I believe every real german my age knows the clay pot “Römertopf” from the seventies and early eighties – if not from his Mom, then at least from his Grandma. It was very widespread then and everyone I know can remember that thing. Nowadays it became somewhat forgotten compared to it’s former popularity, but it’s still present enough that I got one for a reasonable price these days and of course had to give it a try.
I read about this in my doctor’s waiting room in – I shit you not – a women’s magazine. Mediterranean/French style easy homemade butter! They adressed several different seasonings and further uses in the article, but the basic procedure is always the same. All you need is a food processor and half a liter of heavy cream (get the real enchilada: 30% fat). After having my TBE shot, I knew what I had to do…
… the traditional german way – or not?
Sauerkraut is so german it even gave us our name 🙂 , it’s very widespread in the nation, very regionally diverse and versatile. It is part of the traditional german cuisine, mostly eaten as a side dish but also as a full meal when made with the appropriate ingredients. It’ very healthy – for example for it’s contents of vitamin C which even increases when cooked.
There’s what feels like a gazillion ways of preparing sauerkraut in germany alone (and I bet there are even more recipes all over the world). To condense these down to some kind of a standard formula that everything else can be built upon, here’s my way. BTW: We’re talking fresh and unprocessed Sauerkraut here, not the pre-cooked, canned version from the supermarket.
(This recipe is so far authentically italian, as an italian person that I know confirmed to me.)
1/2 cube fresh yeast
1/2 tsp. sugar
500 g flour (ideally, italian “Tipo 00”, alternatively all purpose flour)
4 tbsp. olive oil
1 tsp. salt
300 ml lukewarm water
Now that the Skooma from august has abundantly matured, we did the taste test:
It has a luscious golden golden color and it smells amazing. Made from mostly vodka, apricots and sugar, it is very sweet, a fruity liqueur with the apricots clearly tasteable. I think this is best sipped in small portions and only one glass after dinner. What really stands out is the cardamom aroma – unusual and very delicious.
9/10 would do it again with a little less sugar.
This miso spaghetti recipe is both easy and delicious. Give it a try!
Muaaaahhhh… delicious! I could literally bathe in that stuff 😀 . As with most slow cooker dishes, this is a very low stress and very high reward endeavour. The image looks shit but the meal was great. Here’s how:
Ingredients (for 2):
2 large beef shanks
2 cups beef broth
4 garlic cloves, sliced
1 onion, sliced
1 tsp. garlic powder
1 tsp. onion powder
2 tbsp. dried herbs (rosemary, thyme, parsley, oregano… whatever)
liberal amount of salt and pepper (to taste)
Update october 2020: New sauerkraut, substantially more information added 🙂
Since I happen to be a “Kraut” by birth, I decided to home-make my own Sauerkraut. Fermentation using wild lactobacillus is an ages-old and easy way of preserving almost every reasonably hard/crunchy vegetable you like. It’s easy and for our grandparent’s generation it was a perfectly common thing to do.
So what is this “fermentation thing” all about? Fermentation is latin and means the decomposing of carbohydrates in foods by various bacteria or yeasts with no oxygen around. Besides improving digestability, this produces a wide variety of distinct aromatics and other substances, the most important one being acid (lactic acid in this case). Harmful bacteria cannot thrive in an oxygen-free, acidic environment, thus, our food becomes preserved.
This is another thrown-together, absolutely non-traditional yet very tasty pasta recipe. It’s amazing what you can do in practically no time with simple ingredients and a little creativity:
Pan fried potato rounds. It feels like it’s been ages since I had these the last time as a kid from my aunt. I missed them… Basically, these are flattened german potato dumplings (Kartoffelklöße) fried in butter to golden brown deliciousness. Here’s how:
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