The Milk Automat / Der Milch-Automat

A few weeks ago I noticed this large sign had appeared along the side of Hellbrunner Allee. It's not far from Schloss Hellbrunn in a remote section of the alley that is bordered by farm fields on both sides. The arrow points across the fields towards a beautiful pinky farm house. Not exactly the highest of quality in terms of marketing attempts, the sign caught my eye. The idea of a machine dispensing milk around the clock in the middle of nowhere for the bargain price of 70 Euro Cents (about $1.00) per liter struck me as funny. I was intrigued and knew we would have to investigate some time soon.

Today we stopped by the Milk Automat machine on our way back from Hellbrunn park. Sure enough, as you pedal up the the farmhouse, you find a wooden door built into the side of the building which is clearly marked Milch Automat. Behind the door is a tall metal milk machine with a coin drop on the top and a rubber tube near the bottom. You need to bring your own bottle (which, alas, we had failed to do), but once you insert your 70 cents and put your bottle under the tube, the machine promptly fills up your bottle with a liter of cold fresh milk - whenever you want it, day or night.

And how fresh is the milk you wonder? Very. The dark doorway you can see to the right of the wooden Milch Automat door takes you straight to this: