Alt Heidelberg closes, but the cooking will continue

Bad news: Marliese Hall recently closed Alt Heidelberg, the German restaurant she opened  in the Fern Hill neighborhood in the fall of 2008.

Good news: Her cooking will continue.

Hall and Sharon Swartz, owner of T-4-2 etc. in Puyallup, will team up to offer a German themed dinner at T-4-2 on Feb. 19. T-4-2  is a downtown Puyallup tea room and British grocery (or, as Swartz cheekily calls it “the British aisle.”)

“We’d like to do the dinners more than once a month, but we’ll start with this one,” said Swartz.  The two women intersected many years ago through restaurants at Freighthouse Square. Hall owned the Freight Hause German Restaurant and Deli, the precursor to Alt Heidelberg. Swartz worked at McGregor’s Scottish Tea Room in Freighthouse.

Swartz opened T-4-2 in 2006, but relocated it to another location in downtown Puyallup in 2009.

The dinner on Feb. 19 will be an ode to German eating (read: heavy on carbs and proteins. Wear your big pants). Among the menu items will be Hall's specialties: schnitzel, a sausage combo with bratwurst, goulash, sauerbraten, rouladen. For sides, bring on the German potato salad, red cabbage and homemade spatzle. For dessert? Hall’s Black Forest chocolate cake.

If you’ve never eaten Hall’s food, it best can be described as amped up German eats (think brats and schnitzel with homey twists). I wrote about Alt Heidelberg in December 2008. Here’s a link to that review. Hall's restaurant was cozy, comfortable and the food was honest-to-goodness delicious. I remember watching from the small dining room on one of my visits. The restaurant was little more than five tables, plus an open kitchen where everything was on display. She was pressing spatzle dough into a hand press, and long curls of noodles escaped the other end. She boiled the noodles, drained them, and then topped them with a generous river of thick, rich, beefy gravy. And, I'm pretty sure she made all the food while she was puttering around the kitchen in her slippers. Or at least they looked like supremely comfortable fuzzy shoes. I'll miss her restaurant.

German Dinner featuring Marliese Hall at T-4-2 etc

When: 4-9 p.m. Feb. 19

Where: 105 S. Meridian, Puyallup

Call: 253-445-8454. Reservations required.

Cost: Entrees in the $12 range. Call for details and the menu.

Info: www.t42etc.com

This story was originally published February 8, 2010 at 9:50 AM with the headline "Alt Heidelberg closes, but the cooking will continue."