Dukatenschnitzerl

December 29, 2016 ~ American Expat in Europe ~ 3 Comments

On Christmas Eve Robert and I feasted on fresh raw oysters, a fresh whole baked trout with lemon and herbs, and parsley potatoes before opening gifts in the evening. Unlike in the States, Germans (along with many other European countries) celebrate Christmas on the 24th, Christmas Eve, with a big family dinner and gift exchange in the evening.

On Christmas Day we made dukatenschnitzerl, or little fried balls of pork and fried potatoes with a lemon-thyme salt and fried parsley. This dish reminds me of the classic British fish and chips dish, but pork instead of fish. (Is there honestly anything better than fried pork??!) It´s a classic Austrian dish. We used a recipe from the Wiener Küche cookbook by Susanne Zimmel. FYI: “Dukaten” is an old word for “coin” and the pieces of pork and potato are roughly the size of coins, which is where this dish gets its name — “little coin schnitzel.”

First, here is a list of ingredients you will need:

Potatoes
Fresh thyme
Fresh parsley
Lemon
Pork tenderloin
Butter
Lard
Eggs
Flour
Breadcrumbs
Salt & Pepper

To get started, boil the potatoes until they are soft, about 30 minutes. While the potatoes are boiling, remove a few sprigs of thyme from the stem.

Boiling Potatoes

Fresh Thyme

Then, get out your mortar and pestle to make the lemon-thyme salt. First, place the thyme inside and add the zest of one lemon. Crush well. Then, add salt and pepper and crush well once more. (As you can see, we also added a few dried tomatoes because we had them, but these are not required.)

Fresh Thyme + Lemon Zest

Add Salt & Pepper

While the potatoes continue to boil, cut up the pork tenderloin into bite-sized pieces. Also, set up your flour-egg-breadcrumb station (from left to right) as you can see below. At this point, the potatoes are likely soft and can be removed from the boiling water. Once the potatoes have cooled a bit and are easy to handle, peel them and cut into bite-sized pieces as well.

Boiled potatoes cut into bite-sized pieces

Next, put the butter and the lard (schmalz) into a big pot, which is what you will use to fry the pork, potatoes, and parsley. Allow the butter and lard to melt and then raise the temperature to 150ºC for frying. Add the potatoes to the pot with butter and lard and fry until they´re crunchy like french fries or chips.

Next, fry a few sprigs of fresh parsley in the same pot of hot butter and lard. Make sure to have a plate or bowl lined with paper towel nearby where you can deposit the potatoes, parsley, and ultimately the pork after frying so that any excess frying grease can be absorbed.

Now, take the pork pieces and dip into the flour, then the eggs, and finally the breadcrumbs before placing into the frying pot. Be sure the butter-lard is still at 150ºC for frying. Fry the pork until golden brown in color.

Now that the potatoes, parsley, and pork has been fried you’re ready to assemble! We served our dinner in newspaper cones as if it were street food. Just load up the cone with pieces of the fried pork and fried potatoes and top with slices of lemon, the fried parsley, and the lemon-thyme salt …and bon appetit!

Super Easy Stuffed Peppers

November 19, 2016 ~ American Expat in Europe ~ 1 Comment

Last night Robert and I made really easy stuffed peppers. You’ll need the following ingredients:

Large bell peppers (we used red, green, and yellow)
Bulgar, cooked
Chickpeas
Fresh Chives
Feta Cheese

The easy recipe is as follows: cut the peppers in half and clean out the inside, in a bowl combine chives + bulgar + chickpeas and then use this mix to fully stuff each pepper, top with feta cheese and roast in the oven (we had our oven set at 200°C) for 15 minutes. Here is a picture of the peppers before they went in the oven and one after. ENJOY!

Pumpkin Soup / Kürbissuppe

November 10, 2016 ~ American Expat in Europe ~ Leave a comment

Tonight we made pumpkin soup (in German: kürbissuppe) for dinner. We used a recipe from a cookbook I bought for Robert for Christmas last year, Wiener Küche by Susanne Zimmel. (“Wiener kuche” translates to “Viennese cuisine.”) We used a Hokkaido pumpkin, which we picked up at the Ludwigsburg Pumpkin Festival last month.

