Auf Wiedersehen, Paul

For anyone following along with us on Twitter or Facebook or – gasp – real life over the last couple of weeks (though obviously not here, as we've not been cooking much thanks to jungle heat and a busted-ass kitchen), we've been rooting for Japan and Germany in the World Cup. This has nothing to do with any love for the old Axis – we laughed heartily when Italy's theatre troupe got booted. No, we just felt an affinity with a couple of young teams considered too inexperienced to do much of anything yet who somehow were putting on clinics against the established order.

That and the nicknames "Mannschaft" and "Blue Samurai" sound like fun toys.

At any rate, once Japan was out, we put all our emotional chips on Germany. We rallied with the handful of Germans in Paris at one of the very few German bars in town for every match, drinking litres of Paulaner, eating Currywurst and Bratwurst like it was going out of style, and cheering roaringly (yet in an ever so orderly and polite manner) for every goal. And there were a lot of them.

Then that slimy Paul the Psychic Octopus came along and picked Spain to beat Germany in the semi-finals. It turned out that that mother bitch of a mollusk was right, and we ended up leaving our local Bier und Bratwurst bar all heartbroken. Vowing to eat Paul, of course. We weren't the only ones with the idea, but none of our friends on the other side of the border have gloated about eating octopus today.

So in honor of our fallen second-favorite team, we have stepped up to the plate. We hereby present fellow fans of the Mannschaft a couple of octopus dishes we worked out tonight.

Parsley salad with octopus tentacles

Almost every western preparation of octopus sounds like the one proposed in the second article linked above: Grill it and garnish with olive oil, lemon juice, and garlic. It's good, but dammit, it reminds me too much of time spent rolling around naked, chugging wine and eating seafood on the beaches of... you guessed it... Spain. Hmph! What to do?

Before leaving the office this evening I called Alannah to let her know I'd be stopping by the Asian market to pick up some octopus. "I need flat-leaf parsley. And a lemon. Must. Have."

I didn't tell her what I was up to, but I was inspired by Fergus Henderson's parsley salad (which he serves with his signature roasted marrow bones). We tossed some flat-leaf parsley and finely sliced onion with salt, lemon juice and olive oil, and topped the salad with bite-sized pieces of octopus tentacle pan-grilled with the tried and true olive oil, lemon juice, and finely chopped garlic. A little Spanish. A little English. Simple. Delicious. Vindictive.

And delightfully refreshing with a pint of lager on a ridiculously hot, muggy summer night, if you're looking for the right beverage.

Octopus Schnitzel over squid ink Spätzle.
Tell your German friends it's "Kaviar"

The second dish isn't quite as fit for a mosquito-ridden Parisian summer, but we simply had to do right by Deutschland. I basically pounded a "filet" of octopus tentacle with the rough side of a meat tenderizer, dredged it through an egg, floured it and fried it. There: Octopus Schnitzel. Throw a squeeze of lemon on it and you're good to go.

Alannah seriously stepped things up. She's good with Späetzle, a German egg pasta made with an equal amount of flour and egg, and enough milk to make it viscous and goopy (but not liquidy). The easiest recipe calls for two eggs, 1 cup of flour and a 1/4 cup of milk. This makes more than enough for two people. We added a pinch of salt but skipped the usual nutmeg for a different magic ingredient: Squid ink – about a tablespoon of it. (Octopus ink would've been more appropriate, but where the hell do you get that? And does it taste the same? Let us know.)

To cook Spätzle (blackened by squid-ink or not), you squeeze your viscous goo through the holes of a strainer into a pot of salted hot water. Let the Spätzle cook for a few minutes (if they're floating, they're done) and pull out with a slotted spoon into an oiled or buttered bowl. This keeps them from sticking. Before serving, toss with butter or olive oil. (I broke the rules and used both, without telling Alannah.)

The end result was even better than anticipated. While an octopus Schnitzel may sound 10 shades of wrong, it came out remarkably light and paired really well with the slightly squid-y Späezle.

Germany may be known more for beer, precision engineering, and Scheiße videos than for seafood, but by applying German technique to cephalopods, the results are pretty damn good.

So there you have it. It may not be Paul the Psychic Octopus himself, but we nailed one of his cousins good n' hard.

Getting Stuffed, German Style

As if the previous weekend's overindulgence in London wasn't enough, it was off to Germany this past weekend. While the focus of our trip was Düsseldorf, travel issues forced us to spend more time than planned on train changes in Brussels and Köln. And though they were an inconvenience, we found ways to take full advantage.

Half a minute of pleasure

Despite being laid over two hours in Brussels to change Thalys trains, we didn't have much time to indulge Belgian style. Not only was getting anywhere on Brussels' cramped, slow metro system time-consuming (half an hour to go three stops!?) but the weather was so bad, even the locals wouldn't come out with their carts to sell us waffles and fries.

No matter, though. I managed to find one of the most charming beer bars in town, Au Bon Vieux Temps, to relive the greatest part of a previous visit: Westmalle. It's the only Trappist ale you can get on draft (all the others are bottle conditoned).

Unfortunately, by the time we ordered, we had about thirty seconds before we'd have to suffer the godforsaken transit system back to Brusells-Midi/Zuid station, so we more or less chugged our monastery-brewed liquid goodness and booked it back to catch the Thalys train.

But even when not properly appreciated, a proper Trappist ale is, um, appreciably better than most of the swill served up on our side of the border, where Heineken-brewed Affligem passes for an Abbey ale. Poor monks. Not only can they not get it on, but their finest product has been jacked by a conglomerate.

