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Authentically Austrian at Fort Myers restaurant

  • The Austrian-German Restaurant opened in Fort Myers in 2008.
  • Owners Helmut and Helga Heiss also own a restaurant in Austria.
  • A large portion of the menu is devoted to schnitzels, and the cuisine is Austrian.

Austria is almost 9,000 miles from Australia. Two very different countries on two very different continents.

But that didn't stop diners from a mess of confusion when Helmet and Helga Heiss opened the Austrian-German Restaurant in 2008. The German part of the name was added to clarify that the cuisine was most definitely not Australian. "We have no kangaroos," Helmut joked.

Austrian-German Restaurant in Fort Myers serves authentic Austrian cuisine.

The restaurant's owners are from Austria; Helmut is from Innsbruck and his wife is from Vienna. They own a restaurant in Austria, Neubaushenke, which serves almost the same items as their Fort Myers restaurant. When Helmut sold his company, the couple decided to make the move to Southwest Florida where they already owned a home. But there was no resting, relaxing and strolling beaches planned for their retirement..

"If you have no work in your life, you lose your life," Helmut said. "A restaurant is a lot of work but the contact with people is what we like."

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The menu is exclusively Austrian. "Ninety percent of our tourists in Austria are from Germany," Helmut explained. "They come there to eat." He says this is due to the use of very fresh ingredients and authentic family recipes. "For example, when you taste my cauliflower soup, you taste the vegetable itself. There is no preservative."

An entire page of the menu is devoted to schnitzel, cuts of pork or veal pounded thin, then fried to a golden crisp. "Here it is a niche, and people like that very much," Helmut explained. Traditional schnitzels like Hungarian schnitzel and hunter schnitzel appear next to more inventive schnitzels like French brie schnitzel, where the schnitzel is folded around brie and walnuts like a meat omelet.

Shnitzel is a specialty at the Austrian-German Restaurant in Fort Myers.

"Our plates are full," Helmut says, holding up an over-sized plate. "This is our secret," Helmut said. "The freshness, the food. This is why people come."

Goulash and sauerbraten also appear on the dinner menu alongside a few healthier options, like a fitness plate that has chicken as the protein. For special occasions, Helmut offers suckling pig, goose, duck and wild boar. The goose is marinated, then roasted in an oven and served with red cabbage and dumplings.

A biergarten (beer garden) wraps around the outside of the restaurant under an awning and has its own menu. Weisswurst, bratwurst and pork knuckles are offered as savory dishes to enjoy with German beer or Austrian wine.

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Many of the regulars are Americans who served overseas, according to Helmut. "Not the tourists. They come one time and then they leave." He also has a lot of German residents from Cape Coral who make the drive over the bridge.

Owner Helmut Heiss holds a pan of apple strudel at Austrian-German Restaurant in Fort Myers.

Dessert options include apple strudel, bienenstich (bee sting cake), black forest cake and kaiserschmarrn (emperors pancake), a thin, lightly sweet pancake with raisins flambeed tableside, topped with plum relish or applesauce. The apple strudel is made from a family recipe and is something Helmut says the restaurant has become known for.

The menu changes seasonally, and Helmut also takes requests from diners who are missing something from home. Most people find the restaurant through word of mouth, and, after a successful eight years, Helmut is looking forward to many more years in Royal Palm Square.

Bratwurst, sauerkraut, and potatoes from Austrian-German Restaurant in Fort Myers.

Austrian-German Restaurant is located at 1400 Colonial Blvd. inside Royal Palm Square in Fort Myers. Hours are 4:30-9 p.m. Monday-Saturday. Lunch returns Sept. 6 and will be offered Tuesday-Friday 11:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m. For reservations and more information, call 936-8118 and visit

Off the Eaten Path tells the stories behind locally owned restaurants throughout Southwest Florida. Connect with this reporter: @AnneKathrynReed (Twitter)