Trying New Restaurants: Teske's Germania

Continuing with our quasi-New Year resolution to explore more restaurants in the area we recently tried Teske's Germania. It's a German restaurant and pub in downtown San Jose. Like many "new" restaurants we're trying it's not really new; it's been there for at least umpteen years. It's only new to us.

I've been meaning to try Teske's for years. It's just never been that high on my priority list. What spurred me to try it finally— aside from that quasi-New Year resolution I mentioned— was a friend inviting us for dinner at Mezcal several weeks ago. When I mapped directions to Mezcal, Teske's appeared on the map a few blocks away. Both restaurants are in downtown San Jose.

From the outside you can barely tell what Teske's is. It's in a fairly anonymous low-rise building on a quiet-ish edge of the core downtown district. The only marker of what's inside is an old-style wooden sign hanging over the door. Once inside, though, it's a different matter. Right away you know you're someplace different. The doors open into a darkly paneled room, cramped in a cozy way, with an old-style bar near the door you have to sidle past to get to the host's stand to ask for a table.

While the bar just inside the door might be as far as some patrons venture, that's only a tiny fraction of the restaurant's space. There are two dining rooms with at least a couple dozen tables between them, and there's also a full menu of German entrees. I emphasize entrees as it's not just Germanic finger-food like sausage appetizers and pretzels but plenty of baked and sauteed dishes with beef, chicken, pork, and fish. Hawk ordered beef paprika goulash. I thought I might try the wienerschnitzel but then got interested in one of the chef's specials, sauteed beef in a white wine sauce. Friends of ours we met at the restaurant ordered a variety of other things including, yes, sausages and pretzels.

Then there's the beer. I did mention beer, right? 😅🍺😋 Teske's has a good selection of German beer, both on tap and in bottles, including some brands I don't think I've seen carried at Total Wine. I mention them as a point of comparison because they stock several dozen German beer brands. Another local restaurant that bills itself as a German biergarten only has half Teske's selection. Along with a sausage-and-pretzels-heavy menu. 🤣

On the whole, the food was good but not great. Did we enjoy it? Yes. Would we go back? No. Except for maybe a special occasion when we decide we really want German food and are willing to venture to downtown SJ for it. ...And even then, we'd likely check first for another German restaurant we haven't been to yet.

Waterfalls Galore: Cataract Falls Trail, part 2

On the Cataract Falls trail on the flank of Mt. Tam you start out seeing a small falls, then another. But don't stop there; that's only the start of it! The trail is replete with falls. You don't even have to look hard to find them. They're right in front of you.



With our visit this past Sunday we've hiked this trail I think 4 times now, maybe 5. It's never failed to please.



Our last visit was 3 years ago, in Jan 2020, right before the pandemic shut things down for a while. We also visited in 2015.

One thing that's interesting in looking back over the pictures I made on previous visits versus the pictures here is that the color tonality is different. I attribute that to the sunlight. The two previous visits I blogged were on days with a heavy overcast. That evened out the light and made it easy to capture pale green tones.



On this trip there was strong sunlight above the trees. As it filtered down through the canopy it created harsher contrast between light and shadow and gave a bluer cast to the water and wet rocks. I've adjusted for the color tone and light balance with my camera and in postprocessing. It's not possible to make the pictures look the same. After all, photography is not about capturing the thing that's there but rather the light that reflects off it.



We turned around after less than a mile and several hundred feet of ascent. The trail goes farther, but we know from past trips that the best sights are in the lower parts of the canyon. We're ensuring we have time and energy for another hike— no, make that two more hikes. In beauty we walk.

Stay tuned for more!

Update: more waterfalls in part 2!