I Ate My Way around the Columbus Oktoberfest

Husband and I spent last weekend in Germany.

Actually, it was sorta Germany.  Husband and I spent an afternoon at the Columbus Oktoberfest eating lots and lots of fried food.

From Germany.

Well, from local German themed restaurants. That explains the fried curly potato turned nacho thing they called German nachos. 

Hang on to your cholesterol meds we’re going in!

Weinerschnitzle sandwich

With a side of sauerkraut balls

Pierogis!

  

The deep fried Ruben on a stick seems appropriate since the event is at the state fairgrounds. The state fair loves their crazy fried food on a stick.

After the fried food fest, which I knew my stomach would remind me about later, why not kill the diet with a little dessert?

Gorgeous funnel cakes!

Thank you Germany for funnel cakes

Schmidt’s famous creampuffs the size of a softball!

 This is a two person cream puff

 We washed it down with a demi tasse of dark German beer

After drinking one of these (over the course of the entire afternoon) you won’t notice the off key singer in the bands or that the prices are three times higher than Disneyland. Well, not as much.

This means while we had fun, Husband and I thought Columbus Oktoberfest is overpriced and overrated. You to buy individual tickets at $1 each for all food and drink purchases to cleverly disguise that an 8 ticket order of chicken really cost $8.00 a serving or the beers we drank (with the souvenir mug) actually cost $15.00 a mug.

I understand once you go to an amusement park, festival, or fair, everything automatically costs more money because they have you. I get it. I grew up in a tourist area and had summer jobs at more than my fair share of amusement parks. The difference is when I go to anywhere else; they don’t try to fake me out and try to  hide the high cost of the stuff I’m going to buy. If you are going to charge $6.00 a Schnitzel fine. Do not disguise it as six tickets to fake people out. Be honest and charge $6.00.

Husband and I could have had dinner at any of the restaurants in attendance for less money and bought more food (and made TWO VISITS!) than we did at Oktoberfest. We spent over $60 on two beers, a Weinerschnitzle sandwich, an order of sauerkraut balls, the Ruben, and a cream puff. 

Add to that the off pitch singers in the bands of varying quality make us feel Columbus Oktoberfest is more flash than substance.  It was disappointing.

My advice? Have dinner at Schmidt's instead. It’s just as tasty, you’ll hear better music, and it is a much better return on investment.

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