FoodBanter.com - View Single Post - Finally decent weather to bring out the grill

In article .com>,
wrote:

> Goetta is a mixture of pork, beef, oats, herbs and spices "created" by
> the Cincinnati German-American community in the late 1880s.
> Some people say it is like scrapple, a mush of ground pork and cornmeal
> that has to be molded. But it isn't like scapple. It is more solid, and
> tastes better. It is usually cut in thin slabs and pan fried like many
> other breakfast meats.
>
> Of course, it can also be put in a sausage casing and put on the grill,
> and the locals have many, many other ways of using it. So many, that
> they started a festival. Four or five Octoberfests a year just isn't
> enought for us.<g> Beer, goetta, live music : life is good.
>
> Dean G.

When I was a child in Cincinnati I don't remember anybody selling goetta
in the stores ... but then I never looked for it cause mom made it from
scratch. Here's a recipe that I think I posted here a couple of years
ago. Is it authentic? Can't answer that. If you like it, its authentic.
If you don't, modify it till you do and then it will be authentic. ;^)

GOETTA
The quantities below just barely fit in my 4 quart pressure cooker. If
you are using a smaller cooker (which is doubtful), scale down the
quantities so it fits! Relative quantities are approximate and, IMHO,
goetta is so good that you really have to do something radical to mess
it up.

2 quarts water
5 bay leaves
2 1/2 cups pinhead oatmeal
1 lb pork and 1 lb beef, chopped into 1/4 inch chunks
-you can cheat and grind the meat, but its not soulful
1 med. to large onion, chopped
1 Tblspn minced garlic
1 Tspn sage
1 Tspn oregano
1/2 Tspn nutmeg
1 Tblspn black pepper
Salt to taste

Bring water with bay leaves to a boil in the open pressure cooker. Add
oatmeal, stirring until it boils again. Add onion and simmer, stirring
often, for 10 to 30 minutes.

Add all other ingredients, mix well, close pressure cooker and cook at
moderate pressure for 40 to 50 minutes. Keep heat low or the goetta will
stick to the bottom of the cooker.

Mold the finished products into bricks, wrap, and freeze.

Notes;
Goetta is easy to make. The only thing to worry about is burning and
sticking during pressure cooking and that¹s no real problem. Stir often
when simmering the oatmeal and once the cooker has been closed up, keep
your burner real low. I usually place the cooker off to the side of the
burner and rotate it occasionally so excessive heat doesn¹t build up on
any point on the bottom of the cooker. If the goetta appears to be
excessively soggy after pressure cooking, you can simmer it for a while
with the lid off to drive off excess moisture.

A wet goetta will take a while to fry. Just keep the fire low till it
dries out a bit and don¹t be too hasty in adding oil to prevent
sticking. It will usually act like its going to stick real bad but then,
as it browns in the skillet, you will find that it scrapes right off the
bottom and the stuff you scraped up really adds to the taste of the
finished product. If you panic early in frying and add a bunch of oil or
butter to prevent sticking, you may get stuck with some pretty greasy
goetta. If you used fatty meat, you may be able to put the goetta in a
³dry skillet² with no oil at all and it won¹t stick. If you used meat
that had little or no fat, you can drop a bit of oil in at the beginning
of the fry, or better yet, put some in when you do your pressure cooking.

Regards,
Dave W.

--
Living in the Ozarks
For email, edu will do.

During times of universal deceit, telling the truth
becomes a revolutionary act. - George Orwell, (1903-1950)