So I have to apologize because on the 8th day of Christmas, I slept. After running a half marathon and cooking German food I was plum tuckered out. However, I had so much fun learning how to make the food of my German friends childhood. As many of you may have guessed I have an affinity for food (read with sarcasm) and so when someone offers to teach me something new I jump with joy! I have a dear friend who is German. She speaks German, grew up in Germany and well knows how to cook German food. So when she offered to teach me how to make Rouladen, a dish that her Mom made for the holidays when she was growing up I was ecstatic, especially because it is a beef dish and she is a vegetarian. Details, when it comes to the food of your youth, right?  And we turned the cooking lesson into a festive holidays girls night. So you can imagine the holiday spirit that 7 ladies, a few bottles of spiced wine and German comfort food can bring to a house. We actually scared away her husband...sure he said he had to attend a "retirement party," but we all know the truth. 

Rouladen is a rolled steak dish that is stuffed with bacon, onions and mustard. Some people also stuff it with pickles, but we did not. It is cooked in a red wine vegetable reduction sauce and it is so tender and flavorful that it melts in your mouth. It also makes the house smell incredible as it cooks, especially due to the fresh rosemary and celery root that is included in this dish. It is usually made with topside or round steak that is cut very thin. Originally it is believed that this dish was made with venison or pork, however today it is more common to use beef. If you go to the butcher at Gelsons and tell him you are making Rouladen he can hook you up with the meat cuts. 

So first of all take a piece of steak and layer with some mustard, salt and pepper. 

I would love to tell you the measurements, but since the recipe was in German, well my translation skills were lacking, so I just went with it. 

Next add onion and bacon to the steak. 

And roll the steak up, like a burrito.

Tie with kitchen string so they don't fall apart.

Pan fry the steak rolls. 

Meanwhile, add the vegetables to a pot. We used leeks, carrots, celery roots, onions and fresh rosemary.

I had never cooked with celery root before so I was pretty excited by this vegetable. Just chop off the top and peel it like a potato. It smells amazing like celery and we just chopped it into 1" cubes and tossed it into the pot. 

Once the vegetables are tender, add red wine and beef broth. The recipe called for vegetable broth, but we both agreed that beef broth would be better and so that is what we went with and it was awesome.

Add the meat to the vegetable/broth pot and cook for 90 minutes. 

And as you all know, every kitchen experience with me ends up creating some type of kitchen tornado and last night did not let us down, due to a cornstarch explosion. So once the meat has been cooked, add cornstarch to the broth mixture to create a gravy of sorts. 

The finished dish is served with some of the vegetables from the pot and some of the gravy. Yum! It was 100% comfort food as it was warm and cozy. The meat was perfectly tender and had a hint of spice from the mustard. The vegetables were fresh and the gravy had a great hint of salt from the broth, herbs from the rosemary and wine well from the wine. It was heaven and was perfect for the cold So Cal evening. 

Our side dishes consisted of boiled potatoes with butter and parsley, red cabbage, brussels sprouts and tater tots...yes I said tater tots. Not only were the a thing of my US youth, they were also a childhood German favorite, so we busted them out last night. We actually did a combination of regular and sweet potato tater tots and yes they were tasty, just as I remember them. 

We also had Gluhwein and if you are unfamiliar with it, it is like a spiced wine. You can buy this at Total Wine and other wine realtors and the spices are already mixed in for you. It is warm, cozy, spicy and because it is cooked it does not have the alcohol after taste. All you have to do is warm it up and pour it into mugs and enjoy. I was so excited when I saw it bottled because I use to beg my friend to bring me the spiced tea bags from Germany and I think she was starting to feel like my drug mule for wine spices. The wine spices would just be steeped in a bottle of red wine, but this is so much easier and just as tasty. 

We did not make the desserts, but the other ladies brought some incredible treats. We had a pear white chocolate almond tart, some chocolate coconut bars and some little chocolates. Needless to say none of us went hungry. 

I also wanted to just give a shout out to my new fur friend, Fernando...and by fur friend I mean we had fun in the kitchen together...not as in I brought him home. He already has an incredible home and this 18lb fur ball of love was so funny and endearing and soft and fluffy that he truly made our German night that much more festive. Cheers to Fernando!