German Family Recipes

I will be posting recipe's collected over the years by my family here. Not right now though I'm awfully tired and need sleep.. (3am!)

Look forward to:

Kartoffelsalat - warm & kalt (Potato salads, hot and cold)
Falscher Hase (false rabbit)
Grützwurst
Kartoffel- & Nudelaufläufe (potato & pasta-gratins)
Kuchen & Torten (Cakes)
and many more

Aon,
This comes from the Pennsylvania Dutch Cookbook; I like balsamic vinegar instead of the cider as you suggested in our chat:

Recipe Name: SPECK UND BONA ( HAM WITH GREEN BEANS )
Category: MAIN DISH
Serves: 6

SOURCE PENNSYLVANIA DUTCH COOKBOOK - FINE OLD RECIPES

3 Pound smoked ham
1 Quart green beans, broken into 1-inch pieces
6 Medium potatoes, pared and quatered
2 Tsp. salt
1/4 Tsp. pepper

Cover ham with cold water and simmer 2 1/2 hours. If necessary, add water during cooking to keep at least 1 quart of broth at all times. Add the beans and continue cooking about 25 minutes. Add the potatoes and cook about 25 minutes or until the vegetables are tender. Season with salt and pepper. Serve hot, accompanying with cider vinegar for those who like this dish strongly flavored.

This one is a combination of PA Dutch, Carolina BBQ and my own smoking process:

SMOKED BEEF BRISKET WITH SAUERKRAUT & DUMPLINGS
Serves: 8


2 Tblsp Carolina BBQ Rub ( recipe found on BBQ and Grilling Site )
2 Tblsp butter or other fat
1 Large onion, sliced
3 Pound brisket of beef
salt
pepper
1 1/2 Quart sauerkraut
2 Cup flour
1 1/4 Tsp. baking powder
1/4 Tsp. salt
1 Tblsp butter
milk

Rub the brisket with " A Carolina BBQ RUB " http://bbq.about.com/library/rec/bln0224a.htm and let marinade for an hour.
Meanwhile get your smoker ready for a 2 hour slow smoking ( 150 -165 degrees ) with Cherry and Maple woods. Smoke the brisket for 2 hours. Remove from smoker.

Melt the butter in a large pan and brown the onion. Then add the meat . Add the sauerkraut and cover with boiling water. Cook slowly for 2 hours, or until meat is tender. To prepare dumplings, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Using a pastry blender or two knives cut in the butter. Quickly stir in enough milk to make a soft dough. On a floured surface, roll dough 1/2 inch thick. Cut into 12 squares. Put the squares on top of the simmering beef and kraut. Cover tightly and simmer 20 minutes without removing the cover. Serve immediately.

Aon,

I will be following this thread with interest. One branch of my family is German Anabaptists (Church of the Brethren). They immigrated to Pennsylvania in the early 1700's, however, for the most part kept to themselves, marrying only others of the same German descent.
So, it will be interesting to see how many of the family recipes have remained the same or at least similar to what they brought with them.
The oldest Inglenook (CoB) Cookbook I have was printed in the early 1900's. Wonder how many similarities I will find.

Elspeth

my great grandmother who started it was actually french.. that apple cake recipe I posted in the general forum was of hers.. I vary it a bit usually.

Shadows, just a smallish correction: Speck mit Bona = Bohnen mit Speck, very very popular in my family. Served with Balsamico Vinegar, it gives the dish a sweetish taste which is just lovely (I like it anyway). Also, add onion pieces together with the ham..

Right now I am actually cooking a "falscher Hase" which means fake rabbit, this is what you need for a small one:

250g minced beef
250g minced pork
a medium onion
2 slices of bread from the day before, hardened
a teaspoon (or more ) mustard (I use Düsseldorfer since that is where I come from)
2 or 3 carrots cut into smallish cubes
1 egg
salt, pepper, paprika, mustardseeds

mix well through and foarm a loaf. If you like it hide 1 hardboiled egg in it.
Put into the pre-heated oven and cook for 1 1/2 hours on about 190°C, Gasmark 5-6

Serve in it's own juice.

A thing typically from the "Rhineland" is

Himmel und Erde mit Flönz

I trust you can measure how much your family will eat: so you will need
Potatoes
cooking Apples
Sugar, Salt, Cinnamon, lemon juice
A nice ring of "Blutwurst" which is black pudding.