The recipe I’m sharing here is for 8 servings (we doubled the recipe from the book). It’s super easy and healthy. Here are the ingredients you will need:

1 Hokkaido pumpkin, de-seeded and chopped into large pieces
1 tablespoon tomato paste
600ml / 2.5c of vegetable (or beef) broth
1/2 diced onion
1 pinch of chili flakes (if you’d like, for a little heat)
1 tablespoon of olive (or other vegetable) oil
100g / 1c of heavy cream
1 teaspoon peanut butter (surprise!)
a drizzle of pumpkin oil

The first step is to dice the onion and chop the pumpkin. At the same time, heat the vegetable stock in a small pot.

Then, heat the olive oil in a medium-sized pot and add the onion and cook until translucent. Then, add the tomato paste and stir until the onion and tomato are incorporated. Finally, add the pumpkin, the vegetable broth, and the chili flakes to the onion-tomato mix and stir well. Cover with a lid and low boil for 15 minutes.

After 15 minutes, remove the lid and add the heavy cream and peanut butter and stir well. Blend all ingredients well with an immersion blender. Finally, spoon the soup into bowls and add a drizzle of pumpkin oil.

ENJOY!

Marcella Hazan’s Lasagna

November 6, 2016 ~ American Expat in Europe ~ 8 Comments

You may have read in my Roma & München blog post that I missed out on the famous lasagna at Tavernaccia da Bruno while in Rome so Robert and I decided that, once back in Stuttgart, we would make Marcella Hazan’s classic lasagna with bechamel and bolognese sauce. Hazan is by-far my favorite Italian cookbook author. I make her easy tomato sauce at least once a week. My favorite book by her is The Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, which is where we found this lasagna recipe. I bought this book in Florence, Italy in 2001 while studying abroad so it also carries a lot of special memories. Here I will include the recipe with photos.

First, we made the Bolognese sauce. Here are the ingredients you will need:

2 tablespoons vegetable oil
45g / 1.5oz butter
85g / 3oz onion, chopped
3 sticks celery, chopped
4 medium carrots, chopped
350g / 12oz ground beef
250ml / 8oz whole milk
nutmeg
250ml / 8oz white wine
500g / 1lb + 2oz canned Italian plum tomatoes, cut up, with juices

The first step is to chop the carrots, celery, and onion. Then, add the butter, oil, and onions to a medium-heat pan (I used Le Creuset) and cook the onions until translucent. Then, add the carrots and celery and cook altogether for a few minutes. Add the ground beef to the mixture and salt immediately, separate with a fork, and cook until no longer raw. Add a sprinkle of fresh nutmeg. Then, add the milk and cook until the milk completely boils away.

Then, add the white wine and tomatoes and let simmer for at least three hours. The waiting is tough as it already smells so good! And, that’s it for the Bolognese sauce! Just wait, wait, wait… 🙂

Then, when the Bolognese sauce is ~10 minutes from being finished, get started on the Bechamel sauce.

Ingredients for Bechamel sauce:

450ml / 3/4pint milk
50g / 2oz butter
47g / 1+3/4oz flour
1/4 teaspoon salt

Add the milk to a pot and bring just to the verge of boiling. While heating the milk, melt the butter in a separate saucepan and then turn the heat down to low. Add the flour and stir constantly for 2 minutes. Add the hot milk (a couple of spoonfuls at a time) to the flour/butter mixture and continue stirring. Once all ingredients are incorporated, turn the heat down to low, add salt, and stir until the sauce has the consistency of sour cream. Done! Finally, add the bechamel sauce to the bolognese sauce and stir well.

Now it’s time to assemble the lasagna and stick it in the oven!

Ingredients for Lasagna:

Lasagna noodles (fresh or store-bought)
Butter (for greasing the baking dish)
Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese , shredded (for the top of the lasagna before baking and serving)

Cook the lasagna noodles in salted boiling water according the directions on the package if store-bought, or for just a few seconds if using fresh pasta. Once boiled, rinse the pasta in cold water and lay flat. Preheat the oven to 200°C / 400ºF. Grease the lasagna pan with butter. Line the bottom of the pan with lasagna noodles. Spread a thin layer of the bechamel-bolognese sauce on the noodles and top with shredded Parmigiano-Reggiano. Repeat the last few steps until you have at least 6 layers of pasta — make sure to reserve enough bechamel-bolognese sauce for the top layer. Once complete, sprinkle the top with Parmigiano-Reggiano and a few dollops of butter. Bake for 10-15 minutes…and ENJOY!!