Category: food and drink.

food and drink.

Ethnic food, Westphalian style

 

Scrapple is a great example of a polarizing food—people either love it or think it’s abominable.

I happen to love it because it’s substantially similar to Panhas, a traditional Westphalian food that was one of my comfort dishes growing up. (The recipe for Panhas was imported by German immigrants, which is why it’s mostly made and eaten in and around Pennsylvania and parts of the mid-Atlantic region.)

Panhas and scrapple used to make use of the broth and pig parts left over after pig-butchering and sausage-making. The ingredients, preparation, and flavor place scrapple and Panhas (and their close cousin, the Dutch Balkenbrij) in the black pudding family.

Slice it, fry it up, serve it with eggs and bread. Now you, too, can eat like a 17th century Westphalian peasant!

food and drink.

Po-tay-toes

 

All right, the All Dressed potato chip flavor is pretty damn good. I stocked up in Canada, and today I saw that our local grocery store carries at least one brand variety of All Dressed as well. (For the uninitiated, of which I was one until recently, All Dressed is a combination of ketchup, BBQ, sour cream & onion, and salt & vinegar flavorings. It’s a little more tart and less sweet than your average BBQ chip.)

5/5, would (and will) binge again.

food and drink. history.

One of the top three American inventions

 

Why didn’t anyone inform me that licorice-flavored gum is a thing?

(Today I learned that Black Jack has been around since 1884, that it was the first flavored gum in the United States, and that it was the first gum to be offered in sticks.)

castle frostbite. cultural oddities. food and drink.

Achtung! Kein Kinderlakritz!

“An acquired taste is an appreciation for something unlikely to be enjoyed by a person who has not had substantial exposure to it. It is the opposite of innate taste, which is the appreciation for things that are enjoyable by most persons without prior exposure to them.”  –Wikipedia

I explained the concept of acquired taste to my kids as flavors that you generally have to grow up with to find them appealing. Salmiak is a great example of acquired taste. It’s licorice (which in itself is a polarizing taste–people tend to either love it or absolutely hate it), but not the sweet form you can find in grocery stores everywhere. Salmiak licorice cranks the flavor dial up to 19 because it is flavored with ammonia salt (ammonium chloride), which gives it an extremely intense astringent taste.

Salmiak is only common in Scandinavia, the Netherlands, and northern Germany. It’s pretty much impossible to find outside of those areas. People who love salmiak flavor almost invariably grew up with it, and I’ve never met anyone that liked it who wasn’t from one of those countries. Everyone else usually finds it disgusting. In Germany, salmiak licorice has to be labeled “Erwachsenenlakritz-Kein Kinderlakritz” (“Adult Liquorice – Not Children’s Liquorice”). Even my son, who’s the only other person in the house that likes licorice, will not touch the salmiak licorice. It’s pretty much the only candy I can buy for myself and just leave sitting out in the kitchen somewhere because I know it’s in no danger of being pilfered by teenagers in search of a snack.

The little baggies in the picture are salmiak-flavored Fisherman’s Friend menthol drops. I usually carry one of those with me when I am out of the house in the winter because let me tell you, that ammonia salt in combination with menthol will clear your sinuses right up. My daughter came down with COVID a few weeks ago, but nobody else in the house got it. I know it’s likely because she was mostly isolated in her room and we’re fully vaccinated and boostered with the new bivalent shots, but I’d like to think that the virus didn’t find a foothold in my nasal passages because it smelled the ammonia salt from the salmiak and went all, “Nope, nope, nope. I’m out.”

 

food and drink. writing.

My morning brain fuel of choice

A lot of my writer friends basically live on coffee. I like it every now and then, but it’s not a daily thing for me. It’s what I get when I am grabbing breakfast while out and about, not what I make every morning to get going.

At Castle Frostbite, we drink tea instead, and a lot of it.

This is our morning fuel. It’s Ostfriesentee, a German tea blend from East Frisia (where they drink more tea per capita than anyone else in the world.) It’s a pretty strong Assam/Ceylon blend.

This is what I drink when I am working. On a normal day, I probably have four or five cups of tea before lunch. The East Frisians drink theirs with cream and rock sugar, but ain’t nobody got time for East Frisian tea ceremonies around here, so I drink mine plain and black.