First you make the "Apfelmus" with some cooking apples. Peel, take the seeds out, clean and cut into small pieces. Put into a pot and add a bit of lemon juice, cinnamon, about 2-4 Tbs sugar and a bit of water. Sugar of course as sweet as you want it.

I like it a bit sourish so I use about 2 Tbs sugar on about 6 large cooking apples.

Simmer until you have a smooth mixture and let it cool down. (You can fill it into glass jars and put them into a slow cooker to keep it for longer, also you always have a bit for the kids.. I loved it when I was a child! just like that with some condensed milk over it =) )

Boil the potatoes and mash them (we use milk to make them more smooth).
Cut the "Blutwurst" into thick slices and fry them until they are nice an black.
Pile the "Blutwurst" on a plate, add some mash and put the "Apfelmus" over the mash.. it's delicious!

"Schwäbischer Kartoffelsalat" (a bit different from the usual stuff!)

For 4 portions:

500 g potatoes (best a variety that boils and doesn't get too soft.. but not too hard either.. they have to soak up some liquid)
1/4 l Stock (whatever)
1 pinch curry-powder
1 teaspoon hot mustard
1 small onion
1 Tbs Vinegar (I often use Malt vinegar or white wine one)
1/10 l vegetable oil (rapeseed, walnut, sesame or something similar)
Salt, white pepper


Boil the potatoes in their skins.

Let the potatoes cool down until handwarm, then peel them and cut them into fine slices.
Pour the stock over the potatoes. It should be overspiced.Then add the vinegar, curry, a good measure of salt, mustard and pepper and the fine cut onion to it. Now add the oil and mix thoroughly.

Leave the salad for half an hour to draw flavour. Basically finished to eat then but usually to make it taste that wee bit better add another bit of stock, vinegar and salt because the salad soaks up the flavours alot.

Great Grandma Lisbeth's Kartoffelsalat:

This is from my great grandma who died two years ago.

750g potatoes boiled in their skin (for further reference I'll call them by their German name from now on: "Pellkartoffeln")
1/2 ring of Fleischwurst (the thick pink pork sausage! in the UK available at Lidl)
2-3 Gherkins
1 Carrot
1 Onion
1 sourly apple
1 Pepper or 2 tomatoes
1 can of cubed ham, or cube some cooked ham yourself
400 ml of cream

Mixture of 8 herbs containing: parsley, dill, cress, chervil, chives, garden sorrel, borage and salad bournet.
Some Salt & Pepper

Cut the potatoes into slices, fry the ham until it is crispy and cube the rest of the ingredients.
Mix everything up and add cream, the herbs and some pepper. Be careful with the salt since the ham is salty already.

ideal für "en bissle obendruff!"

Another bit from the region where I come from... delicious with Pellkartoffeln and "sauce" which is a traditional way to eat potatoes. The sauce is basically a mixture of sour cream with herbs, paprika, salt & pepper. You peel the still hot potatoes and pour the sauce over it.

Another way to eat them is with Quark (curd? the french call it fromage blanc), you mix it basically up in the same way as the sauce.

With it you often eat this:

Heringsstipp

2 smallish red onions
3-4 Gherkins
some "Bismarckheringsfilets" (pickled Herring)
1 sourly big apple
some fresh dill (chopped)
150 ml creme fraiche (one of the little pots)
150 ml sour cream
a bot of horseradish (in mayonaise if you get it?)
1 Teaspoon mustard
Salt
Pepper
some single cream (I only refer to single cream in here btw, in Germany you don't get double cream)

Cut the onions into fine pieces (rings, cubes.. whatever) and the gherkins into fine slices. Cut the herring fillets into small pieces as well.
Cube the apple
Mix up the sour cream, creme fraiche, horseradish and mustard with the salt and Pepper. Then mix the sauce with all the other ingredients.

Let it draw flavour for about 1 - 2 hours.

If you take "bismarck herrings" out of the glass you can use some of the stuff they are in to make the creme fraiche and sour cream taste a bit better.

That spelling comes straight out of the Pennsylvania Dutch Cookbook . Maybe PA Dutch dilect is slightly different.

mmh.. not much as far as I know.. but it reminds me of "schwäbisch" which is a southern German dialect.

Bohnen mit Speck is a typically northern German dish though, from it's origins.

Well whatever the spelling or where it originated... IT IS GOOD!!!

definitly is like =)

try "Heringsstipp" some day, you will probably like it. One of my personal faves =)

That one had already caught my eye.....LOL

Ingredients already on my groceres list LOL!!!

on mine as well for when I next time make "Pellkartoffeln"