Tag Archives: german cuisine

Konigsberg-style marzipan
christmas, dessert, food history, german cuisine, recipes, winter

Marzipan Two Ways: Lubeck and Konigsberg Style (with recipe)

Lubeck-style marzipan
Lubeck-Style
Kongisberg-style marzipan
Konigsberg-Style

            For many people, the days leading up to Christmas are cookie-baking season, and they finish eating them around New Year’s. Crunchy butter cookies are especially great. Not only are the delicious, but they can be kept longer than most cookies without getting stale. This enables a cook with sufficient willpower to make a variety over the course of a few weeks to a month. When I worked at a bakery for a year right after graduating college, we made and assembled the boxes of assorted butter cookies before Thanksgiving, and they held up fine. This year, I decided to make my own selection to give as gifts.

            Marzipan is another popular Christmas treat, especially in Europe. At its simplest, it’s just a mixture of blanched almonds, sugar, and enough water to form a paste. Many homemade versions add egg white as a binder. Historically, a few bitter almonds were used to add the distinctive aromatic almond flavor, since the more common sweet almonds have a pleasant but very mild taste, but it was hard to get the ratio right. Bitter almonds contain a small amount of cyanide, dangerous in the hands of an inept or unscrupulous cook, so almond extract is typically used today. Rosewater is a traditional flavoring, though perhaps not as common today.

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            Almonds, sugar, and rosewater were elite, prestigious ingredients in the Middle Ages, especially in Northern Europe where there were more middlemen between the source and final destination. Exactly when and where marzipan came from is unclear, though the Middle East is a likely candidate. Sweet dishes with nuts and rosewater can be found from Morocco to India. Through a combination of trade and warfare, Europeans discovered and adapted these specialties.

            In Sicily, shops sell stunningly realistic-looking marzipan fruit. English Christmas cake and Swedish princess torte are covered with a layer of rolled marzipan. All over Europe, marzipan is covered in chocolate, stuffed into festive breads and cakes, and made into figurines, including the pigs that are supposedly good luck for the New Year. Germans seem to be particularly fond of it, and specialize in two main kinds, both originating in trading ports on the Baltic Sea. Lubeck-style is soft and typically lower in sugar, while Konigsberg-style is browned under a broiler for a caramelized flavor. (For more information, see 1,000 Foods to Eat Before You Die, pg. 304)

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            Homemade marzipan is easier to make than you might expect, and has a much better flavor than most store-bought varieties. The only somewhat tricky part is blanching the almonds, but it’s more time-consuming than difficult. Just put the almonds in a bowl, cover with boiling water and stir, let stand a minute, pour off most of the boiling water, and add cool water until you reach a comfortable working temperature. The skins slip right off when squeezed, especially if the almonds are kept in the warm water until ready. Individually squeezing each almond takes a while, but it’s a satisfying process, especially with something to listen to. If you can rope in your spouse, child, guest, or any combination, it will go even faster.

Lubeck-style marzipan
Lubeck-Style, molded around an almond, covered in chocolate

            There’s one thing to note before beginning. Rosewater is a common flavoring in marzipan and goes very well with almond, but be careful with it. Depending on the brand and how fresh it is, rosewater varies in strength. Generally, brands with an alcohol base are stronger and keep their flavor better after being opened than those distilled with just water, but this is far from an absolute rule. Add it slowly, a teaspoon at a time, tasting as you go, until desired flavor is reached. You want a light floral taste, not edible perfume.

Konigsberg-style marzipan
Konigsberg-Style cutouts, with assorted cookies

Ingredients:

  • 1 pound almonds, blanched
  • 1 cup powdered sugar
  • 1 – 2 teaspoons almond extract (use more if not also using rosewater)
  • 1 teaspoon or more rosewater
  • 2 – 4 tablespoons water
  • Sugar for rolling out dough
  • Parchment paper (essential for getting baked marzipan off cookie sheet)

Directions:

