[Sca-cooks] Cinnamon in German cooking, esp knodeln
Sharon Palmer
ranvaig at columbus.rr.com
Sat Nov 27 00:26:22 PST 2010
>> In particular, he claims that cinnamon appears
>>in recipes where it doesn't belong, and offers
>>the example of knodeln.
>
>Hopefully Ranvaig can chime in about German recipes - she's
>immediately who comes to mind, with her work on Rumpolt. I personally
>think that their tastes were somewhat different in period than in
>modern times. The first dish I EVER tasted in the SCA was like
>tortellini in a cinnamon flavored chicken broth. It was strange, yes,
>but GOOD.
Thank you, I've been traveling from Ohio, to
Mississippi for a wedding, to Missouri for
Thanksgiving, and home tonight, and I just saw
this discussion.
First, I wonder what he means by "knodeln".
Modernly it means a steamed or boiled dumpling of
bread or potato. Potato is unlikely but I have
yet to find a recipe for plain bread dumplings in
Rumpolt or any other period German source.
"Kno:del" or "Klo:ß" ("o:" means umlaut) seems to
mean meatball, from any of a variety of meat,
poultry, or fish. Bread is often but not always
mentioned, but may be implied in other recipes.
Also two recipes from hard boiled egg, and one of
flour and egg yolk fried in butter, that could be
something like spaetzle. But nothing like modern
kno:del.
I found one recipe in Rumpolt that called for
cinnamon in the sauce for Kno:del, none in the
kno:del themselves. Ginger and pepper are most
common, along with various spices "mit allerlei
Gewu:rz", mild spices (lindem Gewu:rz), spice it
well "wu:rtz es wohl", tarragon, juniper,
parsley, saffron, and mace (not all in the same
recipe), none of which seem unreasonable for
meatballs.
Another thing to consider is that proportions are
seldom given, and it's hard to tell how strong
their spices were. Cinnamon is used in a number
of recipes, and you can't always tell if they
mean a strong cinnamon flavor, or just a touch.
Rumpolt has 40 Kno:del recipes and some of them
aren't translated yet, but I'll look though them
tomorrow and give more details.
Ranvaig
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