It’s been a bit of a crazy year so far. With social distancing and working from home, I havent traveled a lot or done much interesting tech stuff recently, but I’ve had the itch to do some blogging. So lets do some food blogging!
It started with this great first-person cooking video that came up in my Youtube feed:
I’ve been following Kenji for a while, from his time at Serious Eats. He explains recipes really well, as well as being a genuine guy and great at explaining things.
So following his video, I did a quick test runs of making spatzle:
It was super quick and easy. I did it based on Kenji’s video, but the recipe from Step-by-Step Cook is good, and it allows you to change between metric and imperial, and how many servings you want.
But I wanted to do something more indulgent, something with baked, rich with a lot of cheese. I thought “Someone must’ve thought of making a mac-and-cheese with spetzl right?”
Answer: Yes they did - Käsespätzle!
> Taken from WikiMedia
For the recipe, I used one from Daring Gourmet, but it’s pretty much what you expect: layer spetzl with cheese and caramelized onion in pan, then bake until the cheese on top is golden brown.
I did a quick photo breakdown of the steps:
Add the flour and eggs to a bowl and mix.
Slowly add 100-200ml of carbonated water until it forms a thick dough. Regular water or milk works too.
It should be think and come off the spoon slowly. Add flour if its too thin, more water if its too think.
Leave to rest for about 30-60 minutes.
When ready, bring a pot of water to the boil and find something to push the batter through to make the spatzle. I bought a spetzl maker, but I tested it through a regular cheese grater and collinder and that works fine as well.
Pour the mixture into the device, and push it through into the boiling water.
When they float (1 or 2 minutes) take them out to drain and do the next batch. Try not to crowd the pan too much. Shock them in a bowl of cold water to firm them up.
Caramelize some chopped onions, throwing a little of the starchy water in to
Butter up an oven-safe dish.
Add a third of the spetzl, a third of the caramelized onions, then a third of the cheese.
Do this and finish up with a little bigger pinch of cheese on top.
Cook until cheese is golden brown and bubbling.
Serve with greens and potato salad. I did some quick garlic butter asparagus.
It worked out great. Super indulgent, not something you’d eat every day, but it was great comfort food.
