Photo by Felicia Orth

This Sunday is Family Bread Service at church. Congregants bring two loaves of bread from a recipe that is meaningful to them for cultural reasons or as a reflection of ethnicity.

Although I was aware growing up that my ethnic heritage was German-Swiss on both sides, there was no special focus on that history in my family. Nevertheless, the dishes that appeared on our table routinely and at the holidays spoke volumes: my mother served cabbage as a regular vegetable and made sauerbraten as a special treat. Mustard and horseradish were standard condiments.

My grandmother served pork with boiled potatoes and sauerkraut every week.  Braunschweiger (liverwurst) sandwiches were in my lunch bag. Pickled herring was eaten for good luck. A tightly-lidded jar of Limburger cheese was always in the refrigerator (delicious if you could get it past your nose). Potato salad was prepared with a hot bacon dressing. The cookies served during the holidays were “butter horns,” intricate roll-ups made with meringue and ground walnuts.

Pumpernickel may be the most well-known German bread, but onions (raw or roasted) in the dough can mark a bread as German, too. For several years, I have brought this bread to the Bread Service, adapted from a recipe in “A Santa Fe Gallery of Recipes” published by the Santa Fe Community Foundation in 1994. It’s not a family recipe, but it takes me back to the flavors of my childhood, and I’ll be preparing it in one of my grandmother’s mixing bowls.

Ingredients:

In a large bowl, mix yeast in ¼ cup lukewarm water, sprinkle with sugar, and let rest until bubbly, about 10 minutes. 

Add sour cream and salt and blend well. Beat in the butter, egg, onion and dill. Blend in 2 cups flour, then knead in additional flour until the dough is smooth and pliable. 

White onions are good in this recipe. Photo by Felicia Orth

The lacy and fragrant dill weed. Photo by Felicia Orth

Photo by Felecia Orth