Das Dutchman Essenhaus, a Real Amish Eating Place in Middlebury, Indiana

Das Dutchman Essenhaus- That really means Amishmen Eating Place. Just so's you know.

Hubby and I were driving east on St. Rd 20 going towards Ohio. We were taking the "scenic route". Hubby said he wanted to "site see", which really means, "look for a good restaurant". Well, just before we drove through Middlebury, Indiana we were rounding a big curve and Hubby slams on the brakes and whips our big ole' 40 ft. diesel pusher motor home into a huge parking lot. He does that a lot.

"This looks interesting," says the King of understatement.

"This" is huge barn-like structure with several large white buildings set in a farm-like park. With plenty of room in the parking lot we parked the "M-T Nest" and started exploring. As we walked the paths between the inn and the gift shops and other interesting places we watched the ducks in a pond and admired the flowers. I wanted to go into each quaint shop but the man said "food first, shop later." Humph!

So we went back to the restaurant. There are several entrances, the front door must be for the tourists. We noticed people with Indiana license plates going around back so we followed them. Whoa, good thing we did. We found the bakery. Oh boy, not just any bakery, this one had rows and shelves of pies, and piles of sweet roles. Come to find out Das Essenhaus is known locally for pies and donuts. They had two of my very favorites, Rhubarb Cream and Peanut Butter.

Hubby tried to say, "eat first shop later". Yeah, like those pies would still be there when we finished eating lunch. I bought the pies and took them out to the refrigerator in the motor home.

Now, Hubby likes sushi and fancy foreign foods. He's not afraid to try new things but when he wants to chow down he likes his mashed potatoes with gravy and noodles, roast beef and maybe some corn to smoosh around in there. Oh and maybe a chicken leg if it's fried right. Well, he found his hog heaven.

This place serves their meals off the menu or "family style". You know what that means? First, fresh, warm loaves of white and wheat bread to slice and spread with apple butter and peanut butter/marshmallow cream. And a huge tray set by our table with roast beef, mashed potatoes, gravy, corn, dressing, noodles and chicken. When we finished the first plate of roast beef, which was cooked so tender it fell apart when I jabbed it with my fork, another plate came out. We were expected to enjoy ourselves by having seconds. And in Hubby's case thirds of taters and gravy and chicken legs. ( By the time we got around to desert he was "fat, happy, and stupid" as our friend Steve says.)

There were over 15 different pies on the menu plus apple dumplings with cream and puddings. Knowing I had my favorites safely stored in the rv and having had only two helpings of everything I decided to order a small piece of raspberry pie. Yeah, like any piece of Amish pie would be small. It was huge with flaky crust and piled high with a creamy filling smothered in raspberry sauce. It was a vacation to wonderland for my mouth.

After we left the restaurant, Hubby in a food induced euphoria, we checked out all the gift areas down the hall. We found dolls, animals, dishes, candles, soaps, creams, linens, games, beautiful pictures and stuff. We resisted everything until we came to the bakery gift shop. We loaded up with chicken noodle base in a jar, several bags of homemade dry noodles, an Amish cookbook, three new flavors of tea, and a lemon zester gadget. Uh huh and the rhubarb pies were all gone, ha, ha.

After dropping the packages off in the rv we toured the Inn, a modern bed and breakfast ,and found a one room school house tucked in the rafters. Way cool. We found a Daddy Haus gift shop with quilts and related items to make cozy bedrooms and relaxing living rooms. Very tempting except living full time in a motor home there's no where to put stuff. I'm not ready to redecorate yet.But it's fun to look. We spent so much time poking around here and there, watching ducks and tourists that Hubby wondered if we could just hang around another half hour and have supper.

"Not a chance, chubby. get in the motor home, We'll drive a ways and stop for a piece of pie and a cup of tea." I said cheerfully. And my man agreed. But suggested we stop off on our way back another time.

And off we went to Bass Island and Put-In-Bay over by Sandusky, Ohio.