family and colleagues have always told me I eat a lot Some of them have gone so far as to accuse me of having a hollow leg a few of my German friends told me about XXL Restaurant Waldgeist Hofheim and its monstrous portions of food that would put most American eateries to shame I never had the opportunity to visit before leaving Germany so when an old Army friend called me up for our first dinner together since moving back recently About 20 minutes from Wiesbaden and tucked away in a wooded area with its large wooden beams and rustic decor It was surprisingly busy for a Monday night My friend and I were promptly seated in a cozy booth we immediately jumped to the XXXXXL section We both laughed at options ranging from colossal hamburgers to steak that topped the scale at over two and a half pounds The massive portions didn’t stop with food; most of the beverages were offered in sizes up to 2 liters That’s nearly a six pack of 12-ounce cans for you folks that don’t drink in metric My friend ordered the XXXXXL hamburger and a 1-liter drink I was tempted by the 600-gram currywurst but felt it wasn’t quite big enough for the night’s festivities and opted for the kilogram (2.2-pound) schnitzel with peppercorn cream sauce and fries we couldn’t stop laughing as our waitress plopped down my mug of cola on top of three normal-sized coasters It dwarfed my friend’s large drink and I struggled to lift the mug with one hand for a toast As we gawked at the foot-wide burger and the behemoth slabs of breaded pork we began to think our food would be more gimmick than quality Our skepticism melted away at the first bite The burger was well-seasoned and full of flavor Though my friend said the burger patty was slightly dry he complimented the proportional condiments and toppings that very easily included an entire sliced tomato was crispy on the outside and delightfully tender and moist on the inside from start to finish as I powered through the gastronomic battle The fries certainly played second fiddle to the schnitzel but were perfectly crispy on the outside My only complaint was that there wasn’t nearly enough sauce to accompany the meat but you can keep the sauce flowing for an additional few euros per bowl I took about a half-pound of meat and fries home — perhaps the 2 liters of diet cola was enough spectacle for the night normally portioned slice of mandarin cheesecake for dessert while we reflected on a story told by our server earlier that evening an American named Randy took on the challenge of the Koenigsplatte He set a new restaurant record by downing 3 kilograms (6.5 pounds) of schnitzel with fries I still can’t conjure a mental image of what a mountain of meat that size possibly looked like breaking the current record will earn you a free 67-euro meal Waldgeist also offers normal human sizes of meals for guests who want a traditional dining experience My waistline certainly can’t afford regular XXXXXL visits to Waldgeist but I would gladly return for an office dinner or celebration with friends Preliminary analysis indicates that this was a random fireball and not associated with any known meteor shower Due to the lack of sound associated with this fireball it is believed that this object completely disintegrated while still high in the atmosphere and that no meteorites survived all the way to the ground Bottom line: A fireball lit up the skies over Germany last night. If you witnessed this fireball the IMO invites you to fill out a fireball report as soon as possible We invite you to visit our campaign page to discover why we need your contributions now more than ever to preview an illustration from Guy Ottewell’s great book that we're helping finalize and to learn more about EarthSky’s history “Things are always so much more peaceful when looking up.” We couldn’t agree more we apologize for the popup and greatly appreciate your support You are using an outdated browser. Please upgrade your browser or activate Google Chrome Frame to improve your experience The move follows failed efforts at Intersolar to find an investor or buyer The manufacturer of micro inverters filed for insolvency right at the end of the trade fair PowerStick inverters in a module frame: The company did not achieve expected sales figures From pv magazine Germany Taking part as an exhibitor at the Intersolar Europe trade fair last week at the start of the The smarter E Europe industry event in Munich last week Solarnative had accelerated the search for a financier with an unusually open statement: They were presenting themselves “on a silver platter” at the trade fair in view of the fact that “all potential interested parties or investors are more or less directly on site.” the company then announced briefly and succinctly that the management had decided to file an application for the opening of insolvency proceedings “Even though the company has received fundamentally positive feedback from potential investors,” it said in justification “it is not possible to implement new financing within the statutory deadlines This marks the provisional end of the company based in Kriftel near Frankfurt am Main which was founded in 2019 and set up a production facility for its microinverters in Hofheim am Taunus Solarnative moved into the premises in September 2022 and the small factory was officially opened in May last year it would have been able to produce up to 100,000 inverters per month at full capacity in three-shift operation; it planned additional production lines and a total capacity of 3 million units per year Despite the extremely compact PowerStick microinverter which was intended for installation in module frames this would have corresponded to a total capacity of around 1 GW per year developed by company CTO Henk Oldenkamp over decades of work and awarded the Innovation Prize at the Photovoltaic Symposium in Bad Staffelstein in 2017 offers great advantages in terms of compactness and temperature management and the IntelliGate communication module also provides a technically advanced system for connecting up to 13 inverters Additional peripheral devices expanded the range the company failed to achieve the expected sales figures; even the actual production capacity of 50,000 units per year led to production exceeding achievable sales the company issued a bond for 1.6 million euros “to finance further growth,” but this did not bring the hoped-for success consisting of Oldenkamp and his partner Julian Mattheis the total number of employees affected is currently around 130 More articles from Jochen Siemer Please be mindful of our community standards and website in this browser for the next time I comment Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value" By submitting this form you agree to pv magazine using your data for the purposes of publishing your comment Your personal data will only be disclosed or otherwise transmitted to third parties for the purposes of spam filtering or if this is necessary for technical maintenance of the website Any other transfer to third parties will not take place unless this is justified on the basis of applicable data protection regulations or if pv magazine is legally obliged to do so You may revoke this consent at any time with effect for the future in which case your personal data will be deleted immediately your data will be deleted if pv magazine has processed your request or the purpose of data storage is fulfilled Further information on data privacy can be found in our Data Protection Policy Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_2" ).setAttribute( "value" This website uses cookies to anonymously count visitor numbers. 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