or Rœstis et emincé de veau, sauce au vin blanc et champignons...or Kartoffelrösti und Zürcher Geschnetzeltes
About a week and a half ago, the lovely Zorra of Kochtopf sent out a note saying she was homesick for her beloved Swiss homeland. Swiss National Day is on 1 August and she'd appreciate if we'd help her celebrate by blogging about dishes that were red, white or Swiss by 29 July.
I must admit that my knowledge of Switzerland and Swiss things is rather spotty:
- Its provinces are called cantons
- It's a landlocked nation with a good defensive army who supply mercenaries to the Pope
- The first Swiss-related food I had was Nestlé's chocolate something or other, the next was Swiss cheese, and the next was rösti--grated potato cakes.
- There are four official languages (German, French, Italian and Romansh)
-The Von Trapps fled the Austrian Nazis for Switzerland
-I've flown over parts of it, so I can tell you the Alps are pointy (which means the mountains are relatively young).
- The Swiss Rocket Man is pretty cool
-The once-popular Helvetica font is named after the rootword that forms Helvetii, a tribal group found in that area
- Their humanitarian tradition includes The Red Cross
- The Geneva Convention
- The League of Nations was based in Geneva
- Napoleon conquered the Swiss army in the late 1700s, imposed a new and unpopular national constitution, but within a quarter century Swiss independence was regained and the other European powers recognized the nation's neutrality through the 1814-1815 Congress of Vienna
- Sir Roger Moore lives there
When it came to cooking for this event, I decided to make some Swiss foods. Unfortunately, the only thing that came to mind was rösti--absolutely delicious, but a bit predictable. Sigh...what to do, what to do...
As luck would have it, I was invited to friends' for supper last week...and one of them is Swiss.
After a delicious meal that included gazpacho and barbecued venison, I told them of the event and asked for some suggestions--but not rösti...I'm sure there will be several versions of it for the event. I left with a borrowed copy of Schweizer Küche/Cuisine Suisse/Swiss Cooking by Michael Klein and Yvonne Tempelmann, a trilingual (German, French and English) book featuring traditional home cooking from the mountainous country.
After flipping through the pages, and pausing over all the cheese-ladened goodies (Appenzeller fried cheese fritters, spinach gnocchi with Schabziger cheese, potato-tomato bake), I decided on a mushroom and veal dish, swathed in a white wine sauce...which is recommended to be served over...umm...rösti.
Really, was there a doubt that the fried potato cakes would be absent? If there was, take a look at this post's title...it kindasorta gives it away.
Both dishes were very easy and quick to make. The rösti is a very quick and simple way of doing away with a few extra boiled potatoes from last night's supper. And I'm seriously thinking of encasing the veal dish in a puff pastry or a shortcrust pie the next time I make it...
Veal Strips from Zürichadapted from Swiss Cooking by Michael Klein and Yvonne Tempelmann
Olive oil
500g thinly pounded veal, cut into strips
salt
pepper
a spoonful of flour
1 minced onion
200g finely sliced mushrooms
1 tsp white wine vinegar
100ml white wine
100ml beef stock
200ml heavy cream
1 Tbsp cornstarch
finely chopped parsley, for garnish (optional)
Fry the veal, remove to a bowl; sprinkle with salt, pepper and flour.
In the same pan, sauté the onions and mushrooms, adding extra oil if necessary. Add the vinegar and wine; reduce the liquid to half. In a measuring jug mix together the stock, cream and cornstarch; add to the pan a stir well. Bring it to a simmer. Tip in the meat and juices, stir well and let the sauce thicken a bit. Season to taste. Garnish with parsley if desired.
Röstiadapted from Swiss Cooking by Michael Klein and Yvonne Tempelmann
600g day-old boiled potatoes, grated
salt
pepper
nutmeg
butter
1 minced onion
Season the potatoes and set aside.
Sauté onions in butter. Tip in the potatoes and stir--you want to heat through the potatoes, so this will take a few minutes.
At this point you could either
- Pat all the potatoes into a cake and fry over a medium flame until the potatoes become a crisp brown.
or
- Remove the potatoes to a bowl. Take out one quarter, shape into a cake and fry as above, frying as many cakes at once as will fit in your pan.
cheers!
jasmine
