This is a local German-Austrian specialty that is famous in the South and of course in Austria itself. Let’s first define first names.
“Kaiser” means “Emperor” and “Schmarrn” means “Mishmash” in Austrian-German. It is one of the best known Austrian desserts, and became very popular in Bavaria. Nevertheless the translation of Kaiserschmarrn has generated some debate. “Kaiser” is literally translated as “emperor”, but the word “Schmarrn” has different definitions such as mishmash, mess, crumbs, a trifle, a nonsense, a fluff. What is Kaiserschmarrn?
Kaiserschmarrn is a light, caramelized pancake made from a sweet batter baked in butter. You can vary it with nuts, cherries, plums, apple jam or small pieces of apple, or caramelized raisins and chopped almonds. The pancake is cut into pieces while frying, shredded after preparation and usually sprinkled with powdered sugar, served hot with apple or plum sauce, or various fruits such as prunes or plums, lingon berries, strawberries or apples. Kaiserschmarrn is actually a dessert, but you can eat it as a main dish as well for diner or lunch.
Some History
It is generally agreed that the dish was first prepared for the Austrian Emperor Francis Joseph I (1830–1916). There are several stories: One story involves the Emperor and his wife, Elisabeth of Bavaria, of the House of Wittelsbach. The lady was obsessed with maintaining a minimal waistline, so she directed the royal chef to prepare only light desserts for her, much to the annoyance of her notoriously austere husband. Upon being presented with the chef’s confection, she found it too rich and refused to eat it. The exasperated Francis Joseph quipped, “Now let me see what ‘Schmarr’n our chef has cooked up”. In this sense Schmarrn means “Nonsense” but to the surprise of Franz Josef, he loved the “Schmarrn” and a new dish was born: The “Kaiser-Schmarrn” became popular across the whole empire. — Find more original German Food at www.MyBestGermanRecipes
Ingredients (4 servings)
575 ml milk
125 heavy cream
4 eggs (medium size)
1 sachet vanilla sauce – find it here
1 pinch salt
50 g sugar
250 g flour
tiny bit of baking powder (as we say “point of a knife” = Messerspitze)
30 g chopped pistachios
50 g flaked almond (they are cut into very thin slices; find it here
2 tbsp clarified butter or ghee
1 tbsp powdered sugar
almonds for decoration
Cooking Instructions Kaiserschmarrn
– Mix 200 ml of the milk and heavy cream in a bowl, add vanilla sauce and mix it with a mixer for about 2 minutes, keep it cold.
– Separate eggs; use egg yolks and mix it in a separate bowl with salt, vanilla sugar, sugar and 375 ml milk.
– Mix baking powder with flour and mix it into the egg mix slowly.
– Carefully mix in almonds and pistachios.
– Beat egg white until firm and mix it bit by bit under the batter.
– Heat 1 tbsp clarified butter in a skillet (preferably 28 cm diameter which would be a medium size skillet).
– Pour in half of the batter and bake it on medium heat until golden.
– Divide it into 4 quarters and turn it with a wide cooking spoon.
– Let it bake until a golden color.
– With a fork mash the pancake in small pieces; keep it warm and bake the remaining batter the same way.
– Dust the pancake with powdered sugar and decorate with almond thins.
– Serve it with Vanilla sauce.