Ems
Ems has a restaurant in the Kursaal, near which the band plays in the evening, said to be fairly good; and there is a restaurant close to the Baderlei, the cliff of rock crowned by a tower, and another on the summit of the Malberg, the hill up which the wire-rope railway runs; but I have only meagre information as to whether the food obtainable at them is good, bad, or indifferent.
Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle)
Henrion's Grand Hotel is the favourite dining-place of the Anglo-Saxon colony in Aachen. M. Intra, the proprietor, lays himself out to attract the English. The German civil servants and the doctors have a club-table at which they dine, and they exact fines from the members of their club for drinking wine which costs more than a certain price, etc., etc., these fines being collected in a box and saved until they make a sum large enough to pay for a special dinner. Every member of this club is required to leave in his will a money legacy to the club to be expended in wine drunk to his memory. There are two table-d'hôte meals at 1.30 and at 7 p.m. At the first the dishes are cooked according to the German cuisine, at the second according to the French. Suppers are served in the restaurant at any hour.
Lennertz's restaurant and oyster-saloon in the Klostergasse is a curious, low-ceilinged, old-fashioned house which, before Henrion's came into favour, had most of the British patronage. Its cooking is excellent, and the German Hausfraus used to be sent to Lennertz's to study for their noble calling. The carte de jour has not many dishes on it. Everything has to be ordered à la carte, though the prices are reasonable, and it is possible to make a bargain that a dinner shall be given for a fixed price. The Omelettes Soufflées are a speciality of the house. The fish used at Lennertz's comes from Ostend, and the Dutch oysters are excellent.
A restaurant opposite the theatre has good cookery but is expensive.
Henry, who presides over the Anglo-American bar in the Kaiser Passage, is an excellent cook and turns out wonderful dishes with the aid of a chafing-dish. He learned his cookery at the Waldorf, and at the Grand, in Paris. His partner, Charlie, is of the Café de Paris, Monte Carlo.
Another American bar where food is obtainable is in the Grand Monarque Hotel.
The Alt-Bayern in Wirischsbongardstrasse is the beer-house which is most to be recommended; and the Germania, in Friedrich-Williamplatz, is celebrated for its coffee.