Mix-Up Monday: 24 Hour Clocks

ikea.com

Germany, unlike the USA, uses the 24 hour clock. Instead of saying something will take place at 7:00 pm, they say 19:00. Although not completely foreign to her because of situations in movies and television when the US military uses the 24 hour system, this still took time for her to get used to. More than once she has had to add the correct number to 12 to figure out what time it was, or has looked at a train time of 16:00 and automatically thought the train was coming at 6:00 pm instead of 4:00 pm.

Now she can use the 24 hour system without much thought and has started to recognize the benefits of it.

- You never question if someone means in the morning or at night. For example, in the USA saying, "I'll call you at 7:00" can make you question (of course depending on the context) if the person will be calling you in the morning or night. Using the 24 hour system, you know if the person means 7:00 or 19:00.
- You never accidentally set your alarm clock 12 hours off. If you want to wake up at 7:00 in the morning you will never accidentally set your alarm to 7:00 pm in Germany. You don't have to rely on that tiny AM/PM button to make sure you won't over sleep.
- You get the fun of seeing the clock say 00:00. Midnight and nothing at the same time. She finds it strange every time it happens!
- You get to confuse people in Germany if you feel so inclined. A large number of people haven't been taught the difference between AM and PM. Annoyed and want to feel superior? Slip it into the conversation and see if you can get them mixed up (evil we know ;) ).
- You still get to use the 12 hour system if you want, so why not use both? Plenty of people in Germany say see you at 8:00 or talk to you at 10:00 because the context tells the time. You are not stuck using the 24 hour system unless you want to (and as long as you are not looking at what is on TV, when trains come, and when restaurants are open).

de.123rf.com

Using the 24 hour clock...just another small difference between the USA and Germany.

Homemade Maultaschen: Completely from Scratch!

Two weeks ago when she was feeling horrible and sick he promised to make something tasty for dinner while she sat on the couch watching TV and feeling miserable for herself. Something tasty indeed! Two hours (give or take) and a lot of work later, homemade maultaschen showed up on her plate. She still felt sick, but her tummy was much happier after that.

We only made half of the recipe we used (the entire recipe listed here) and still had waaaay too much. We froze many of the maultaschen and she ate some as leftovers in the days after he made them. In total, we would say this makes about eight servings (depending what else you eat as a side) or four meals for two people.

Some people make maultaschen but do not do it all from scratch (i.e., they buy dough). He went all out and made the dough and the filling. If you are interested in the history of maultaschen or learning more about how you can cook them, check out our earlier blog entry here.

Dough:
375 g flour
3 eggs
a little salt and water

Filling:
1 roll (day old is best)
125 g spinach
25 g speck (basically bacon or ham in small pieces)
1/2 onion, diced
250 g ground beef *
250 g veal *
2 eggs
salt, pepper, nutmeg, marjoram
1/2 egg (only the white) - optional

* We didn't want to buy veal / not easy to find near us, so we used 1/2 the typical German ground beef / ground pork mix and 1/2 pure ground beef.

 

First make the dough. Mix the egg and flour. Add a little salt and enough water that the dough comes together but is not sticky. Roll it out so that is is quite thin (both in thickness and in width) and long. He found it easier to do a little at the time instead of trying to roll out one long piece of dough.







Anytime during this you can cook the filling. Mix the spinach, meat, speck and onion. Mix well so it because a soft mixtures that sticks together. Add the roll (cut into small pieces) and eggs. Season well.




She actually did get off the couch to help him make the actual maultaschen. We each had our own style. You can decide what is best.

His way: 

Put a spoonful of the meat mixture on a square of dough. 



 

Add a second square to make a small pocket. You can either use something like a empanada press or make it by hand. 




 

He wanted his to look more like traditional maultaschen so he made every pocket by hand. 


 



He used a fork to seal the side and then cut off the excess dough to make it look like proper maultaschen. 





If your dough is not sticking properly, use egg white around the edges.

Her way:

 

She used the entire long piece of dough, put spoonfuls of meat slightly apart up to halfway point. 



 


She then folded over the dough and cut in between the meat pouches. After that, she followed his way of using a fork and cutting off the edges. 

 



Once the pockets are made cook them for 15 minutes in boiling salt water. 








You can then eat the maultaschen like that, add them to soup, or cut them in slices and fry them. If you want a big meal, cook them with eggs like we did in our other blog entry.

Lots of work but much much much tastier than the store bought version. Also, if you use a press you save a ton of time and you can also make a lot at one time and freeze them to eat later without much effort. 

This recipe was adapted from chefkoch.de user Judith.

Tuesday Tales: Daily Food of a Consultant

Time flies when you are having fun...or just when you work a lot :)! Hello to week number six of daily consultant food. I was in a different hotel this week due to the Karneval season here in Cologne. Every hotel was booked out and I had the opportunity to experience some Karneval influenced food. It was supermarket day on Monday for my dinner. I bought some salad with a dressing and two rolls. Also included were some raw prawns and a wrap which I didn't eat in the end due to it being too much food (gotta watch what I eat now that almost every meal is out). I think my eyes were a little bigger than my stomach.
Tuesday was our team dinner in the Croatian restaurant I talked about in past posts. When you are in a tiny town you end up visiting the only decent restaurants over and over and over again. I had a prawn cocktail and a rump steak which did not fit into the picture. A very enjoyable dinner and even paid for by my boss (adding to the enjoyment ;).
Wednesday was sandwich day. In addition to my sandwich I also bought a so called Kreppel. This is a small cake with sugar icing and is very unhealthy. I think one could compare it to donuts :).
Thursday was another eating out from the supermarket day. I bought some Baklava which is a sweet pastry made of layers of filo pastry made of chopped nuts and honey or syrup. I think this would be a good try to make ourselves..
Friday was homecoming day this week. I decided, due to the crazy Karneval crowds to eat some unhealthy Currywurst with Pommes (fries) at the main train station in Cologne while listening to original Cologne Karneval music and watching the crazy dressed up and drunken crowds.
On Saturday I made a Swabian dish (famous in the area I come from). It is called Schupfnudeln with Sauerkraut and a very instant and fast made meal if one wants to go out shopping and running around. The Sauerkraut was exactly the right thing for the freezing weather here in Frankfurt. You can find this recipe in one of our old blog posts here.
On Sunday I made (notice how I had to do all the cooking this weekend!?!) some Pfannkuchen (really just the German word for crepes). But, instead filling it traditionally with Nutella, Bananas or cinnamon and sugar, we made a filling of ground beef, mushrooms, onions and tomato sauce. A salad on the side was just the right thing to go with it. Like the Schupfnudeln, this is a recipe we have blogged about in the past. You can find it by clicking here.