  1. Coarsely grind almonds in a food processor, add sugar and flavorings, and grind again to reach a sandy texture.
  2. Add 2 tablespoons water, process again, and taste for rosewater. Add more if you think it needs it.
  3. Pinch some of the mix together to see if it comes together as a sticky dough. If not, add more water, a tablespoon at a time, until it does. The texture won’t be as fine as store-bought marzipan.
  4. For Lubeck-style marzipan, the mixture is ready to form into shapes, coat in chocolate, mold around whole almonds, and so on.
  5. For Konigsberg-style marzipan, lightly sugar a flat surface, pat the marzipan into a disk, sugar the top, roll out about a quarter-inch thick, and cut out shapes with cookie cutters. Since the dough has no flour, it can be rerolled without toughening.
  6. Bake on parchment paper-lined baking sheets at 350 for 12 – 15 minutes, just until set.
  7. To brown the marzipan, place each cookie sheet under the broiler for two minutes, with the oven door cracked (which keeps the broiler from overheating). Then, watching constantly, broil for another minute or two, until the tops are golden brown.

            As an added bonus, eggless marzipan such as this is gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan, pareve, and Passover-friendly. Assuming the parchment paper is clean, that is, and not previously used for several batches of butter-and-flour-based cookies.

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Sugarplums
christmas, german cuisine

German-Style Christmas Markets: A Mix of Food and Fun

Sugarplums
Sugarplums
Ambrosia
Citrus Fruits
Sorrel Punch
Jamaican Hibiscus Drink
Baked Goods Galore

            Germanic cultures take Christmas cheer seriously. In Germany, Austria, and occasionally in neighboring countries, towns go so far as to have specialized Christmas markets, called Christkindlmarkt, which have been going on for centuries. At these frequently month-long festivals, you can buy (or just admire) all manner of traditional handicrafts. And of course, there are plenty of snacks. Selections often include sausages, marzipan, chocolates, and German-style mulled wine called glühwein. A similar Scandinavian mulled wine is called glogg.

            Due to large-scale German immigration in the 19th Century, the tradition spread to the US, particularly Wisconsin. Many schools have holiday craft fairs, usually to raise money for various clubs and extracurricular activities, which bear a strong resemblance to Germanic Christmas markets. In my hometown, the two or three-dollar admission gets you access to dozens of local vendors, all set up in the high school commons and gym. Knitted hats, scarves, and mittens, painted wood and glass ornaments, creative jewelry, local honey and maple syrup, homemade jam, artisanal soaps and candles, bake sale treats, candied nuts, kettle corn, and all manner of decorations are available for purchase.

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            And don’t forget the lotion and lip balm. They’re great gifts because 1) they get used up and don’t add to “clutter” and 2) everyone can use them. When the heat gets turned on, everyone’s skin dries right out, especially the hands and lips. Almost every craft fair has a vendor selling these things, and they always do good business. Just make sure not to put scented soap and lotion in the same bag as your food, or the aroma will infuse. Eucalyptus-scented brownies aren’t for everyone.

            For a more “authentic” European Christmas market experience, there are several options. I spent an enjoyable afternoon at one a few weeks ago and found some great treasures. It resembled a craft fair in some ways, but with more unusual and high-end merchandise. One memorable stand had ostentatious fur hats, made of fox, coyote, wolf, racoon, skunk, and rabbit. They were pretty flamboyant and definitely out of my budget, but fun to look at. Other stands had unique maps, Baltic amber, alpaca wool socks, scarves, and hats, hand-painted wooden nesting dolls, German beer steins, and of course, all sorts of food.

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            Just like in Germany and Austria, the market in Wisconsin served up sausages, schnitzel sandwiches, little spätzle dumplings, red cabbage, and amazing potato pancakes. I definitely need to master making them at home. Desserts included apple strudel and crepe-like German pancakes, homemade cookies and bars, tins of Scandinavian-style gingersnaps and cardamom cookies, and all sorts of European chocolates. To wash everything down, there was a variety of beer and wine, including, naturally, hot glühwein.

            After purchasing a few “winter survival” lotion/lip balm kits, I loaded up on edible treasures. Between the toffee, cardamom cookies, and fabulous 2-year aged cheddar, a trip or two to the gym might be in order. Really, that’s a good idea anyway. The more time spent watching documentaries while on the elliptical, the more Christmas treats you can enjoy.

