its own. Thuringia and Franconia have argued for centuries over whose is best. And the smell of one on a charcoal grill is, honestly, the smell of Germany outdoors. Everywhere, always. Christmas markets in winter, football stadiums, town squares on market day, straight-off street grills. The original German fast food. That's Germany in 10. From a warm pretzel to a snapping bratwurst, with a beer or two along the way. Now it's your turn. Have you eaten your way through a German Christmas market, and did we skip your favorite? Maltaschen fans, we see you! Tell us in the comments. If this made you hungry, leave a like, and subscribe for a new country every week. Bis bald! See you at the next market stall.