Sauerkraut Recipe

This recipe is my own, but it is really a collection of ideas from many sources over the years. For New Year's Day my mother and my maternal grandmother always fixed pork roast with sauerkraut, mashed potatoes, and rye bread with caraway seed. Before putting the food onto the stove, they would always give me a pinch of raw sauerkraut to eat, as that was supposed to bring extra good luck; notice, I said it's "supposed to bring extra good luck." I would guess that a high percentage of Americans would mention sauerkraut, if they were asked to name a German food, although bratwurst has become very popular since American forces helped to occupy and defend post-World War Two Germany. This recipe has traditional German ingredients, but with some specific Alsatian influences. Alsace (German: Elsass), its most well known city being Strasbourg (German: Strassburg), was long a German land, but because it bordered on French lands, it became a highly contested region, as the French sought to incorporate it into France. Wars and the resulting treaties saw the area come under French control, but then this was largely reversed during Bismarck's time in the 1870s, when much of Alsace came back under German control (a small, but heavily French populated part remained as a part of France). This continued until the end of World War One, when the area went back under French control. Don't get too comfortable, because the German defeat of France in 1940 put the area back into Germany, but Germany's defeat in 1945 saw Alsace become a part of France, where it has remained ever since. The German dialect of Alsace is closely related to that of Switzerland, southwestern Germany (in a fairly broad area, where Stuttgart is one of the main cities), Liechtenstein and the far western tip of Austria.

The use of wine in sauerkraut is not something unusual in Germany/Austria, for while Americans correctly associate Germans and beer, wine is a common drink for Germans/Austrians, and there are several regions, especially in western Germany near and along the Rhine and Moselle Rivers, and in eastern Austria, where vineyards are plentiful and wine is produced in large quantity.

Ingredients:

2 pounds sauerkraut, well rinsed
2-3 strips of smoky bacon, cut into small pieces
2-3 garlic cloves, chopped
1 apple, chopped (Germans tend to use green apples, but I use either green or red, unpeeled, and my German relatives have yet to disown me ... then again, I haven't heard from them for a while. Hmm, maybe I'd better check on that one. LOL!
2 medium onions, chopped
1 1/2 cups of white wine (Germans generally use dry white, but I've used semi-dry white [see under the apple type, above, about my German relatives], but I wouldn't use a sweet wine, see next ingredient )
2 tablespoons of dark brown sugar
1 tablespoon black pepper (unless you're a salt fiend, you won't need salt, as the bacon, ham and sauerkraut add plenty)
1/2 lb. ham, chopped
1 pork steak, whole
4 German sausages (fresh bratwurst; that is, not the precooked type, work well)
2 Frankfurters/wieners/hotdogs, whatever term you use, preferably with natural casing
If you want to make it more Alsatian, add about 8 or 10 juniper berries and 2 bay leaves (juniper berries are used to make gin), as well as another type of sausage, like knockwurst/knackwurst.

Now, I BAKE my sauerkraut, so make sure to have an ovenproof pan (with lid) or casserole that is big enough to accommodate all of the ingredients, keeping in mind the juice that will build during baking and that you will be adding the sausages later. In a skillet, saute the bacon pieces just a couple of minutes, then add the onion. Allow to cook, stirring to get the onions just somewhat softened. Add the garlic and continue for another minute or two. In your baking pan, add the sauerkraut, the chopped apple, the wine, the ham pieces, and the bacon/onion/garlic mixture. Stir to mix. Add the pork steak on top, then add the brown sugar and pepper. Cover and place into a 275 F degree oven. You really can't overcook this, in my opinion, but after an hour, you can turn the heat DOWN to 250 F, and let the dish bake a couple of hours longer. About an hour before serving, place the sausages around the top. Any precooked sausages will just need to be well heated, but any raw sausages will need the time to properly cook through. Mash some potatoes, cut the pork steak and sausages into pieces, and dig in, putting some of the liquid over the potatoes, or in a little hollowed out spot, as you would for gravy. Don't forget the beer or wine! (I'll have a brown ale.) Oh, I almost forgot. Before cooking, take a pinch of raw sauerkraut. HEY! I just got an email from Germany. See, they haven't disowned me .... What the hell do they mean it has to be a green apple and a dry German white wine, or else?

* For the history of the word "sauerkraut," or more specifically, the word, "kraut," see: http://pontificating-randy.blogspot.com/2010/05/german-question-part-twelve.html

WORD HISTORY:
Time-This word, related to "tide," goes back to Indo European "di/da," which had the notion of "divide, separate into pieces." This produced "diman," which meant "periods of time, seasons." This gave its Old Germanic offspring "timon," with the same meanings. Whether this form only survived in the North Germanic languages is unclear to me, but Old Norse had "timi," the form still in use in Icelandic, which means "time, period," and Danish and Norwegian have "time," both pronounced like "tee-ma," and meaning "hour, class (session)," while Swedish has "timme," pronounced similar to the Danish/Norwegian, and with the same general meaning. This form "may" have then come to England with Old Norse to give Old English (Anglo-Saxon) "tima," meaning "time, period of time." Later this became "tyme," before the modern version. Before the borrowing from Old Norse, English used "tid" (long i) for "time" and "tide," before separating the two. German uses "Zeit" (the 'z' is pronounced 'ts' and 'ei' is pronounced as a long i), and "Gezeiten" for "tide" (technically "Gezeit" means 'tide,' singular, but the plural form "Gezeiten" is most often used).