Nouvelle Weihnachten (Christmas!)
Here in Germany, Christmas is somewhat like Diwali – 3 days of non-stop festive eating, drinking, and making merry. Our family tradition always consisted of going to the in-laws and getting pampered with an assortment of home-made Christmas cookies, breads, cakes, and meat. The traditional Christmas-eve three-course meal, however, was always pea soup, fish, and cake.
So this year, when we decided to #stayhomestaysafe due to corona, I was in a conundrum – try to replicate a meal that has been perfected over many decades, or try something else? After hours of googling and asking my more culinary-inclined friends for tips and recipes (off-topic, but here’s one: https://www.greatbritishchefs.com/) I decided to veer off the traditional path and go with something completely new – something I had fallen in love with the first time I ate it more than 15 years ago: pork medallions. Although pork (like other meats) is readily available here, it’s something we rarely ever eat, sticking more to poultry so it would even count as something out-of-the-ordinary, festive even. It is deceptively simple to make and does not require any long marination or preparation.
Combine it with your favourite sides: I kept it mostly simple and had some potato croquettes (I cheated here and went with the frozen supermarket kind – tried and tested and the kids love them 😉), steamed vegetables in garlic+herb butter and baked tomatoes and carrots drizzled in olive oil (some other ideas for sides: creamy mushroom, baked potatoes, or Spätzle – a traditional south German pasta).
I did venture into the unknown again with another recipe I found on one of my favourite cooking apps (Kitchen Stories) – Roasted brussels sprouts in soya sauce. But of course, being my dad’s son, I had to get creative here as well, and threw in some green asparagus to go along. The end-result is in the picture on the left.
The most difficult part I think is time-management – leave your meat in for too long and you miss the sweet spot for the perfect tender meat. You also want your sides to be finished as soon as the meat is ready to be plated, and my Brussels sprouts did dry out a bit too much, but I was still quite satisfied with the end-product: lip-smackingly delicious, especially for a first attempt.
And of course, no Christmas meal is complete without a dessert. Here too I went with something new and tried Apple Crumble in a Glass.
New traditions have been established – next Christmas can’t come soon enough!
The recipe for pork medallions can be found at https://elsatable.com/recipe/pork-medallions/
Recipes for Brussels sprouts and Apple Crumble can be found at https://www.kitchenstories.com/en/our-app/
