Emperor's Crumbs» austrian

Emperors Crumbs Revisited

Valerian — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 03:00:08 +0000

Emperor’s Crumbs or császármorzsa or smarni or Kaiserschmarrn was our first recipe on this blog. I felt like revisiting it for three reasons: first, it is our name and signature recipe, so we should try it with American ingredients. Second, we are delighted to mention that we’re featured on The Hungarian Girl’s website and I don’t want to risk any mistakes! Most importantly, my mother-in-law had a birthday recently, and a decadent breakfast reminiscent of fancy Austro-Hungarian weekends was a perfect way to celebrate it. So I remade the recipe to serve 5-6 instead of the original 2. I also made it more “California compliant” and used less eggs and almost no fat, while keeping its outstanding flavor. It still tastes rich and delicious. If you want to know the background of emperor’s crumbs then check back to our first post and the old recipe.

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Emperors Crumbs

Original recipe tripled, reduced eggs. We have been able to find semolina without any trouble here, both packaged (Bob’s Red Mill is one brand) and in the bulk bins. We love the bulk bins these days!
Ingredients

Makes 5-6 portions

2¼ cup/300 g semolina

3 cups/750 ml milk

2 tsp vanilla extract

5 eggs, separated

pinch salt

1½ cups/300 g sugar

zest from 1 lemon

50 g butter for sauteing

powdered sugar, compote or jam or all three as topping

Method

Mix together the semolina, flour and milk. Let it sit for an hour or so to let the semolina absorb the milk.

Mix the egg yolks together with sugar and stir it into the milk mixture.

Whip the egg whites and a pinch of salt into firm peaks and fold it into the milk/egg mixture.

Melt the butter and add the batter. Stir the batter with a spatula or wooden spoon until it starts to form little clumps – crumbs. Depending on the size of the pan this can take up to 30 minutes.

Serve hot with powdered sugar or with jam, or with compote or drizzle with some syrup.

Linzer bars from the good old times

Valerian — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 14:35:55 +0000

It was an ordinary afternoon when I was picking up my son from his grandparents’ house last week. Usually I have coffee with my parents and discuss the joys and sorrows of life. My dad loves antiques and he is crazy about history, and I love to task him with finding me different items from the past. We were talking about antique cookbooks and I was complaining how expensive they are. He showed me few of his cookbooks which date back to the 1800s, explaining who used this or that book, or where and when he bought it. A few times he mentioned his great-aunt who was a housewife and cook in Budapest. She worked also for Kalman Mikszath, who was a famous Hungarian writer, journalist and politician. Then he pulled out a big pile of handwritten recipes, saying: “these are her recipes”. My jaw dropped. Who cares about the old books of unknown people when we have recipes directly from our family? My dad is like that.

Along with those of his great-aunts, Katicza and Agota Gyurkovics (pictured above), he has a few recipes by a magnificent woman Countess Marica Ordody, whose godfather was Kossuth Ferencz (son of Kossuth Lajos) and some from his mother Valeria. We will post some of these recipes. The very first one I wanted to try my grandma’s recipe for Linzer bars. I love linzer and my dad always asked my mum to make linzer like his mum used to make. So I was curious about two things.

1. How does my grandmother’s linzer taste, obviously.

2. Would my dad recognize the taste and would he mention that “this is like my mother used to make it” or is he just cruel to my mum and he wants to make her something that does not exist.

Grandma

The test won in the 1st case but lost in the 2nd. I loved this Hungarian linzer. It is very easy to make and tastes great! After feeding crumbs to my dad (it is a small recipe… not too much left) he did not instantly recognize it as a miracle from the past though. When I told him that it is my grandmother’s recipe he said… oh yeah that’s right…that’s how my mum used to make it. So, some success but I was expecting more. After this I had a third question: why did’t he show the recipe to my mum, because if she knew it is so easy she would have been delighted.

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Linzer Bars/Cake/Cookies

This is a small recipe so do not make it as your main dish.

Ingredients

Makes 4-5 portions.

1 stick/113 grams butter

1¼ cup/240 grams sugar

2 egg yolks

2.2 ounces/60 grams crushed almonds

3/4 cup + 2tbs/100 grams flour

small jar of you favorite jam (I used cherry)

a few blanched almonds for decoration

Method

Work the flour, butter, sugar, egg yolks, and crushed almonds into a dough.

