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Thursday • September 25, 1997
Lifestyles
Kris Hermes,
jwner and chef of
Schnitzel Haus in
downtown Bryan,
prepares a tradi
tional German
meal.
Photography by Brandon Bollom
I
Schnitzel Haus brings a touch of German culture to Bryan-College Station
hen some A&M
students think of
great German ex
ports, super model
.Claudia Schhiffer might come
omind, but the Schnitzel Haus
looking to broaden local
lews on German culture and
erman food.
Kris Hermer, owner and
hef of Schnitzel Haus, brings
lifetime of experience into
Her kitchen. Hermes has
ooked all over the United
Kates and the world.
She is a native of Frankfurt,
ermany, where her father ran
restaurant.
“When I was five, I would
11 up a stool to the stove and
tart cooking," Hermes said.
Cooking is in my blood and
ily. I knew it was all I want-
dto do."
At 14 years old, Hermes,start-
id working at a hotel in Frank-
art, and then went to culinary
drool in Austria. She then
poked in the United States for
year, before heading off to
fance to earn her master’s de-
ree in cooking.
Hermes ended up in Hous-
on working as a chef in a ho-
rvid at $ e ^ ut s he wanted to open her
)wn restuarant.
I "1 didn’t want to work all the
eeting oajloursfor as little money as I was
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Hermes said. “It was
equivalent to working for mini
mum wage.”
She quit and took some time
off in Europe to visit family and
friends. During the vacation,
she realized her goal was to
open a restaurant.
“I would cook all this food for
family and friends; then I would
get the grocery bill,” Hermes
said. “After a while, I thought I
better open up my own place
and make some money.”
Hermes opened a restaurant
in Brenham, which soon devel
oped a loyal following, includ
ing a large number A&M facul
ty members.
“I’ve been eating with Kris
since she was in Brenham, and
I’ve eaten all over the world,” said
Bart Childs, a computer science
professor. “She is the best chef
I’ve ever had cook for me.”
“My sister originally intro
duced me to Kris’ cooking in
Brenham, and it is the best
food I’ve ever had,” said Mary
Lindeman, a Texas A&M Foun
dation emlpoyee.
Eight years ago, Hermes de
cided to move the restaurant
to Bryan.
“Many people were asking
me to move it to a bigger
venue,” Hermes said.
She found the space she
needed in downtown Bryan.
Schnitzel Haus contains a bar, a
mammoth kitchen and a large
dining room decorated' with
bottles of German beer and pic
tures of Germany.
“Our busiest times are grad
uation, Valetine’s Day and other
important social functions,”
Hermes said.
Hermes said the restaurant
offers a nice meal for a family or
a couple, a statement with which
Lindeman said she agrees.
“People can always go to
Chili’s or McDonald’s, but they
rarely have an oppurtunity to
enjoy a high-quality, fresh-
cooked meal,” Lindeman said.
The food is the reason Her
mes is in the buisness, and she
revels in her culinary creativity.
“She can cook almost any
thing at anytime, with any in
gredients,” Lindeman said.
“And it is always excellent.”
Jenny Foster, a senior jour
nalism major, first visited
Schniztel Haus for Ring Dance.
“My boyfriend and I wanted
a quiet, nice place to eat, and
we’d heard good things about
it,” Foster said. “I asked for a
vegeterian dish, but they didn’t
have any. They made one up on
the spot and it was the best
thing I’ve ever had.”
The Schnitzel Haus’ menu is
not limited to traditional Ger
man cuisine.
“Kris has a wealth of cooking
experience, extending beyond
just German food,” Childs said,
“She has some of the best
seafood I’ve ever had.”
A meal for two at Schnitzel
Haus usually runs around $40.
Hermes said she realizes col
lege students are on a budget
and offers deals to help keep
them well fed.
Tuesday through Thursday
nights, Schnitzel Haus offers a
wide range of food discounted
to $7.95 for college students.
