We have to assume that it was a German who bombed my nan’s house, though of course it may have been at the hands of another nationality. And it was a German who yesterday told me that I did not have a tumour in my skull, for which I was very thankful. It is always possible, of course, that my dad bombed my consultant’s grandparents, he was after all in the right service at the right time, but I mention any of this only because Dresden and the NHS are both in the news, Dresden fairly, as it ought at least to be the subject of a reasonable debate, and the other I feel unfairly: whatever its manifest shortcomings, the NHS has improved enormously. And it gave me good news, courteously.In the consulting room we talked briefly about German liqueurs but we did not touch on food. The two european gustatory lepers never do, entre eux, which is a shame as we share such a common grund, not necessarily in our recipes but in our taste, our enthusiasm for certain forms and textures, and above all, in our passion for the things of the earth – the spud, the cabbage, and the pig that feeds on them. Bacon, egg beans and chips (you really ought to see Russell Davies’ site on this subject if you haven’t already), relates very nicely to Bauernfrühstück, and the almost infinite number of German variations on a tuber mirror our own, albeit narrower, obsession.
The first German cookery book I bought contained a recipe for bear in red wine (apparently the paw is the most tender), but things have moved on a bit since then. I have written before of our lack of interest in the incredible variety and quality of German beer : amazingly we ignore German charcuterie to the same extent, preferring the often inferior French or even Italian. Has it never occurred to us that a nation which employs the same words for hand, and arm, and finger, as us, might possibly share some of the same desires for food? No other cuisine I know shares our fondness for the smokehouse, for example – think of kippers, salmon, bacon, sausage……the German for herring, by the way, is Hering. Kippers are bückling, but if you look up buckling in Chambers dictionary, you find that this English word refers to a baltic smoked herring. How close we are, especially here in the north, where our own ravishingly delicious Pan Haggerty shares a lineage not just with the Bauernfrüstück but with the almost as lovely Danish pytt i panne: inevitably, more on both of these another time.
Incidentally, why are these recipes always prefixed with “hearty” – I’m sure farmers are quite as capable of a miserable curmudgeonly attitude as the rest of us – and almost invariably end with the injunction “enjoy”. Well, I wouldn’t be eating it if I didn’t. Or perhaps there is a huge tribe of food masochists unknown to the rest of us, blissfully causing themselves agony with every bite.
There are as many recipes for bauernfrüstück as there are lände, (perhaps this is what recipekey.com mean when they entertainingly describe this as Brazilian Cuisine), but it’s pretty easy. You boil some reasonably floury potatoes in good salted water and drain and dry when they are done. Meanwhile you have fried some smoked bacon, or speck, or pancetta if you really must, until crisp, drained and reserved. You will have taken some sliced (not chopped) onions, aromatic or sweet, and gently softened them in the bacon fat. Raise the heat, add the dried off spuds, previously crushed or cut into chunks, and some olive oil if the bacon was not that fatty. Cook it all briskly to brown and crust the potatoes. Add to this as many beaten, seasoned eggs as you like (some people add milk to their eggs), reduce the heat and stir vigorously to cook and amalgamate. Pop the reserved bacon back in at this point. Alternatively, after the onion stage, you may like to add the spuds, reduce the heat and wait 15 minutes or so until a delicious crust has formed on the underside, rather like a good hash, before adding the eggs. Various authorities add garlic, peppers, green things and others (though some chopped chives might be nice), but I prefer the basic version. It’s neater for one thing, tastes more honestly of what it is. And even after the heretical addition of ketchup, it has less chance of resembling the results of a bombing raid.
Our thanks to Nick Butters for his contribution:
Bio:
"I am a food lover which is a polite way of saying, a food obsessive. I recently returned to my beloved north-east after 25 years working away in London, at sea and in France. I've been cooking for the last 35 years or so and it has been my entertainment, my passion and my solace. Everywhere I go I hear the message that British food has never been more varied, more exciting or more delicious. So, if you are in food and think I can help you get your message across please take a look at the services page of my blog, http://www.creamandbacon.com/ , or write to me directly at nicholas.butters@yahoo.com "
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