Unfortunately this week was not as interesting for food as some, but sometimes you just need a break from the fancy stuff and eat simple things from the supermarket or old familiar recipes. 

Mix-Up Monday: House Shoes

Some people have house shoes for guests (www.delaishop.info)

When you go to a house in Germany the odds are you will be asked to take off your shoes. Additionally, you may be given house shoes (slippers) to wear while you are visiting.

Removing your shoes when visiting someone at home is not unheard of in the USA but often it depends on what culture the person most closely associates with. Even when asked to take off her shoes in the USA, she has definitely never been offered house shoes. It makes sense though. Take off your shoes and your feet may be cold...why not wear house shoes?

His well worn house shoes

We do not have house shoes to give guests but we do have our own for when we are home and our feet get cold. His are serious house shoes, hers are more for fun :)

Her very fluffy house shoes

One thing is for sure, make sure your socks match (and are clean) before visiting anyone in Germany at home!

Fish Stick Sandwich

We had a craving for fish sticks (yes we know, but it just happens sometimes!) but didn't feel like making any sides like mashed potatoes. Instead, he put together very quick and delicious fish stick sandwiches. The part that took the longest was baking the fish sticks.



What you need:

Small rolls
Fish sticks
Tomato, sliced
Cucumber, sliced
lettuce or rucola
Tarter sauce
Lemon juice (fresh!)
Parsley, maybe a little salt and pepper

You don't have to be amazing in the kitchen to make this (so no excuses!)

Bake the fish sticks according to the directions. We use self-bake rolls so we baked those at the same time.

Then cover the bread with tarter sauce, season with parsley (and salt and pepper if you would like).

Add the slices of cucumber, tomato, rucola (or lettuce), and of course the fish sticks.








Squeeze a lemon over the fish, place the top of the roll on top, and skewer (or else it will all fall apart).

Simple but a nice change from regular sandwiches. Yum :)

Tuesday Tales: Daily Food of a Consultant

This week started out with an experiment: How to "cook" a tomato mozzarella dish in your hotel room without a kitchen.

No knife or even the ingredients? I did not care, I wanted some tomato mozzarella. Girlfiends addiction is growing on me. So I bought all the ingredients at the local Penny market (where nothing is a penny but it is cheap) and asked the hotel to provide me with a knife and a plate.

The result turned out to be pretty yummy and together with a roll this was my very decent and not to expensive dinner.

On Tuesday we decided to go to a nearby canteen in a furniture store. Beside watching lots of retirees "hunting" for their food we were also able to receive a good meal for lunch.

I decided to take some food from the vegetable buffet and got some potatoes to go with it. 

Wednesday night we went back to the Croatian restaurant I talked about last week. I ordered a very not Croatian meal,  a Rumpsteak with mushrooms which was very awesome. We decided immediately to make this restaurant our choice for the team dinner the next week. 

Thursday was homecoming day this week :) - my lovely lady surprised me with a very typical lazy --but awesome -- dish: homemade nachos with hot ground beef sauce and sour cream. Mjuuuummmmy!

After work on Friday I came home so hungry that I had to make myself a very easy and fast sandwich. I took a "Wiener Würstchen" put it on a toast and inhaled it :). 

On Saturday we were invited to a friends dinner and buffet party which included a lot of fun and good conversation. Here I got myself some meatballs, a super extraordinary "I want the recipe" tofu stir fry, salad, Tzatiki and pita bread.

Sunday was a lot of work regarding food. Because she was sick and deserved some good food, I decided to make some Swabian Maultaschen from scratch. Here is the delicious result and the recipe will soon follow here.

Mix-Up Monday: What Time is it?

frozenfly.edublogs.org

Such a simple obvious difference between the USA and Germany, yet something that comes up and causes problems time and time again. The time difference between the USA and Germany is quite large, nine hours from the Western USA and six hours from the Eastern USA (we won't even get into Alaska and Hawaii). Although not an everyday annoyance, we really notice the difference when special events take place in the USA, for example the Super Bowl last night. The kick-off did not take place until after midnight in Germany, making it impossible for us to watch and still survive Monday at work. This is especially frustrating in years, like this one, when the teams hold some personal interest for us - where she grew up versus where she went to university. In three weeks we will face the same problem again when trying to watch the Oscars...and yes, of course we can record them and what them later but everyone knows that is not the same.

dclibrary.org

These examples are rare, but that does not mean that the rest of the year we are not affected by the large time difference. Just trying to call home can involve major planning because you need to find a time that fits both you and the person you are trying to call. This can be almost impossible during the work week.



We know we have little to complain about when a nine hour time change is one of the biggest annoyances we face, but it would still be nice if the USA would plan big events for Saturday not Sunday nights :)