You can get it all over northern Germany, but it’s almost impossible to find in the US, so I bring back ten pounds or so whenever I visit the family, and my brother kindly ships me some whenever I can’t make it over in time before our stock runs low. But every time I do bring back a suitcase full of neatly packaged one-pound packs of black tea, I do feel a little bit like an international drug smuggler, even if it’s a legal drug.

food and drink.

The highest and most noble use for potatoes

Every expat I know has a dietary vice they imported from their home country. It’s invariably something that is a.) bad for you, and b.) hard to obtain outside of its country of origin. Those two factors combine to make it far more desirable than it would be if you could walk down to the local grocery store and see it readily available at all times.

For me, it’s these:

These, my friends, are objectively the very best potato chips in the world–FunnyFrisch-brand Chipsfrisch Ungarisch.

I bring them back in bulk when I am in Germany, and I barter with German friends and relatives, exchanging a box of FunnyFrisch for whatever items they want to get from the U.S. but can’t readily get in Germany. (My brother, for example, has a thing for Chips Ahoy cookies with Reese’s bits…don’t ask me why.) But with the costs of parcel mail between Germany and the U.S., it’s thing that happens once or twice a year at most because the postage is usually far more expensive than the contents of the box.

There are online grocery stores that sell these on Amazon if you’re dying to put my claim of “best chips in the world” to the test, but they’re stupid expensive when bought that way, to the tune of $8-10 for a single 150g bag, so I only use that channel in life-threatening potato chip emergencies. It’s probably a good thing they are that expensive via the ‘zon, though, because otherwise I’d have them on auto-refill, which wouldn’t be good for my middle-aged waistline.

castle frostbite. family. food and drink.

The Spirits of Christmas

Robin gave me a neat holiday gift this year: an advent calendar of cocktails. Each day, she handed me a little numbered and labeled bag with ingredients and a recipe for a different holiday-themed cocktail. If you’ve been following my instagram feed, I’ve documented most of them there.

The one in the picture above was the last little baggie on Christmas Day, Santa’s Whiskey Flip. It’s made with honey bourbon, brandy, calvados, and peach schnapps.

My favorite of the bunch was the Signal Fire, though. It’s basically a Manhattan with a bit of maple syrup and peaty Scotch instead of bourbon. A little sweet, bitter, and smoky all at the same time. I’ll be adding that one to the permanent repertoire in the Castle Frostbite bar.

That was a gift that took weeks of logistics and footwork for Robin, researching recipes and buying and stashing all the ingredients in secret. It was a lot of fun to try out a new cocktail together every night. Of all the Christmas gifts I’ve ever received, that was by far the most involved and thoughtful one.

 

books. food and drink. travel. writing.

a wild blog update appears!

If I’m less active on social media at the moment, it’s because I am finishing up FIELDS OF FIRE, Frontlines #5, for delivery to my publisher.

(FIELDS OF FIRE already has a pre-order page if you want to put your order in early, but be aware that the delivery date is provisional and can change.)

Other than my typical “finish line sprint” stress, things are going swimmingly here in scenic Upper Cryogenica. The weather is lovely, the kids have two weeks of school left, and my calendar is pretty light for the rest of the year. I just attended Manticon in Minneapolis as Guest of Honor and had a great time. Manticon (and its sister con, Honorcon) are military science fiction conventions run by The Royal Manticoran Navy, the official fan organization for David Weber’s Honor Harrington series, and they’re all lovely and fun people with a shared enthusiasm for all things Military SF. They made me an honorary Sergeant Major in the Royal Manticoran Army, which was pretty cool:

IMG_3075 (Edited)

Manticon was also the first occasion where someone other than me mixed Shockfrost cocktails, which were a crowd-pleaser. They taste great, and watching the preparation is kind of fun. (Video is still uploading to YouTube at the speed of molasses in the freezer, so refresh in a little while if it’s not loading yet.)

And on the last day of the con, a bunch of TRMN folks kicked off the inaugural meeting of the official Frontlines fan club, if you can believe that. (There’s a Facebook group and everything.)

