Der Stuff Innenseite
Stranger Than the New $20 Bill
Salty, Yet Strangely Yummy
Ha, I bet you thought it was something sexual. Well, that was the point, at least. But the topic of this diatribe is not swapping yummy body fluids, but that saltiferous, shredded German concoction: Sauerkraut.
Actually, both times I visited in Germany, I didn't get a chance to sample sauerkraut. Maybe I wasn't in the right region, but I did have plenty of sausages and beer and cheese. By the end of my first trip, in 1995, all I wanted was a green salad, with no dressing, no crumbled cheese, no bacon bits. But that's another story, for another Monstress.
So
lets get back to why sauerkraut is so wonderful. First of all, it's an
all natural food, unlike those hot dogs underneath the mounds of fluffy
sauerkraut you buy at the ballpark. It has three ingredients: cabbage,
water and salt. Sauerkraut is a fat-free food, again, unlike its friend,
the hot dog. A healthy 8-ounce serving of kraut has only 40 calories,
but still has 12 percent of your daily requirement of vitamin C.
Sauerkraut is perfect for those who are budget-minded because it is very cheap. You can buy a soup-size can for less than a dollar. And, it's versatile. Sauerkraut is wonderful in soups, as a side dish, in a casserole, as a garnish or all by it's self.
It is a little known fact that eating sauerkraut will make you rich. Since it is made from shredded cabbage, which is green and is thought to resemble money, it is fabled to bring wealth and good luck when eaten with pork on New Year's Day. I don't know what the legend is behind eating pork on New Years Day, but the two match quite well together.
The best sauerkraut I have ever had was in Ohio of all places. There are Germans in Ohio. After all, I was there. There's this wonderful restaurant called the Amber Rose in Dayton. Sometimes on Saturday nights, they even have a polka band. But I digress. Let's get back to the sauerkraut. It wasn't white, like the stuff out of a can. It was kind of brown, with some sort of seeds in it, maybe caraway or celery. But it was a very different flavor. And I cannot forget the highlight of every fall in Southwestern Ohio: The Sauerkraut Festival in Waynesville. Where else can you sample deep fried sauerkraut balls, sauerkraut egg rolls and even sauerkraut pies? I haven't been there for several years, but just thinking about it, my mouth starts to water.
I personally prefer the stuff out of a can compared to from a jar or bag. Canned, it has more flavor, probably leached from the can, but that never killed anybody, as far as I know. I was pretty excited when I went into the A&P in Union City for the first time. They had sauerkraut in small, 8-ounce cans. The store otherwise sucks because I couldn't find the mustard in the entire stupid store, (although they did have four aisles devoted to alcohol). The wonderful thing about these small cans is that a person can finish it off in one sitting, whereas the large soup-can size will sit in your refrigerator for months on end. At lease that what usually happens to me. I would think that since it is pickled that it wouldn't go bad, but I'm not going to risk it.
Now that you know all about this wonderful food, I bet you're just dying to try some out. Well, my dear friends, I have several recipes for you, from the simple to the complex. First, for sauerkraut as a side dish, open a can, dump it in a bowl and stick it in the microwave for five minutes. For those of you with more time on your hands, I would suggest trying my grandmother's Hungarian cabbage roll recipe. She wasn't Hungarian, but she apparently used the recipe, which she probably cut out of the newspaper. But it's a good recipe anyway.
Hungarian Cabbage Rolls
Filling
1/2 head cabbage
3/4 lb. ground beef
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1/4 teaspoon pepper 1/2 cup cooked rice
Sauce
1 slice of bacon, minced
1 small onion minced
1 small can sauerkraut, drained
1 small can tomato sauce
1/2 cup canned tomatoes salt and pepper
Cut stem out of cabbage and freeze to soften. Defrost in tap water. Mix filling ingredients. Place heaping tablespoon of filling on leaf and fold over ends to roll up. Fry bacon until almost done. Cook onion until tender. Add sauerkraut, tomato sauce and tomatoes. Season and mix well. Place rolls in shallow baking pan. Pour sauce over all and bake for 2 hours at 325 degrees.
If this recipe is too time consuming, I suggest you try my mother's variation, which is kind of like Grandma's recipe, only everything's not in neat rolls.
Mom's Sauerkraut Casserole
Rice
Shredded cabbage (could boil before to soften)
Chopped onion
Browned ground beef
Can of tomatoes
Can of tomato sauces
Salt and pepper
Layer ingredients in a casserole and bake at 325 for an hour in a half. Freezes well. Potato Pancakes (stolen then revised from Martha Stewart) One potato Quarter of an onion One egg A few tablespoons of flour Pinch of dried parsley Oil for pan frying Peel the potato over a bowl of cold water (prevents the potatoes from turning brown). Drain the water, but be sure to retain the starch that accumulates on the bottom of the bowl. Add the onion, egg, parsley and flour until it holds together. Fry in small batches in a few tablespoons of oil until golden brown and kind of soft. Serve with sour cream, applesauce and sauerkraut.