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food history

Foods Not Eaten: Personal Taste Part 1 (Blue Cheese, Boiled Eggs, and Raw Seafood)

Blue/Funky Cheeses: Stilton, Stinking Bishop, Epoisses de Bourgogne, Fourme d’Ambert, Roquefort, Gorgonzola, Cabrales, Picon Bejes-Tresviso, Kase mit Musik, Liederkranz Cheese

Boiled/Runny Eggs: Aselila (walnut egg salad), Deviled Eggs, Fried Eggs, Pidan (preserved duck egg)

Raw Seafood: The Oysters of Locmariaquer (farmed there or elsewhere in Brittany), Nieuwe Haring (new herring eaten raw), The Fine Art of Oysters (view but not eat), Sild (Scandinavian herring), Pickled Herring, North Atlantic Clams on the Half-Shell

1000 Foods (pgs. 27 – 28, 87, 91, 127 – 128, 195, 257, 298 – 299, 592 – 593, 381, 555 – 556, 571 – 572, 778 – 779, 108 – 109, 155 – 157, 342 – 344, 457 – 458, 604 – 605)

            Everyone has their own personal tastes, so we all have different opinions about what to eat at least once in our lifetimes. For the most part, I trust Mimi Sheraton’s advice on this, but there are a few things I just don’t like. Most notably, there’s strong cheese, hard-cooked egg yolks, runny eggs (usually), raw seafood (usually), meat or fish in gelatin, ketchup, mayonnaise, most bottled salad dressings, or anything with the “wrong” temperature or texture.

            If that sounds familiar, like it might be autism-related, that’s certainly possible. I am, in fact, on the autism spectrum, which might be how I’ve managed to stay obsessed with this project for so many years. It could be a sensory thing, and I do have sensory issues with loud noise and rough/itchy clothing. On the other hand, it could also be a learned behavior. My mom won’t eat most of those things either, except for bottled salad dressing.

            Let’s start with a common aversion: blue or stinky cheese. Even when it’s a type safe to eat, I find visible mold on or in cheese most unappetizing. It isn’t just the appearance. When ground into a burger, blue cheese messes up the taste. That means there’s no point trying Stilton (British), Fourme d’Ambert, Roquefort (both French), Gorgonzola (Italian), Cabrales, or Picon Bejes-Tresviso (both Spanish). Stinky cheeses are also out. No matter how good the flavor is, getting past a “mushroomy,” “barnyard,” or “putrid” (all descriptors used in the text) smell is a tall order. That eliminates four more cheeses: the British stinking bishop, French epoisses de Bourgogne, German kase mit musik, and American Liederkranz.

            For eggs, I don’t like hard-cooked yolks, which smell like sulfur and have a weird texture. Deviling the eggs doesn’t solve either issue, and even looking at egg salad grosses me out. A poached or fried egg is sometimes okay in soup or on a burger or rice bowl, as long as the yolk isn’t cooked hard (texture issue just like hard-boiled eggs), but I don’t usually like runny eggs either. Ideally, they should be scrambled and fully cooked, used in an omelet, quiche, or casserole, or mixed into baked goods. Two exceptions to this rule are Tollhouse chocolate chip cookie dough and my homemade brownie batter. Since I can’t taste the raw eggs, they are no longer gross. And no matter now good the Chinese preserved duck eggs, sometimes called century eggs, are, they look scary.

            The Dutch, Scandinavians, and New York Jewish population seem to like herring, either raw or pickled, but I do not. This might be a partially learned behavior, since my mom hates the smell of seafood (and is actually allergic). Regardless, the idea of eating whole raw herrings, bones, skin, and all, is not appealing. They have a fairly strong, “fishy” flavor, and the texture is off. Oily fish like (presumably) snoek are also too strong. Raw oysters have a slimy texture, and I can’t imagine raw clams being any better. They make a pretty still-life painting, but actually eating them is another story.

            Speaking of oysters in the French region of Brittany, here’s a story our tour director told us on the way back to Paris from Versailles. On a previous tour, most of the group decided to get (raw) oysters in the Breton former pirate city of Saint-Malo, since the area is famous for them. The tour director himself and a handful of people opted for crepes instead. You can probably guess where this is headed. The only people who didn’t get sick were the crepe group. Everyone else was miserable for the next few days. When we got to Saint-Malo a few days later, I went with the safe option. Brittany is also known for buckwheat crepes, with both sweet and savory fillings. The buckwheat crepe with ham, cheese, and egg was delicious and affordable, even in a touristy area. After eating some real food, I could enjoy a few buttery pastries and walk off the calories exploring. Bottom line: unless you really like oysters, stick with the crepes and pastries.

