(The Brooklyn location of this venue is closed.) On a boisterous stretch of the Lower Haight, the subtlety of my first Rosamunde sausage was lost on me.
Even isolated from grilled onions and hot and sweet peppers, the namesake ingredients in duck-and-fig sausage (above, $5.50 at the time) were difficult to detect. Maybe the closeness of the San Francisco weather was partly responsible; then, too, this was the tail end of a weeklong eating excursion. Short on time, I could only imagine that a spicy sausage — say, the andouille, the merguez, or the nuernberger brat — toted next door to the Toronado and washed down with a pint, would be a beautiful match.
Rosamunde's newer Williamsburg venue is outfitted with two dozen beer taps of its own, as well as a showcase for nearly as many housemade sausages. Platters (about $15 each) typically feature two pair, with trimmings. Compared with a fat weisswurst, whose veal was inflected by onion and leek, and twin rabbit sausages, a special prepared with brandy and, I believe, dried apple, on my first visit the more assertively seasoned varieties still got the nod. My dining buddy favored fresh lamb sausages with fennel and sun-dried tomatoes; I preferred wild boar with apples, cranberries, and some spice I didn't trouble to pin down.
Almost totally hidden in the platter at bottom by green salad with walnuts and blue cheese, rounds of bread, and molasses-heavy German bean salad is the best of the fixings. Rosamunde's sauerkraut, carefully rinsed and drained to remove most all of the vinegariness, added the flavors of bay leaves and apple juice. There was a prominent, welcome dose of caraway, too.
Rosamunde Sausage Grill
285 Bedford Ave. (Grand-South 1st Sts.), Williamsburg, Brooklyn
718-388-2170
Also at 545 Haight St. (Fillmore-Steiner Sts.), San Francisco, and elsewhere in the Bay Area
415-437-6851
www.RosamundeSausageGrill.com