Cookbook:Strawberry Dumplings

Cookbook | Ingredients | Recipes

| Austrian Cuisine

Strawberry dumplings (Erbeerknödel)

Ingredients

• 12 ripe strawberries, medium-sized
• 2 cups (500g) of curd cheese
• 1/2 cup (125g) of flour
• 1 egg
• a pinch of salt
• 1/5 cup (50g) of butter
• 1/5 cup (50g) of sugar
• 4/5 cups (200g) of breadcrumbs
• icing sugar

Procedure

1. Wash the strawberries and cut off the leaves.

For The Dough

1. Put the egg and the curd cheese into a large bowl.
2. Add a pinch of salt.
3. Stir until the mixture is smooth; the egg and the cheese should be blended well.
4. Now slowly add the flour and stir until the dough sticks to one side of the bowl.
5. Let the dough rest for about 5 minutes. If the dough is too moist, which sometimes happens due to the salt, add some more flour.

How To Form The Dumplings

1. Cover your hands with flour, so that the dough won't stick to your fingers when forming the dumplings.
2. Take a large tablespoon of dough and put it onto your palm.
3. Add some flour and roll the dough slightly between your hands until you receive a small ball.
4. Then press the ball flat and put a strawberry into the middle
5. Now cover the strawberry with dough.
6. Sprinkle the dumpling and your hands with some more flour.
7. Now carefully roll the dumpling until you get a smooth, round ball.
8. Put the dumplings on a floured plate. Leave enough space between them, as they will otherwise stick to one another.

How To Cook The Dumplings

1. Fill a large pot with about 3 liters of water and bring it to a boil.
2. Put the dumplings into the boiling water.
3. Let them boil in the open pot for about 10 minutes.
4. The dumplings are done, when they float as if they "danced".

How To Roast The Crumbs

1. Melt the butter in a frying pan.
2. Add the breadcrumbs and the sugar and roast them until they gain a brown colour. Stir well, as the sugar makes the crumbs burn faster.

How To Get The Crumbs Onto The Dumplings

1. Take the dumplings out of the boiling water and roll them in the breadcrumbs until they are covered evenly. Since the crumbs are supposed to stick, the dumplings should still be moist on the surface.
2. Serve the dumplings together with a little of the roasted crumbs. Sprinkle them with icing sugar.
3. ENJOY!

Variations

• The breadcrumbs could also be roasted without sugar, but in this case you will miss on the caramel flavor. For the calorie conscious people among us there is the possibility of roasting the breadcrumbs without butter.
• This recipe also works well with other fillings like apricots, plums or chocolate. In Austria we also fill dumplings with "Mozartkugeln", which are little balls of chocolate, nougat and almond paste. It is reasonable to use the fruits of the respective season, since they are fresh and cheap. If you use apricots or plums as a filling, you can add a pinch of cinnamon to the sugar before mixing it with the breadcrumbs. If you serve dumplings with a chocolate filling, garnish them with chocolate sauce and ground walnuts.
• It is a good idea to serve the dumplings with ice cream (preferably vanilla flavor), garnished with fresh berries and a mint leaf.
• Enjoying a glass of cold milk together with the dumplings is especially refreshing in the summer months. In Austria it is also common to serve sweet dishes with a cup of coffee.
• Curd cheese dough only tastes well with sweet fillings. For savory dumplings, which are very popular in Austria, Germany and the Czech Republic, use potato dough and no breadcrumbs.

About the Recipe

• Strawberry dumplings are a typically Austrian dish usually served as a main course, rather than as a dessert. Sweet dishes as main courses are very common in Austria and especially popular with children and vegetarians, since the Austrian cuisine is heavy on meat dishes like "Schweinsbraten" (roast pork), "Wienerschnitzel" or "Speckknödel" (dumplings filled with bacon), and has only little to offer for people who don’t like meat. There are many variations of sweet and savory dumplings, especially when it comes to the fillings. A specialty of Salzburg, for example, are the "Mozartknödel": cream cheese dumplings with a "Mozartkugel" as filling. Savory dumplings can be filled with minced meat, greaves or bacon and are usually served with sauerkraut and gravy.
• For an amateur cook, the above recipe is recommendable if he needs a tasteful, quick, and easy to prepare dish for, say, an evening with his parents-in-law; they will certainly be impressed by his cooking skills. Cooking strawberry dumplings is relatively easy, but of course it can only be perfected by practice. If you have grown tired of strawberry dumplings, just vary the filling and use other fruits of your choice.
• Always use fresh, ripe strawberries, as they taste much sweeter than the ones you can buy in the supermarket. Also consider picking strawberries yourself; this way you can choose the ripe and fresh ones and get the size you need for the dumplings. Moreover, you can try a few while picking. In Austria you can do this in June on several privately owned strawberry fields. Use the spare strawberries for cooking jam. Since they go bad within a few days, remember to use strawberries immediately after picking