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german cuisine, recipes, stew

Nothing to Do with Ground Beef: Hamburger Aalsuppe (Hamburg eel soup)

1000 Foods (pgs. 292 – 293) for information, recipe is my own creation, but lacks eels

            Like other places in Northern Europe, the German city of Hamburg gets quite cold and dreary during the winter months. A specialty found there is eel soup, with chicken, beef, ham, vegetables, dried fruit, vinegar, and raspberry jam. If it sounds crazy, recall that combining sweet and savory flavors like meat and fruit used to be common in European dishes and is still popular in other parts of the world. Turkey and cranberry sauce, sauerbraten, and Swedish meatballs with lingonberry jam are some modern examples of this principle.

            Since eels are hard to find where I live, I decided to make “eel” soup without them, because the flavor combination sounded interesting. For the base, there’s beef chuck, ham, chicken, onions, bay leaves, and thyme. To prevent overcooking, carrots, celery, parsnips, leeks, parsley, prunes, and dried apricots are added a bit later. At the end of cooking, the soup gets a finishing touch of vinegar and jam. You can also add mini dumplings.

            For a dish that sounds so weird, the eel-less eel soup is actually delicious. The vinegar and jam give it a sweet-tart flavor resembling sauerbraten.

            Here’s what you need to make your own eel-less eel soup:

  • 1 pound beef chuck or similar cut, cubed
  • 2 chicken breasts or 4 thighs, cubed
  • 1 pound ham, chopped
  • 1 yellow onion, chopped
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 1 teaspoon dried thyme or 3 teaspoons fresh
  • 2 carrots, washed, halved, and sliced
  • 2 ribs celery, with some leaves if possible, sliced
  • 4 parsnips, peeled and chopped
  • 12 prunes, halved
  • 12 dried apricots, halved
  • 1 leek, halved and sliced crosswise
  • 1 bunch parsley, chopped
  • ¼ cup vinegar (I particularly like apple cider vinegar)
  • 2 tablespoons raspberry jam
The meats, without eel
The vegetables and fruit

            To make it:

  1. Put the beef, chicken, and ham into a large pot and turn on the burner to medium, stirring frequently. When it starts to brown, add 1 cup of water and scrape any browned bits off the bottom of the pot.
  2. Add the onion, bay leaves, thyme, a pinch of salt, and enough water to cover. Simmer for about 45 minutes.
  3. Add the carrots, celery, parsnips, leek, prunes, apricots, and parsley. Stir and add more water to cover. Simmer for another 45 minutes.
  4. When the meat, vegetables, and fruit are tender, add the vinegar to the soup, followed by the jam, and stir to combine.

            And remember, subscribing is free, and you’ll get a notification whenever there’s a new post.

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food history, german cuisine, stew

Pre-Potato Winter Stew: Frankischer Grunkern (with green spelt)

1000 Foods (pgs. 288 – 289)

            Imagine, for a moment, that you’re making stew on a cold day. It has beef, onions, carrots, celery, and parsnips, plus some butter and minced bacon to brown the meat and vegetables before adding liquid. Most people would think of adding potatoes at this point, and some cooks do, but they aren’t the key ingredient. That particular honor goes to grunkern, or green spelt. A specialty of Baden-Wurttemberg in the southwestern corner of Germany, the stew contains starch, protein, fat, vitamins, and flavor in one bowl.

            Spelt is an ancient variety of wheat that’s been grown for thousands of years. The German word grunkern sounds very similar to “green corn,” because the grain is harvested before it’s fully ripe. In Europe, corn can mean any type of grain, not just maize and sweet corn. Exactly how green spelt was discovered is unclear. Perhaps one summer grain supplies were running low and the harvest was still a few weeks or months away, so some farmers harvested a bit of their grain early. Interestingly, grunkern doesn’t seem to be widespread in European cuisines. Maybe it was more popular before potatoes, which are also ready before the main grain harvest, were introduced from the Americas, but that’s just speculation.

