Although I have spent quite some time in Germany, I never once bought Schweinbraten (I had my reasons!). Now my mom has just come back from a holiday in Switzerland, and brought some for me.
So am I supposed to get rid of the skin (thin membrane like thing covering the meat), or is that edible too? The thing is is like a rather large semi-limp penis (first analogy that came to mind), so slicing it like salami looks unlikely. Should I roast it, or pan-fry? Cook the hwole thing first and then attempt slicing it? Or cut off a bit on the top, and squeeze out the meat? By the looks of it, it doesn’t look like it can be eaten raw (or am I mistaken about that?).
Mmmmmhhhhhmmmmm… Schweinebraten. You’re making me hungry (and it’s lunch time here, but no Schweinebraten to be had)…
Normally, you should roast the Schweinebraten (that’s where the “braten” part of the name comes from). There’s a pretty good recipe here. As it says at the end, it should be served together with potato or bread dumplings, but mashed potatoes, any other form of potatoes, or even spaetzle will do in a pinch. Also, it should be served with sauerkraut, or even better “blaukraut” (cooked red cabbage). And, the most important part of the entire meal is of course a nice cold German or Czech lager.
Between the time I posted and now, I cut half the Schweinbraten, then tried to slice it (not very successful), tried to get the skin off (that worked, somewhat), and then pan-fried (smells like heaven!). It tasted super-delicious, but I did feel that it could be better.
Thanks for the tips! I’ll give it a shot tonight! I’ve even got a few packets of Roesti to go with it. No Czech or German beer though - I do have some French wine instead.
Incidentally, re: never eating pork raw. How about all the different kinds of salami available in the supermarkets. They’re edible without cooking, aren’t they?
I’m kinda ignorant about this stuff, because in India, ALL meat should be cooked - never take a chance with that!! In Germany, I was never sure what needed to be cooked, and what didn’t. As a result, it was almost at the end of my stay that I knew about most meats. Obviously Schweinbraten was not one of them. I regret that.
Yes, but this is because the pork used in salami or other cured, uncooked sausages is guaranteed to be free of trichina worms. This can be done by freezing the pork before using it to make the sausage. You can see this mentioned here. In fact in Germany another delicacy is ground raw pork (called either Schweinebrät, Bratwurstfilzl, or Schweinemett depending on which part of Germany you’re in), which is spread on bread and eaten that way. Obviously, this also has to be 100% free of trichina worms.
As you can see from the following:
the symptoms of trichinose are no laughing matter.
