>>> We're here at the world-famous Schmidt restaurant in German Village in Columbus, Ohio.

I'm here with Matt Smith, the brand ambassador and part-owner of Schmidts Restaurant.

Matt, good to see you.

>>> Good to see you, too, George.

>>> Listen, I want to start out by talking about this is a wonderful place.

One of the long-term plays here in Columbus.

Let's talk about a little bit about the history.

>>> Yeah, yeah.

>>> Of Schmidts.

Give me a little bit about the history of how it started.

>>> Well, that's actually one of the things I'm most proud about of our businesses, our history, because I'm actually fifth generation and we started back in 1886 as a packing house, actually right around the corner from the restaurant right now.

1960s the big packing houses came into the city and kicked out the smaller mom and pop packing houses.

But my grandpa at the time was smart enough to know that, hey, the community still wants our food.

How are we going to do this?

So what he did was the restaurant that we're sitting in right now used to be the livery stable.

And with that, it's where we keep all our horses and carriages that would deliver all the products throughout the city.

So in 1967, this officially became Schmidt's restaurant.

And no longer were we the packing house.

>>> Okay.

Okay.

So you got Ben Smith's.

You don't just get a good meal like I'm enjoying right now.

You don't just get that.

You get the whole experience.

>>> The whole experience.

>>> The whole German experience.

How does that happen?

>>> You can feel this.

You can see the history.

We have our servers in Dirndl and Lederhosen.

So you get that feel.

We have the Oompah bands playing.

My grandpa's paintings are all around this restaurant.

It's really cool, and it makes me very proud.

>>> You get all German all the time when you come to Schmidt's food.

So, Matt, tell me a little bit about what we have here.

>>> Your dish is one of my favorites and one of the most popular we have at the restaurant.

It's called our Old World Sausage Samplers on a bed of sauerkraut that has little hunks of pork in it.

We put four different types of our sausages.

We have our famous spicy, smoked Bahama mamas.

It also comes with a mild Bahama mama, which doesn't have as much as a kick as the spicy ones and has our pure pork bratwurst.

And then one of my favorites, and I think one of most underrated is the garlic, not worst.

It also comes with that German potato salad.

You know, that warm vinegar base potato salad.

It's not like the American version that most people are used to, which I think is way better than also comes with our chunky apple sauce and then a toasted New England style split top bun.

>>> Very good.

>>> In front of me.

Again, one of my favorite dishes personally is our Wienerschnitzel.

So that is two pieces of veal pounded then and Brendan flash fried.

I have our red cabbage, which people love.

Secret recipe.

But we do cook it with apples.

>>> Okay.

>>> Very good.

And then it comes with a mushroom gravy that has a little bit of vodka in it.

>>> So ok. >>> It has a little kick to it.

>>> Okay.

>>> So I'm sitting here and I'm looking at I'm a peripheral vision.

>>> The creme puff.

>>> The cream puff and there's some history behind those.

How they made.

>>> Our world famous half-pound jumbo cream puffs are very popular everywhere.

And we take them everywhere we go, whether it be on the food trucks, fairs and festivals.

Our most famous is vanilla.

That's the biggest seller.

People just come in droves and get it.

We also always have at the restaurant the peanut butter fudge and the chocolate.

Now, something really fun that we do is we do collaborations with other family businesses around Columbus and Ohio, where we do special flavors.

Buckeye Donuts.

We do an apple fritter.

We do something with Graeters from Cincinnati, and we do a black raspberry cream puff, which is extremely popular.

And now that we have two food trucks in Cincinnati, it's going to be even more popular.

We also work with Anthony Thomas Chocolate Factory and Stauff's coffee.

We make a staff coffee cream buffet.

T. >>> His is amazing.

So you have your customers, I assume, are some returning customers and their children and their children?

>>> Yes.

>>> What do we say to the people who are new to the city?

Come on down to German village.

>>> If you're coming to German Village, I think you should absolutely come to Schmdt's.

You know, because we have such history here.

It's just such a beautiful area.

You can spend a whole day and it's almost like you're on a mini vacation.

>>> Now, there was a bad time when there was a fire.

How did you all recover?

>>> So that's something that we also pride ourselves in.

You know, any time there's any kind of situation or problem.

You know, it's rising.

I've seen how we can make ourselves better, get through it, whether it be that fire that happened in 1983, it started upstairs in our banquet house burnt down.

But guess what?

My grandpa the next day had a big tent on the parking lot serving food, and the community came up and was paying money and just helping us support the business.

Even before that, during the Great Depression, while we had the packing house, my great-grandpa would be handing out pigs feet to the neighbors so they could make soups and stews and have something to put in their bellies during a hard time.

And we all remember COVID, how horrible those times were.

But the good thing about Schmidt's, we already had established the food trucks, so we were out in different neighborhoods and people felt comfortable going up to the food truck when they didn't feel comfortable going in the restaurant.

We already had established our shipping that we would ship our product all over America so you didn't have to go out.

You could just have it delivered to you.

That saved us.

>>> Yeah.

So just kind of being innovative in your thinking.

>>> Yes.

>>> In desperate times.

>>> Absolutely.