Franconian Comfort Food.

It's drab and grey outside, there's lots and lots of rain (though no snow at all), December is almost around the corner, the festive season is getting ready to waft its gingerbread-smelling tentacles into our general direction...

which all means that I'm slowly getting ready for the baking spree. For which I've posted almost all of my recipes during the past years. So today, for a change, you get the recipe for a kind of comfort food, Franconian style.

If you've ever visited the area, you will probably know that local food is rather heavy on pork products - there's lots of meat dishes. There are also onions (grown in great quantity, traditionally, around Bamberg, which is called "Zwiebeltreterland" - "land of the people stepping on onions"). There's also wonderful pure rye bread.

And then, Franconia is divided into two parts: the beer part (where I come from, and where Bamberg still counts to) and the wine part (which is not very far from here, and has mostly white wines, and mostly dry ones).

Now... if you add pork sausages, onion, bread and wine together, throw in some spices and some vinegar, you get a dish called "Blaue Zipfel" (Blue ... well... ends. As in sausage ends.)

Success of this recipe depends on you being able to get good (or at least decent), fresh Bratwürste - that are sausages intended to be fried. The best of all of them, of course, are Franconian ones - they are, typically, pork, have a rather coarse consistency of the filling, and are seasoned with herbs, though not overwhelmingly so. For this recipe, they are not fried, but gently heated in a hot acidic broth until done.

The broth for four persons is made by mixing a litre of water (or a bit more), 200-500 ml of (preferably dry, preferably Franconian) white wine, 200-500 ml of white vinegar, and a bit of sugar to taste (recipes vary between no sugar at all and up to 100 g). Add about 1 teaspoon of peppercorns, 4 laurel leaves, 10 juniper berries, 10 cloves, 1 teaspoon of salt, and 1 tablespoon mustard seeds. The wine can be replaced by a bit more vinegar (or just left away completely), but it will add to the taste of home. At least if you're from hereabouts!

Peel and cut onions into half rings (recipes vary between one large onion per person to 250 g of onion per person). If you like to have more colour and more veggies, you can cut carrots into julienne strips as well (make sure they are not too long, so they can fit onto a spoon easily).

Bring the broth to a boil, add the onions and optional carrots, and simmer until the onions are done but still have a little bit of bite left. Then turn the temperature down even more, add the sausages (2 per person) and let them sit in the hot broth for 20-30 minutes.



This is traditionally served with rye bread (preferably, you guessed it, Franconian bread). It's not looking like much, it's quite acidic, it's warming, it's lovely - and for me, a true autumn-winter-comfort food.