sauerkraut – Cook and Drink

Partridge with Sauerkraut and Parsley Root

14 November 2022

Partridge is perhaps the most delicate of game birds. Tasty, aromatic, mild. It is also one of the most vulnerable birds, given it is under threat from loss of habitat. Especially the grey partridge is becoming scarce. They are also expensive (we paid 10 euro per partridge) and the best part of the season (September-November) is relatively short, so don’t wait too long if you want to enjoy partridge once a year, like we do.

The meat of a partridge is lean and tends to become very dry when preparing it. So what to do? Of course! Put a strip of bacon on each breast and transfer the partridge to a hot oven.
Not really. The bacon will impact the delicate taste of the partridge. And placing such a small, lean bird in a hot oven is a massive risk. Just a few minutes too long (simply because something else you are preparing takes a bit longer) and the meat is bone dry. Stuffing the partridge doesn’t help either; the filling will be moist, but the meat will be dry anyway.

The key to an excellent partridge is to be brave enough to use an oven on a really low temperature, meaning on the temperature the meat should have when it’s served, which is 70 °Celsius or 160 °Fahrenheit. Dutch chef Peter Lute presents this method in two highly recommended videos.

Partridge combines very well with a range of vegetables and herbs. You could celebrate the end of summer by enjoying your partridge with a thyme-courgette cake. Easy to make and full of flavours. This year we decided to combine our annual partridge with Sauerkraut (Elzas-style) and Parsley Root Puree.

Wine Pairing

We enjoyed our Partridge with a glass of Riesling, produced by Markus Molitor. A classic Moselle Riesling from Germany. Clear mineral aromas, also fruit, herbal, delicate and pure. Excellent with the flavors of the partridge and the sauerkraut.
In general you’re looking for an aromatic white wine, with perhaps a touch of sweetness.

What You Need

For the Partridge
- Two Partridges
- Two Garlic Cloves
- Bay Leaf
- Butter
- Olive Oil
For the Sauerkraut
- 250 grams of Sauerkraut
- 50 grams of Bacon
- One small Shallot
- Bay leaf
- Caraway (cumin)
- Pink (or Red) Peppercorns
- Juniper Berries
- White wine
- Butter
- Olive Oil
For the Parsley Root Puree
- Parsley Root
- Cream
- White Pepper
- Nutmeg

What You Do

Start with preparing the sauerkraut. Slice the bacon and chop the shallot. Fry the bacon in some butter in a small iron skillet. After a few minutes add the shallot. Mix sauerkraut, pink peppercorns, crushed juniper berries, crushed caraway, white wine and a splash of olive oil. Add the sauerkraut to the skillet, add bay leaf, some butter, cover with foil and transfer to the oven (110° Celsius or 230° Fahrenheit). Leave in the oven for 4-6 hours. Check the sauerkraut every hour, mix and add water if needed.

A very helpful instruction (in Dutch) how to prepare partridge is presented and demonstrated by Peter Lute in two excellent videos. Please watch them and see how it should be done.
In summary: prepare the partridge by carefully cutting of the two legs and removing the lower part of the back of the bird (the tail bone area). Warm a heavy iron pan and add butter. Coat the birds with butter, making sure they have a very light brown colour. Transfer the pan to a warm oven: 70° Celsius or 160° Fahrenheit. Leave in the oven for 50-60 minutes. Since the oven is on the ideal temperature for the meat, it doesn’t really matter if you leave them in the oven longer. Set aside.

Peel the parsley root, chop and put in a pan with water and bring to a boil. When the parsley root is halfway, remove the water and add cream. Let cook on low heat until tender. Use a blender to create a puree. Add white pepper and nutmeg.

Add a touch of olive oil to a non-stick pan, and quickly brown the meat, skin side only. Just before serving separate the tenderloin from the breast and remove the fleece before serving the breasts. If all is well you will see a beautiful pink colour, indicating your cuisson is perfect and your partridge as tasty and delicate as possible.

Partridge with Sauerkraut and Parsley Root ©cadwu

Choucroute

10 February 2022

A classic choucroute is a tribute to winter food. You could go for a rich version with confit de canard or pheasant (Choucroute d’Alsace) or for an unexpected combination with fish (Choucroute de la Mer). We decided to make a simple but very tasty version with pork sausages, bacon and pork meat.
The choucroute is moist and soft, the meat comes with some nice fat and a light smoky aroma, the juniper berries are full of flavours. Ah, it makes you love winter.
Preparing choucroute can be done in various ways, including cooking in water. We prefer the slow approach in an oven at 80° Celsius or 175° Fahrenheit during four to six hours.