The portions are the regular
size, but the prices are not.
“College kids don’t have any
money,” Hermes said. “So I try
to make it easier for them to eat
well. The special is for students
only, not the professors — they
have money.”
The Schnitzel Haus might
not be in the everyday price
range of students, but the
restaurant offers an oppurtuni
ty for students to enjoy a nice
meal with family and friends.
“I would highly recommend
it to students looking for a great
place to eat and enjoy yourself,”
Foster said.
Schnitzel Haus offers stu
dents a chance to eat good
food in a quality atmosphere.
All they have to do make
reservations and bring an ap
petite the size of Deustchland.
Internet Job-Find:
Employers sought with
the click of a mouse
By Stephen Wells
Staff writer
I t can be frustrating for
students when they en
ter the real world and
find out that not every com
pany on the face of the
Earth is chucking job inter
views at them.
Enter the men of hous-
tonemployment.com, Jerry
Kowalchik, a former stu
dent of A&M, and Ryan
Murphey, chief executive
officer of houstonemploy-
ment.com. Their company
is an Internet version of a
placement service.
Kowalchik, the compa
ny's president, said the
niche existed in Houston’s
job market for a locally-
maintained database of
employers and employees.
“What started the idea
was the recognition of a
need for job seekers and
employers to find each
other,” Kowalchik said.
“For employers, it’s tough
financially to find the right
employees, to contact all
the job agencies and to
place ads in the papers.
For job seekers, it’s tough
because they don’t direct
ly contact employers. They
just answer ads in the pa
per or give a resume to a
placement service.”
For those job seekers,
www.houstonemploy-
ment.com makes life con
siderably easier.
“Job seekers interested
in employment can access
our resume template and
fill in the blanks,”
Kowalchik said. “They can
complete the template and
advertise themselves to all
of the employers who use
the service. At any given
time we’ve got about 1500
resumes on our page, and
about 17 percent get noti
fied for job interviews.”
Some of Houston’s
largest employers regularly
use the page and recruit
college students actively, so
job seekers need not be
wary of getting stuck with a
job they will not enjoy.
“At any given time,
there are probably 50 busi
nesses on the system, in
cluding Enron and Com
paq,” Kowalchik said.
“That’s the advantage of
using our site over a na
tional site, because a na
tional service will usually
only offer technical jobs.
We have ads for managers,
machinists, even hairstyl
ists,” Kowalchik said.
U Right now,
the joh
market in Houston
is extremely good.”
Jerry Kowalchik
President of
houstonemployment.com
Internet services like this
one ar e a boon to students,
eliminating much of the
stress of leaving the com
fortable cocoon of college
life and jumping feet first
into the daily grind. Being
easy to use and successful
makes these sites popular
for job seekers.
“We’ve had over a mil
lion hits on our Website in
the past six months, but
we were just starting out,”
Kowalchik said. “Now, we
average about 300,000
hits per month. Every day,
we probably get 100 peo
ple who access our site
from the Texas A&M
Home Page, because
there's a link there under
Career Opportunities.”
The job market for edu
cated or skilled workers in
Houston is expanding, and
a lot of the companies look
to the Web for employees.
“Right now, the job mar
ket in Houston is extremely
good,” Kowalchik said. “As
far as frequency of job of
fers, there’s really a lot of
computer engineering jobs
out there.”
Kowalchik and Mur
phey said the greatest
benefit is the local nature
of the Website.
“One of the most
uniques things about our
Website is that we target a
local area even though we
are Internet based,” Mur
phey said. “We only adver
tise local jobs. People com
ing from A&M don’t want to
work in Green Bay. We con
centrate on where people
want to work, and we have
Internet links to almost
every major campus in
Texas. ”
So, students do not need
to suffer from the machina
tions of the real world and
the cruel sport job hunting
has become. Instead of
pounding pavement and
becoming numb to rejec
tion, Internet placement
services offer convenience
and mass appeal.
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