Making Spätzle

Spätzle are the little egg dumplings that are typical of German, Austrian, Swiss cooking.  Its something that my mother often made, and I have always suspected that she got the recipe from her Swiss grandmother.  One evening while at Walter and Helen's house, we made spätzle as a side dish for supper.

Helen had already made the dough.  My mother always used to simply spoon the dough into a pot of boiling water, but Helen had a special tool for making the dumplings.  It's a round metal plate with holes that is placed over the pot.  Walter placed a big spoonful of dough on the metal plate, and I used a plastic scraper to rub the dough across the plate.  The dough fell through the holes into the boiling water.

(photos were taken by Helen)

(I had warned Helen that I am a messy cook.  You can see that I made a mess on her stove.)

Once the spätzle are cooked they rise to the top, and we spooned them out.  We did several batches, until all the dough was used up.

The finished product!

Helen had made beef with vegetables, and the spätzle made a nice side dish.  It was a delicious meal.

Helen gave me the recipe for the dough, and she also gave me the metal spätzle maker and scraper to take back to Mexico.  I intend to try out the recipe and make my own here in Mexico!  I also found a recipe for Käsespätzle in which the dumplings are mixed with fried onions and melted cheese.  I'll try that out too if I can find some decent Emmentaler cheese in an upscale supermarket in Mexico.

Danke schön, Helen!