Some add goose fat to the choucroute to enhance the taste, but that’s too much for us. We actually prefer a light version of the vegetable, allowing the meat to bring fat to the dish and a velvety mouthfeel.

Wine Pairing

The obvious choice is probably a white wine from the Alsace region in France. Which is exactly what we did. We were looking for a refreshing, round white wine and decided to drink a glass of Pinot Gris as produced by Cave de Beblenheim. Perfect with the present flavours of the choucroute.

What You Need

400 grams of Sauerkraut
One Shallot
Juniper Berries
Caraway seed
4 strips of Bacon or Pancetta
Dry White Wine
Olive Oil
Two Bay Leaves
Various Sausages and Pork Meat (all organic)
Dijon Mustard
Optional: a mash made with Parsnip and Parsley Root

What You Do

Taste the sauerkraut. If too much acidity, then squeeze and remove some of the liquid. Peel and slice the shallot. Crush the juniper berries and the caraway seed lightly. Slice the strips of bacon or pancetta in 6 or 8. Combine the sauerkraut with the shallot, the caraway seed, the berries and the bacon. Add some white wine, a splash of olive oil and two bay leaves. Transfer the mix to a heavy (iron) oven dish. Put some aluminium foil on top of it, making sure you press it on the sauerkraut (as if it’s a cartouche). Leave for 4 – 6 hours in the oven on 80° Celsius or 175° Fahrenheit. Check the choucroute every hour to make sure it’s sufficiently moist. Also move the slightly browned choucroute at the edge to the centre of the dish. One or two hours before serving add the meat to the dish. Serve with some Dijon mustard.

Choucroute tightly covered with foil ©cadwu

Choucroute de la Mer with Riesling

6 November 2019

Bofinger

The traditional Choucroute Garnie or d’Alsace comes with various sausages, smoked pork belly, confit de canard, steamed potatoes and Dijon mustard. Combine it with a glass of Riesling and you will have a great dinner. Perhaps a bit heavy on the stomach, but the sauerkraut itself will make things lighter.
A very interesting variation is called Choucroute de la Mer. We have fond memories of restaurant Bofinger in Paris. They serve an excellent Choucroute de la Mer with haddock, salmon, sea bass, king prawns, boiled potatoes and horseradish butter. The haddock is actually smoked haddock, which works really well with the choucroute. The sharp horseradish is an excellent alternative for the Dijon mustard. When in Paris, go to Bofinger and order Choucroute de la Mer!

For some reason it’s hard to find smoked haddock where we live, so we tried smoked herring (kippers). Worked very well. And because we wanted to give the fish a deeper, fermented flavour (after all, the choucroute is fermented white cabbage) we marinated the fish in miso before frying it. Excellent result, deep and intense flavours and not to heavy on your stomach.

Wine Pairing

We very much enjoyed a glass of Riesling with our Choucroute de la Mer. We decided to buy a bottle of 2017 Riesling Kalkmergel, produced by Weingut Rings. It’s a classic, organic Riesling from the Pfalz in Germany. It is juicy and fresh with balanced acidity. Great combination with the sauerkraut, the fish and the umami from the miso.

What You Need

For the Marinated Fish
- Salmon
- Haddock
- Miso
For the Choucroute
- One Shallot
- 500 grams of Sauerkraut
- 10 – 20 Juniper Berries
- Dry White Wine
- Olive Oil
- Bay Leaf
- Butter
For the Horseradish Butter
- Horseradish
- Soft Butter
For the Mash
- Parsnip
- Jerusalem Artichoke
- Parsley Root
- Or a combination of these
- White Pepper
- Crème Fraiche
- Olive Oil
4 Large Shrimps
Kippers

