For this week’s effort, I embarked on what could be called the German Holy Trinity. There was meat, oh so much meat. And potatoes! And pretzels! That’s right, to make up for the simplicity of my prior week’s meal, I went all out for Germany. After all, it is Oktoberfest time! The air is a bit crisper and I had a whole Sunday to play around in the kitchen. The end result might have been a bit of work, but worth it! Matt’s parents came over as well to help indulge me in my effort to recognize part of my heritage. Before I dive into the dishes, I would like to point out a great discovery upon moving to Northern Virginia-The German Gourmet! This specialty shop sells all things German food and was a great option for purchasing beer and some of the critical ingredients for this effort. Check them out here: https://www.germangourmet.com/

On to the dishes. First, I made my first attempt at homemade pretzels. This dough boasted a hard cider (I used “Pound O’ Gold” from Supreme Core cidery in Washington, D.C.) and the recipe was courtesy of Half-Baked Harvest: https://www.halfbakedharvest.com/hard-cider-pretzels/. The dough was a little tricky to shape (or I just could not grasp how to shape a pretzel, which is entirely possible). However, they baked beautifully and I think we will definitely make these again, perhaps with some add-ins to the dough. Served with both a sweet mustard from a distillery in rural Pennsylvania and a traditional German whole grain.

For the rest of the meal, I made the whole house smell of bacon and beef. No regrets. After reading about German Rouladen in a book called “The Hungry Planet” that Matt got me several months ago, I decided to work with the recipe in the book along with what I could find online. Essentially, Rouladen is thinly sliced beef wrapped with pickle, bacon, onion, and mustard. Then rolled together, browned in a pan, and then cooked in a gravy of red wine and other good stuff. I served it alongside a German Potato Salad recipe I first tried with family in Pennsylvania in August and chose to make it again for this meal. I think I’d prefer yellow or Yukon Gold potatoes to the red potatoes I used but loved the bite of this potato salad. And I’m pretty anti-mayo so any vinegar or mustard-based potato salad is a win in my book.

Rouladen: https://www.daringgourmet.com/rouladen-recipe/ (though I also referred to a family’s recipe in one of my books)

German Potato Salad: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/83097/authentic-german-potato-salad/

Overall Level of Effort: 4 (for the meal collectively. I found the potato salad to be very easy)

Skill Level: Intermediate

Would Make It Again? Definitely will make the potato salad and pretzels again. While I enjoyed the Rouladen, it was a bit heavy for my tastes.

Additional Notes: I managed to handle the time management of this meal pretty well, though I did find that the pretzels took a little longer to bake than listed in the recipe, along with the potatoes, yet the Rouladen took less time. Go figure. And as a programming note, I’ll be going on vacation next week and as a result won’t return to this cooking project/blogging until later in October. But boy will I be eating well during my trip to California. Can’t wait!