Sauerkraut Pizza, Ms.Schnitzel Style

 

We are really excited to share this recipe because it is super simple to prepare and yet still meets up to the Ms. Schnitzel Standard of Excellence! You could make it for Friday pizza night when you're exhausted from a long week of work, or throw it together for a casual gathering of friends.

We tested it three times to ensure we had the right balance of flavors. Oh, the sacrifices we make! 

The first time we ended up having to go to two different stores on empty stomachs, which is never a great idea, and we were getting HANGRY. (That is not a typo, it is a term that is defined in the Urban Dictionary, though Tara initially thought that Jen and GK made it up.) So we tossed our grandiose ideas to the side and just smeared some garlic infused oil on our crust, topped it with sauerkraut, sausage and cheese and threw it in the oven. It was super quick and pretty darned good, especially with a bit of horseradish. But we knew it could be better.

The second time we wanted to do a test run of our idea before the big MSU vs. OSU game, which is a tradition in these parts, and at which we wanted the pizza to make its big debut. We will not talk about the outcome of the game as there is a bitter rivalry between the founders of this blog.... Outcome of the game aside, the outcome of this pizza was brilliant - no matter who you ask!

See our lovely array of ingredients:

Pretty simple, right? When we are feeling more ambitious, we will make our own crust. But we had a whole game day spread to prepare, and buying Trader Joe's dough really made prep a breeze. You could also buy a prepared crust, which we did on our hangry night with a Whole Foods brand organic prepared crust. So you've got options.

Since our dough was chilled, we needed to bring it to room temperature for 30 minutes. Having tried to hurry this process before, we highly recommend you take the time to do so or your dough won't be pliable. Like yeah, it will just break apart when you try to stretch it. But this is the perfect amount of time to prep your ingredients.

Once your ingredients are prepped and the dough is ready, go ahead and spread it out or, if you're fancy like this fella we know named Rob, toss it in the air pizzeria style!

Then, drizzle some garlic oil on the crust and spread it all over, including the edges (fingers work well if you're not afraid of getting them a bit greasy!). We used pre-infused garlic extra virgin olive oil, but you could also gently heat a finely chopped clove of garlic or a few shakes of garlic powder in a tablespoon or two of olive oil and that would do the trick.

Next, spread your sauerkraut sauce evenly over the crust.

After that comes the sausage.

And finally, plenty of cheese!

This was definitely a hit, even the skeptics were made believers! It's not German, but it is German-ish. :)

Our Ingredients:

1 prepared pizza crust or dough ball

1-2 Tbsp garlic infused extra virgin olive oil

8 oz Cortland Valley organic sauerkraut

8 oz organic mixed medley cherry tomatoes (so pretty!), halved

1 small organic gala apple (also pretty!), grated

Pinch of caraway seeds, optional

6 oz (or 2 links) of precooked Brats Hans Chicken Brats, cut into thin rounds

8 oz Kerrygold Kilaree Cheddar (roughly, or more to taste)

Horseradish to serve, optional

1) Bring your dough ball (if using) to room temperature.

2) Make sure to start simmering your sauce first so that the flavors have a chance to meld together and the tomatoes and apple get tender. For one pizza, throw 8oz of sauerkraut, 8oz of cherry tomatoes (cut into halves), and 1 grated apple into a small saucepan and turn it to medium. If you'd like to throw a pinch of caraway in, go for it. We tried and liked it both ways.

3) While the sauce simmers away, preheat your oven according to the directions of your pizza crust (ours was 475*). Slice the bratwurst and grate up half a block of white cheddar - the Kerrygold Kilaree Cheddar comes highly recommended. 

4) Once the dough is pliable, spread it out or toss it to fit your pizza pan. Spread the garlic oil all the way to the edges of the dough. Evenly distribute the sauerkraut mixture over the dough, using a slotted spoon and pressing out most of the liquid. Place your sausage rounds in a pleasing pattern, and top everything with as much cheese as you fancy. Just remember, this is cheddar and it is stronger than mozzarella.

5) Pop the pizza in the oven and bake it according to the directions of your crust of choice. Ours said 10 minutes but took a little longer. Just make sure to keep an eye on it so it doesn't burn!

This recipe is so easy to double since we used exactly half of all the ingredients we purchased. Or you could just save the other half for the next time you want Sauerkraut Pizza. Like later in the evening... or the next day... Because you will want it again, and soon. Trust us.

Seriously though, we hope you enjoy this as much as we did. Have a fabulous weekend!

Cheddar-Beer Spread Part 1

Guten tag und willkommen to the first of two posts on Cheddar-Beer Spread!

We always read through our recipes before starting to make sure there aren't any wild cards, such as in this recipe where Grandma's Cookbook instructs us to seal the spread with paraffin wax and keep refrigerated for several weeks…. Wait… What?! We have to wait several WEEKS to sink our crackers into this?! Unacceptable.  So we looked into other similar recipes online, and without variation the instructions were to leave the spread (sans wax) in the fridge overnight.  The conclusion we came to was that we simply had to make two batches (there's no such thing as too much Cheddar-Beer Spread, right?) and, for the sake of authenticity, try the paraffin wax method as well as the overnight method and compare the difference.  What a delicious experiment! In Part 2 of this post, we will let you know how the aged spread turns out.
 

We think, as with any simple recipe, the key is to use high-quality ingredients so the flavors really shine.  We also look for pasture-raised and humanely treated animal products, so our version was not exactly cheap, but we both agree the expense of using a high quality German beer and Kerrygold cheddars was totally worth it. Kerrygold, you ask?  Isn't that Irish?  Well, we couldn't find any German cheddars, which we're pretty sure Germany is NOT known for, so we thought to ourselves, "Irish cheddar will do!"  And Kerrygold's website assures us that all cows are raised on lush, green Irish pastures.

Yay, happy cows!

Since we were making a double batch, we needed two 7oz blocks of cheese. We decided to try a little mix and bought Kerrygold's Reserve Cheddar and Red Leicester Cheese. On a side note, while perusing the cheese counter we witnessed a young man without a cart or basket walking around the store creeping on unsuspecting female shoppers. 

Oh, LA.

Afterwards, we went to our favorite local beer store to pick out a German beer (or three) and that was its own adventure. Make sure to look for our future posts on this awesome store and it's massive German beer selection!

Now that we have our ingredients all that's left to do is start mixing, so get your bowl and spoon ready!

This is a fairly simple recipe to throw together, but the flavor is everything you could ask for and more out of a cheese spread - at least the way we made it. The first batch went over so well we had a hard time not eating the entire jar in one sitting! 

Stay tuned for part 2 ...