What You Do

This recipe requires a bit of planning!
The fish needs to be marinated for five days. Use a shallow bowl, cover the bottom with miso and place the fish on top of it. Now cover the fish with miso, making sure it’s completely coated. It requires a bit of patience. Cover the bowl with foil and transfer to the refrigerator for 5 days. Check every day and if necessary add some miso. We use miso with less salt (and more flavours). After five days the salmon will have a deep red colour and the white haddock will be also have an beautiful red/brown colour. The miso marinate will also change the structure of the fish, so carefully monitor when frying. We have the best results with thinner pieces of fish.
Four days later (so one day before your want to serve the choucroute de la mer): taste the sauerkraut. If too much acidity, then squeeze and remove some of the liquid. Cut and slice a shallot. Crush the juniper berries (feel free to add a few more, we just love them). Now combine the sauerkraut with the shallot and the berries. Mix. Add white wine, a generous splash of olive oil and a bay leaf. Coat a heavy (iron) oven dish with butter and add the mix. Put aluminium foil on top of it, making sure you press it on the sauerkraut (as if it’s a cartouche). Leave for 4-6 hours in the oven on 80° Celsius or 175° Fahrenheit. Cool and store in the refrigirator for the next day.
Warm the dish in the oven (same temperature, let’s say one hour) and in parallel make the mash. Finish with some crème fraiche, a dash of excellent olive oil and white pepper. Keep warm.
Combine the soft butter with the grated horseradish. Taste and adjust. Set aside.
Clean the prawns without removing the head
Make sure you have three nice, warm pans. One heavy iron skillet for the prawns, two non-sticky ones for the salmon and the haddock.
Wash and dry the salmon and the haddock. Decide on the order of frying. We started with the salmon. We like to have a bit of caramelisation on the salmon.
In parallel (planning!) remove the skin from the kippers. Transfer to the the oven and grill two minutes on the former skin side. Turn, drizzle with some olive oil and grill for another three minutes.
Make sure salmon, haddock, shrimps and kippers are ready to be served at the same time.
Serve the sauerkraut on a warm plate and decorate with salmon, kippers, haddock and shrimps. Add the mash. And don’t forget the horseradish butter!

Kimchi Soup

6 February 2018

Kimchi Soup

A very tasty soup, nice as a starter to your Korean evening or as a quick and nourishing lunch. Kimchi soup can be made with pork belly or with tofu. We prefer the vegetarian option.
It’s not difficult to prepare kimchi from scratch (see below) but you can also buy kimchi from your local Korean shop.

Here is what you need (soup)

Kimchi
Onion
Garlic clove
Spring onion
Soybean paste (Korean Doenjang or Japanese Miso)
Red chili paste (Korean Gochujang)
Fish sauce
Tofu

Start by chopping the onion, the garlic and the spring onion. Keep some spring onion for decoration. Fry the garlic and onions in some oil. Add the soybean paste, the red chili paste and the chopped kimchi. Stir fry the mixture because this will enhance the flavours. Add water and leave for 15 minutes. Taste the soup and add fish sauce, soybean paste or red chili paste to your taste. Leave to simmer for another 15 minutes. Then add chunks of tofu and allow to simmer for another 5 minutes. Decorate with spring onion.

Kimchi background

Hipster food or the traditional Korean way of preserving cabbage? The latter of course. But we must admit, all the foodie-talk about Kimchi inspired us to join a workshop at Mediamatic in Amsterdam. Marrit Kuyng Ok Schakel ran an excellent workshop and not only did she share her passion for Korean food and Kimchi, she also showed us how to make our own Kimchi using white cabbage.

Making Kimchi is all about fermentation: a controlled biological process to change ingredients into food that can be preserved. Fermentation is at the heart of our food production. Beer, cheese, wine, bread, yoghurt, tea, coffee, classic Dutch haring et cetera: fermentation is an essential aspect.

Here is what you need (kimchi)

Chinese Cabbage
Salt
Garlic
Ginger
Red chili paste (Korean Gochujang)
Fish sauce
Spring Onion

The quickest way to make kimchi is by thinly slicing the cabbage, add salt, grated ginger, sliced garlic, red chili paste and fish sauce. The preparation is simple: just mix with your hands (do so for 5 minutes) store in a jar and wait for 5 – 10 days. The fermentation will produce some carbon dioxide so make sure to open the jar on a daily basis. The smell could be rather powerful in the beginning. In this case the amount of salt required depends on how much fish sauce was used. We suggest tasting the mixture and expect between 1% and 2%.

The better way to make kimchi? Slice the cabbage, starting at the bottom, but not completely. Tear the halves apart. Leave the cabbage in water with salt (5% is recommended) for 1-2 hours. Remove the cabbage, wash with cold water and taste if not too salty. If so, wah a bit more. Make a mixture of red chili paste, fish sauce, garlic and ginger. Using your hands, gently work the paste into the cabbage until all leaves are thoroughly coated. Move to a jar and leave to ferment

Also try making kimchi with Daikon, White Cabbage or Pak Choi. We will continue the experiment by using chicory.