The weekend was fun, but now I have to put the pedal to the metal finishing up FIELDS, so don’t be surprised if you don’t see a whole lot of me on the FaceTwits until this thing is in the bag.

books. food and drink.

frontlines: the cocktail.

Just in time for the upcoming Manticon (where I will be Guest of Honor), I present to you the first Frontlines-themed cocktail: the Shockfrost.

Those of you who have read ANGLES OF ATTACK will know that the Shockfrost is featured in the novel as the specialty of the bars on the ice moon New Svalbard, and that it’s supposed to pack quite a punch. Andrew mentions the look (blue) and the flavors of the drink when he tries one for the first time (notes of licorice, mint, and God-knows-what-else). So I made a trip to the liquor store for ingredients and experimented with the flavors a bit to create a real-world replica.

Frontlines Shockfrost:

1.5oz Bombay Sapphire Gin

1.5oz Blue Curacao

1.5oz Everclear 151

1/4oz. (a dash) of absinthe (Pernod will substitute)

1/4oz. (a dash) of peppermint schnapps

Put 4-5 ice cubes into a shaker and add all ingredients except for the Everclear. Shake until ice cold.

Take a lowball glass and pour the Everclear into it. Swirl to coat glass with Everclear. With a long-nosed lighter, set the Everclear on fire and let it burn for a few moments.

Dump contents of the shaker, ice included, into lowball glass to extinguish the Everclear. Drink one of those for a really good mood, drink two to get soaked, drink three if you want to forget what planet or moon you’re currently on.

(In the novel, Sergeant Fallon lights her drink and puts it out with her hand before downing it. In real life, that would take a great deal more Everclear than I added to the recipe. Let’s just say that the ice miners on New Svalbard don’t screw around when it comes to getting drunk, and that they like their cocktails strong enough to fuel a drop ship.)

For expediency, you can add the Everclear in the shaker and pour the whole thing without lighting the glass on fire, but that takes away half the fun.

 

 

IMG_2938

food and drink.

german food favorites.

Food loves kindled or rekindled on our Germany trip:

 

1.) Ostfriesentee (East Frisian tea)

Ostfriesentee is a very dark Assam blend, strong enough to keep its flavor when using cream and sugar in it like the East Frisians do. This is a real kick-in-the-pants blend that can hold its own against strong coffee when it comes to getting the synapses kick-started in the morning. (East Frisia has a strong tea culture–they consume about fifteen times the German annual average, and East Frisians consume the most tea per capita in the world.)

2.) Hefeweizen (wheat beer)

I’ve not been a huge fan of hefeweizen before, but on our trip, my brother liberally plied me with Erdinger, and I’ll be damned if my tastebuds didn’t get used to it. Hefeweizen is the least hoppy of all the beers I know. All of a sudden, I find it exceedingly drinkable. The closest thing I can find to Erdinger locally is Harpoon’s UFO Weissbier (UnFiltered Offering). It’s not quite the same–it has a sort of citrus-y note that Erdinger lacks–but it’s close enough.

3.) Broetchen

Broetchen are the breakfast rolls you can get just about everywhere in Germany. Bakeries have them. Grocery store bread counters have them. Gas stations have them. They’re crunchy on the outside, soft and fluffy on the inside, and they’re the primary staple of a proper German breakfast. You slice them in half and spread jam or Nutella or cream cheese on them, or slap a few slices of Schinken (prosciutto) or other cold cuts on there. Simple as they look, they’re really hard to replicate in a home baking setting. Even the Germans don’t bother–Broetchen are so widely available everywhere that nobody goes through the effort of trying to make them from scratch, which is why it’s hard to even find a recipe for plain Broetchen.

4.) Frikadellen

Frikadellen are a cross between a burger patty and a meatball. They’re the perfect “hand food” for snacks on the go, and there isn’t a pub in Germany that doesn’t offer them as beer food. Unlike Broetchen, Frikadellen are easy enough to make at home, though, and recipes are ubiquitous.

 

If that list gives the impression that we spent our time in Germany mostly with eating and drinking, you would be absolutely correct. Yet despite all the excess, I only carried an extra 3/4 pound home with me, and I’m already back down to where I was before the trip. I’m guessing that all that running around had something to do with the fact that I didn’t gain ten pounds while we were there, because I put away a lot of calories.