muckefuck | Finding my head again or losing it completely

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eats,
german

Finding my head again or losing it completely

While we're on the subject of German food, here's something fresh and light that should get that spleeny taste out of your mouth:

I can't tell if I'm closer than ever to rediscovering one of my favourite dishes from my student days in Germany or if I'm only mired deeper into confusion. One of the regular side-dishes as the Mensa (university cafeteria) I regularly ate at in Freiburg was a salad consisting of entire heads of lettuce. They were small--bite size, in fact--and consisted of smooth-edged, spoon-shaped leaves. I remember this being called Kopfsalat ("head salad") and assumed it came from the fact that the heads were eaten whole rather than being plucked apart.

But an article I was reading on Badener cuisine mentioned Nüssli (Standard German Feldsalat) as a popular local green. A trip to Wikipedia informs me that this is a dialect name for what in the States I've always heard called mâche. But I was startled to see in the pictures of it the closest similarities to this aforementioned "Kopfsalat" I've ever seen. It's been so long, I can't remember the taste well enough to confirm that it had the "nutty" flavour supposedly associated with mâche (the Badisch name actually means "little nut"), but that would explain why I ate it so readily. If I've had mâche in this country, it's only been as leaves in a mix, never as whole heads, which is why I would never have made a connexion earlier.

But, so far, my research hasn't turned up any instances of "Kopfsalat" being used to describe Valerianella locusta, only Lactuca sativa var. capitata which is--of all things--a close relative of iceberg. Now you know that the tasty green I've been pining for all these years couldn't possibly have anything to do with nasty old iceberg, so I'm vexed. Where to turn now? To a friendly greengrocer who will sell me whole heads of mâche for a pretty penny for a tableside taste test, I guess.

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I grew up with something called kopfsalat, too (Westerwald), but I was more mesmerised by the kwark-based dressing than by the leaves themselves. Your mâche there looks about right, but I too cannot testify to nutty flavour; definitely not iceberg. ick.

When I first realised you weren't American, I thought you were Irish. Then you posted something that made me think you were English. Now this! Are you one of them limey-kraut mongrels like the Swiss Miss (hmm, guess that makes him technically a limey cheesehead) or

pne? Or do you simply like messing with me?

You got me bang to rights, I'm a limey-kraut mongrel - though I spent most of my childhood in Cornwall, which might make me a pasty-kraut. But my mongrelitude pales in comparison with that of my kids, who also add Brazilian, Russian and Serbian to the mix - so I don't often get credit for it.

Since Feldsalat doesn't come in real "heads", your description made me think of Brussels sprouts first. ;)

I've never heard of "Kopfsalat" meaning anything other than plain old lettuce... But if it hasn't changed in Freiburg, maybe you can ask a student there.

Why don't you folks like iceberg?

Iceberg has no flavour.
Iceberg has no nutritional value.
All iceberg has is crunch. But it's often shredded and left to sit before being added to convenience foods here, thereby losing even that.

I seriously don't understand why anyone ever eats the stuff in a world with romaine/cos, bibb, oak leaf, red leaf, spinach, mâche, argula, frisée, radicchio, sorrel, and dozens of other varieties of greens that actually taste good and give you valuable vitamins.

I love the crunch, and it's rather succulent in comparison, while eating oak leaf, frisée or especially Lollo Rosso feels more like stuffing an Elizabethan ruff down your throat. Iceberg is also easier to get, store and handle than all the others (bibb gets bad quickly). Don't really care much about nutrients, but I read that iceberg has lots of vitamin A.

Don't get me wrong, I don't dislike the others. I love arugula/rocket in particular.

Depends what you consider "lots". Pound for pound, it's way behing the others. One 15g leaf of iceberg has 75 IU of Vitamin A, or about 2% of your RDI. A single leaf of bibb lettuce has five times that amount (497 IU) and half a leaf of romaine (14g) more than 10 times (813). But the real winner is spinach. 14g have a staggering 1642 IU or a full third of your RDI. The numbers are comparable for other vitamins like C and K, minerals like calcium and iron, and protein.

That's why, if I'm going to invest some energy into munching on greens, I prefer to make it lettuce wherever possible. If I want crunch, I'll add red cabbage or raw onions.

I don't really care much about those recommendations... Have you heard about Udo Pollmer and his books? His major plea is that people should just trust their own body instead of relying on the ever-changing results of scientific studies.

it does have one valid use: if you're making a hot thai salad, or Chinese shredded squab or something like that, you can use it as a sort of lettuce wrap, where its neutrality, thinness and crunch are assets.

But shredding it and half-freezing it as the basis for a far-from Greek salad, ias done by every Cypriot diner in New Jersey, can only lead to misery.

If you're making a Thai salad and non-iceberg isn't "neutral" enough, you're not using nearly enough hot pepper. Cabbage has crunch, too.

and choi sum is a better choice in all regards except form factor; a good scallop-shell of iceberg is ideal for some wrapping applications.

But I'm really not here to defend it.

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