            The full recipe can be found in 1000 Foods to Eat Before You Die on pages 288 – 289, but here’s a summary. Butter is melted on the stove, then bacon, onion, carrots, and celery are added. You can add the beef or pork at this point to brown, which I did. Then soaked grunkern is added, with optional leek and parsnip, along with celery leaves and the meat, if it hasn’t been added already. This is followed by a bit of thyme, pepper, and either broth or water. I omitted the leek but added a minced parsnip, celery leaves, dried thyme, and beef broth. The recipe called for salt, but that can be added later to taste. Since I used salted butter and broth instead of water, adding extra at this point was unnecessary. Then everything simmers for a little over an hour.

            One thing that surprised me about this recipe was how little meat it uses. For 4 to 6 servings, it only called for 8 ounces beef or pork. That’s less than 2 ounces per serving, contrary to the stereotype of German food. Even though Germans have historically had more meat available per person that many other Europeans, large servings were an occasional treat, particularly during the Early Modern Era and into the 19th Century, after large-scale population growth and before industrial agriculture. So we have a stew with plenty of grain and root vegetables, with some beef and bacon as enhancements.

            Overall, this soup is highly enjoyable. My favorite from this project is still beef-mushroom-barley, but this was an interesting change of pace. Like barley, the grunkern swells up in storage and upon reheating, so a bit of extra broth or water might be necessary. If you have trouble finding green spelt or grunkern, which I couldn’t find even online, try looking in a Middle Eastern food store. There it’s called freekeh, but the product is the same. Ziyad brand is one of the most widely available.

            Next time there will be another soup recipe, so be sure to subscribe. Did I mention it’s free?

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Uncategorized

Fruhlingssuppe (German seven-herb soup)

Source: 1000 Foods (pgs. 289 – 290)

            In cold climates, the first spring vegetables and greens are particularly appreciated. Often, they appear around Easter as edible symbols of renewal. Seeing the landscape coming back to life after a long winter seems like the perfect celebration of the Resurrection. This does make the idea of celebrating Easter in the Southern Hemisphere, where it occurs during the fall, a little bit strange. My grandparents once told me that when they were in Australia one year for Easter, there were chrysanthemums on the altar at mass. While I understand why the seasons are reversed south of the Equator, thinking about a fall Easter with harvest decorations or a Christmas summer barbecue is still somewhat mind-bending.

            Anyway, back to green herbs. Traditionally, seven-herb soup was a German dish for Holy Week, right before Easter. Historically, fasting rules for Lent were a lot stricter than today. In early Christian communities, meat, fish, eggs, and dairy products were all forbidden. Fish was permitted from the Early Middle Ages onward. While this may seem surprising given the relative cost of fish today compared to most types of meat, it makes sense in the historical context. When fasting rules were first established in the later Roman Empire, most Christians lived around the Mediterranean, where grazing land was limited but fish was relatively abundant. As a result, fish was cheaper than meat.

            This changed once the people of northern Europe became Christian. Here there was plenty of land to pasture cattle and forests where pigs could forage. This made meat and dairy products more abundant and thus cheaper than they were further south. In many cases, meat was even cheaper than fish. Another issue was that north of the area where olive trees grew, people relied on lard, butter, and suet as their main cooking fats. This could be why, from the 15th Century onward, restrictions against dairy products (and eggs) during Lent and on Fridays began to be relaxed.

            The seven “herbs” I used were parsley, tarragon, watercress, chives, scallions, spinach, and lettuce. Cooked and pureed with vegetable broth and enriched with potato and cream, it was very fresh tasting. The only issue I had was that since I had never cooked with watercress before, I didn’t realize that the tougher stems needed to be removed, resulting in tough bits in the soup. Personally, I liked the extra texture they provided, but they weren’t supposed to be there.

            After Lent is over, an option is to use chicken or meat broth and add meatballs to the soup. Even though I made this in July, I stuck with the traditional Holy Week version to let the herbs shine. Served with some multigrain crackers, it was a light but complete meal, perfect to celebrate spring or summer.

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