Meat and two veg. Maybe three.

Köln (Cologne) - Brauerei Früh - Do you see the onion, tomato, and lettuce used as garnish above? (Alongside the little pretzels...) Ogle them, because you won't see anymore vegetables. The platter above - consisting of aforementioned garnish, Leberwurst (liver sausage), Blutwurst (blood sausage), Speck (bacon), potato salad and aged cheese contained the last vestige of veg we saw until our return to France. That said, the charcuterie and cheese were so good, we didn't even miss food that contained color.

Taste the golden spray

The beer you wash down all that meat and cheese and dark bread with in Köln is, naturally, called Kölsch. It's light. It's nutty. It's refreshing. And it goes down way too easily. It's as though it's made to go with food. Or without food. Or to be drank by the gallon between train rides. And the waiters know this. They just keep bringing it until you stop them, marking your coaster with a pencil to keep a tally of how many you've had. Not to make sure you don't overindulge, but because it's a much easier way to keep track of the huge quantities being ordered at each table.

We didn't want to leave. We could've ordered even more cured Wursts and other unmentionable animal parts, but we eventually had to get to our destination, Düsseldorf. Which isn't to say we didn't get our tubesteak on before hopping on another train. After all, they sell Bratwurst and Currywurst on the train platforms there.

Slurping on the Axis

Who knew that the best Japanese food I'd ever have in Europe would be in Düsseldorf, Germany? The locals, apparently. People there line up – even in freezing weather (thanks to a heated bench) – for Na Ni Wa's array of authentic ramens. They're big, they're the real deal, and in proper German fashion, they're meaty. Really meaty. I had more cha-shiu in my bowl of ramen than in all the bowls of ramen I've eaten in Paris combined. And that's a lot of ramen. (And never you mind that green onion. It's not a vegetable. It's a garnish.) While Alannah slurped up the most fantastic curry ramen, I went for what they call the "Stamina." It's actually a kim-chi ramen, but they call it stamina because you seriously need some if you want to make it through the giant bowl, not to mention the serious dose of spices.

Oh, but it burns so good. Twice, even.

I like 'em older

Na Ni Wa had dominated us. Bound us. Tied us. Made us her bitch. Despite the fascinating array of old-school German brewhouses (and their accompanying menus), we couldn't eat another bite. But, we theorized, beer is liquid, and thus can fill the crevices without (most likely) killing us.

So we parked ourselves at a booth in Brauerei Uerige to imbibe in some Altbier. That means "old beer," but it's not old, just made using old methods that predated lighter-colored lagers. (By pre-dated, I mean back to the 16th century.) Alt is the Shirley Bassey of beers - older, darker, and still worth fantasizing about after all these years. And despite its rich appearance, its far from heavy, so you can keep drinking it just like with the Kölsch. See the marks on the coaster above for proof.

Swingin' with the locals

We don't go traveling solely to eat, you know. In fact, the main motivation behind this trip was to see Depeche Mode's final concert of their Tour of the Universe. So we'd met up with fans from all over (and stayed with our friends in nearby Dortmund). Upon the suggestion of one of the locals, a bunch of us got together for a pre-show lunch at Im Füchschen ("The Little Fox") for more Düsseldorfer Brauerei action.

While the beer didn't flow quite as freely (four non-drinkers and slower service in general), I managed to rack up five tallies of Alt on my coaster over lunch.

Lunch itself was a gorgeous, dark set of balls... Liver balls (or dumplings, though they weren't very bready) known as Leberkloße. As part of my put-as-many-unknown-meats-in-your-mouth-as-you-can travel/eating policy, I was excited to try this new sensation... and admittedly a little apprehensive. While the balls themselves were a bit organ-y, they were brilliant with a bit of gravy, sauerkraut and mashed potatoes. To be honest, I also ordered it because I was hoping the sauerkraut would somehow compensate for the lack of vegetables in my diet. But, of course, the cabbage was cooked down to near-nothingness, leaving the chunks of bacon mixed within as the only morsels.

Alannah, growing tired of mystery meats, stuck to the plain Schnitzel.

Stick it in your pretzel hole

If I learned anything at the concert Saturday night, it's that if Germans aren't drinking beer, they're eating. And because outside of a Brauerei there may be a five to ten minute gap between beers, there is food available everywhere. And when I say everywhere, I mean on the floor, in front of the stage, within the audience, at a concert. Not only were there vendors going around selling beer, cola and – WTF? – pre-made caipirinhas, but they'd also come around with enormous baskets of pretzels, cheese bread, and other baked snacks the size of your head. A small bicycle bell on the handle of the basket alerted us to their (omni)presence.

I didn't indulge, fearing that having anything more to eat would make me have to go drop the kids off at the pool during Depeche Mode's most energetic, energized, electrifying show in decades (though the previous week's gig at Royal Albert Hall was their best ever, but in a totally different way).

Between after-parties, staying out late, sleeping in really late, and rushing to catch mostly canceled trains during Europe's biggest storm since the late 90's, our eating and drinking adventure ended prematurely, but this is probably a very good thing.

A steady diet of fat and beer since the previous weekend – while culinarily inspiring in some ways – has actually given us a new mandate: To detox.

So we promise... The next update will be about something healthy. Something fresh. Something that doesn't involve squeezing meat, pulling casings, or chugging as fast as the tap allows. Unless, of course, I find a cheap ticket to Prague.