Christmas markets are renowned for being fun places to eat, drink and be merry, and one of the most popular Christmassy food items is sold there but when Danielle Kate Wroe tried it, she wasn’t pleased
Browsing Christmas markets is such a fun activity to do with family and friends. There are so many different festive offerings to feast on, plenty of tipples to drink, and trinkets galore to buy, so you can tick off all your different pals from your gift-giving list. However, something I’ve never personally tried from a Christmas market is a bratwurst sausage.
For someone who does eat meat, I tend to stick to just chicken as much as possible, but I’ve always been a little bit curious about why people seem to love these German sausages so much. I even noticed they had a 20-inch bratwurst, but I thought that was a little ambitious; however, for my first time.
So, off I went to the bratwurst stall near the Bull Ring shopping centre in Birmingham, secretly wishing I was going into the bar for a nice glass of prosecco instead.
It was chucking it down, I was freezing, and I was probably about to make my day even worse by trying a bratwurst.
On the board, there were bratwursts and currywursts, and truthfully, I hadn’t a clue what the difference was.
And when the man asked me whether I wanted a light or dark sausage, I was baffled. Panicked, I chose the dark one, as I thought that was what I’d seen more people eating, and really hoped it would be tastier.
I went to put some ketchup on it, praying that the sweet, sugary sauce would perhaps drown out the flavour of what I kind of knew was coming. However, I was really disappointed – as I knew I would be.
It tasted like a really bad version of a hot dog. Like a girthier, less yummy hot dog. I almost expected it to have some Christmassy spice-vibe, but no.
And unnervingly, it was majorly pink inside, which was a bit off-putting for me as well.
Traditionally, a bratwurst is supposed to have spices like nutmeg and marjoram, but I couldn’t taste anything like that. It was unseasoned, and the bun felt a bit stale as well.
I feel as though this might not have been the best first experience, and perhaps I need to try a bratwurst from somewhere else to get a true sense of what it’s like.
My friends who have been to Germany and had bratwurst say it’s actually delicious, so I’ll have to hang on to hope that one day I might try a German sausage I like.
I just hope that the next one I try, I don’t have to pay £6.50 for, and then awkwardly throw it in the bin in front of other people who are devouring (and clearly enjoying) their sausage.
