Mischling Deutsch.

Sure there was Kassler, but the meal was more ‘free’ German than ‘serienmäßig‘ German.

It was also very allium-y, spring allium-y in particular: Each of the entrée’s 3 elements included a different local mild spring ‘onion’.

The vegetables were superb; both potatoes and chard, like almost everything else, were from the Union Square Greenmarket, and so quite local.

• the chopped white sections of half a dozen ramps from Dave’s Max Creek Hatchery, the green leaves reserved for the end, softened over a low to moderate flame in a tablespoon or so of Organic Valley ‘Cultured Pasture Butter’ that had been heated inside a heavy, medium-size tin-lined copper skillet, after which two smoked 9-ounce loin pork chops from Schaller & Weber were added, the pot covered with a universal copper lid, kept above a very low flame (just enough to warm the chops through, as they were already fully-cooked), turning the meat once, then, near the end of the cooking time (I went for about 8 minutes this time), then the lamp leaves that had been set aside earlier, now sliced lengthwise, added for a minute or so, the pork removed from the skillet and arranged on 2 plates, brushed with a little horseradish jelly [!] from Berkshire Berries
• ten or 11 Pinto (or Pinto Gold) potatoes from Norwich Meadows Farm, scrubbed, boiled, unpeeled, in generously-salted water until barely cooked through, drained, halved, and dried in the still-warm vintage Corning Pyrex Flameware blue-glass pot in which they had cooked, tossed there with a bit of Portuguese house olive oil from Whole Foods Market, and a cuttings from the stem of a spring red onion, also from Norwich Meadows Farm, seasoned with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, arranged on the plates, sprinkled with chopped bronze fennel, once again from Norwich Meadows Farm
• one bunch of beautiful rainbow chard from Eckerton Hill Farm, wilted in a couple tablespoons of olive oil in which 2 sliced spring garlic stems from John D Madura Farm had first been heated and slightly softened, seasoned with sea salt and freshly-ground black pepper, finished with a little juice from an organic Whole Foods Market lemon, and, finally, a drizzle of olive oil

• the wine was a German (Rheingau) white, Rheingau Riesling Trocken, Weinhaus Ress 2016, from Astor Wines
• the music was an album of some of Valentin Silvestrov’s music for piano and orchestra, Alexei Lubimov performing at the piano, with Dennis Russell Davies conducting the Radio Symphonieorchester Wien

 

[image of Weingut Balthasar Ress Weinberge, in Hattenheim, Rheingau, from this Weinhandel site]