Roll them 1/2 inch/2 cm thick into your desired shape: it can be one big square, one big circle or small circles. This might be a bit tricky with the rolling pin because the dough is very fragile and may fall apart. I used my fingers and pressed it into shape. Reserve a little bit of dough to make shapes on the top of the linzer. I made a lattice. Or tried to — as I mentioned, the dough was very fragile.

Spread the jam over it, and add a dough design if you choose. Place blanched almonds on top for decoration.

The recipe says you should bake them in a very hot oven. So I tried 350 F (180 C). I baked them for 25 minutes, but I think 30 minutes or a higher temperature might work better. The dough under the jam was slightly undercooked.

When the sides and the lattice are getting golden, take out the linzer and let it cool.

Do not touch! Let it cool completely. And enjoy.

MAGYAR KZTRSASG KORMNYA ¼

The Emperor’s Crumbs

Katy — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 11:10:30 +0000

We called this blog “The Emperor’s Crumbs” because we will be writing about – and eating – food from one of Europe’s crossroads. The old Austro-Hungarian Empire was home to something like 50 million people and stretched from Poland to the Mediterreanean, so that’s a lot of different palates, climates, and traditions. If you could visit a market from the turn of the last century, you’d find the Czechs offering you their pernik (gingerbread), the Transylvanians cooking kürtös kalacs (coiled cake) over hot coals, the Slovaks tucking into their bryndzové halušky (tiny dumplings with sheep’s cheese) and the Austrians roasting vast pans of sausages. More recently, a good chunk of this part of the world was behind the Iron Curtain, as Winston Churchill (a man who liked his food) put it. While not much of that era can be remembered fondly, I’m sure we’ll come up with a few nostalgic bites from the Socialist past.

The cuisine of Central Europe is not quite as widely known as French or Italian or even Thai cooking, perhaps because it tends towards the heavy and hearty, which isn’t so much in fashion these days. But when it’s well prepared, it’s homey, wonderful food that deserves recognition.

Since we’re in southern Slovakia, obviously we’ll be leaning towards the dishes typical of this part of the region. I hope you’ll send in your own versions of the imperial classics and your own favorites as well.

To lead off, here’s the recipe for császármorzsa in Hungarian, kaiserschmarrn in German. Loosely translated, it means, yep, emperor’s crumbs. It’s usually served with jam or stewed fruit, but it’s equally delicious with maple syrup, and some places in Budapest top it with a custard sauce. It’s a substantial dish, usually served as a main course even though it’s sweet (I have always had some weird thing about having a sweet as a main course, so I aim to serve a salad or something when we have one of these types of dishes, to at least nod towards a savory item).

Valerian says “this meal was a long time favorite of my family. The origin of this dish is in Austria. According to one of the legends the meal was invented by Emperor Franz Josef of Austria-Hungaria. The truth is that this meal was an Austrian peasant meal and only the name refers to the emperor. ”

So here it is, a family favorite.

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Emperors Crumbs

When I asked my mum how does she makes this meal, she told me that smardli (as we call it in our family) is basically pancake (crepes) batter prepared like scrambled eggs. There are two ways you can prepare this meal: the labor-intensive way on the stovetop and the lazy way made in the oven.

This is a basic recipe — I think the original was only flour, sugar, eggs, milk and fat — but there are many ways to make variations. You could add vanilla extract, raisins or lemon zest, or experiment even further.

Ingredients

Makes 2 portions

3/4 cup/100 g semolina

1 cup/250 ml milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

3 egg yolks

3 egg whites

pinch salt

1/2 cups/100 g sugar

half lemon zest

50 g butter for sauteing

powdered sugar, compote or jam or all three as topping

Method

Mix together the semolina, flour and milk. Let it sit for an hour or so to let the semolina absorb the milk.

Mix the egg yolks together with sugar and stir it into the milk mixture.

Whip the egg whites and a pinch of salt into firm peaks and fold it into the milk/egg mixture..

Melt the butter and add the batter. Stir the batter with a spatula or wooden spoon until it starts to form little clumps – crumbs. Depending on the size of the pan this can take up to 30 minutes.

Serve hot with powdered sugar or with jam, or with compote or drizzle with some syrup.