The Historic Sausage Kitchen of Regensburg (Wurstküche) is notable as perhaps the oldest continuously open public restaurant in the world. In 1135 a building was erected as the construction office for the Regensburg stone bridge. When the bridge was finished in 1146 AD, the building became a restaurant named Garkueche auf dem Kranchen ('cookshop near the crane') as it was situated near the then river port. Dockers, sailors and the staff of the nearby St. Peter cathedral workshop were the regulars for the centuries to come. The present building at this location dates from the 17th century, but archaeological evidence has confirmed the existence of a previous building from the 12th century with about the same dimensions.
Until ca. AD 1800, the specialty was boiled meat, but when the family who currently own the restaurant took over in 1806, charcoal grilled sausages were introduced as the main dish offered. The kitchen still operates today and serves 6,000 sausages to guests daily.
References:The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.