# Comparing high German vs. low German cooking



## pmeheran (Aug 2, 2014)

I am not exactly sure where this belongs, so I will let the admin people move it wherever.  It is about comparing hoch deuch vs. platt deuch [high vs.  low german cooking].  Suffice it to say they are very different.  The recipe my mother gave me many years ago for potato salad was nothing like what I see in recipes now.  It used no sugar or vinegar and definitely no mustard.  It was not that complicated.  The list was potatoes, hard boiled eggs, crisp bits of bacon [and you can cheat and add some bacon grease], onions, celery, mayonaise [no miracle whip]pickles and the list can go on, but no sugar and no vinegar, that's for low germans. I am not saying their food is bad, just a little strange.


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## Kayelle (Aug 2, 2014)

I'm not sure how to respond to your post. Is there a question or....?

The American cuisine has many geographical differences also.


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## GotGarlic (Aug 2, 2014)

I'm not familiar with the concepts of high and low German cooking. I did a search and found references to high and low German language characteristics based on geography, but nothing about food. 

My husband and I have hosted three German exchange students and one of the things I learned from them is that much of what Americans consider to be typically German food comes from Bavaria; I believe that's because most German immigrants came from there, fleeing persecution since they were primarily Catholic. That includes hot German potato salad with bacon and vinegar. None of our students was familiar with it; two were from Berlin and one was from Hamburg. 

It was only about 130 years ago that Germany was unified from several smaller kingdoms into one state and there were, of course, regional variations in their cuisines, just as there are in China, Thailand, Italy, the United States, etc.

I too am wondering if you have a question


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## Aunt Bea (Aug 2, 2014)

In our family the difference in potato salad and many other things was country vs city. 

The city folks used pickles, miracle whip etc.. and the country folks used celery, mayo etc...  

It was simply a case of working with what was available, to my city cousins pickle relish was a vegetable!


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## mmyap (Aug 2, 2014)

I spent the first six years of my life in Germany (Giebelstadt, Bavaria)  and spoke German exclusively until we moved to the US. My mom was German and met my step-father U.S. soldier, married etc.  We were a military family and we spent a majority of his service in German so my mom could be close to her family.   

I remember the high/low German thing being a language / accent thing.  But I was not cooking at that age so.... 

Anywho, My mothers potato salad did not use pickles or sugar.  But I have a feeling that as in any other place... every one has their family recipe and "secret ingredient."    I knew one lady that uses pimento's.  (I'm not a fan of that one.)

I sometimes make a crab meat potato salad we like.  I wouldn't read too much into potato salad variations.  Potato salad has gone global.


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## pacanis (Aug 2, 2014)

Kayelle said:


> I'm not sure how to respond to your post. Is there a question or....?
> 
> The American cuisine has many geographical differences also.


 
+1
I have no idea where you are going with this either.
Was your mother high or low? Where is your comparison?


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## GotGarlic (Aug 2, 2014)

pacanis said:


> +1
> I have no idea where you are going with this either.
> Was your mother high or low? Where is your comparison?



Since she says "low-German" food is strange, I'm guessing her family is "high-German."


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## jabbur (Aug 2, 2014)

High and low German cooking may be high is the more fancy, upscale cooking used by the nobles and ruling class as compared to the peasant/working class of cooking.  That's what I think of anyway.


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## GotGarlic (Aug 2, 2014)

jabbur said:


> High and low German cooking may be high is the more fancy, upscale cooking used by the nobles and ruling class as compared to the peasant/working class of cooking.  That's what I think of anyway.



Is this something you know for sure? I did several Google searches and didn't find anything like that.


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## Kathleen (Aug 2, 2014)

A long time ago, in German class with Herr McGlothlin, we were taught that high-German meant it came from the highlands and low-German was the low lands.  Typically, we were told that low lands have a lot of farms.

Mind you, I'm quoting Herr McGlothlin who married Helga who made the BEST German potato salad bar none.  By the time I got to German IV, I'd forgotten to ask for the recipe.


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## GotGarlic (Aug 2, 2014)

From http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_German

" "Low" refers to the flat plains and coastal area of the northern European lowlands, contrasted with the mountainous areas of central and southern Germany, Switzerland, and Austria, where High German is spoken."

Looks like you're right, Kathleen.

Two of our German exchange students gave me cookbooks in English by Dr. Oetker, who is apparently well-known there. I can paraphrase the recipe if anyone is interested.


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## Oldvine (Aug 2, 2014)

My grandmother made it clear that she spoke the "high German" and the neighbors spoke the "low German" but I can't remember her ever making a comment about high or low German potato salad.  There are 100s, if not 1000s of recipes for potato salad not all of them German, high or low.  I've made potato salad with bacon, but never included extra bacon grease or sugar but sometimes include sour cream in the dressing.  Never gave it a thought to it being high or low German.  Like Kayelle,  I can't find a question to answer so have included my comments as part of the conversation.


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## Kayelle (Aug 3, 2014)

I don't mean to sound "testy", but it's dang frustrating when an OP just hits and runs..What's up with that? Nice people deserve better. Sigh. Done here.


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## GotGarlic (Aug 3, 2014)

Oldvine said:


> My grandmother made it clear that she spoke the "high German" and the neighbors spoke the "low German" but I can't remember her ever making a comment about high or low German potato salad.  There are 100s, if not 1000s of recipes for potato salad not all of them German, high or low.  I've made potato salad with bacon, but never included extra bacon grease or sugar but sometimes include sour cream in the dressing.  Never gave it a thought to it being high or low German.  Like Kayelle,  I can't find a question to answer so have included my comments as part of the conversation.



This isn't about potato salad per se. The OP talked about high vs low German cooking and I used that as an example.


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## CraigC (Aug 3, 2014)

I can only think of formal German vs informal. Sorta like:

Was machst du heute? (informal)

Was machen Sie heute? (formal)

What are you doing/making today?


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## GotGarlic (Aug 3, 2014)

CraigC said:


> I can only think of formal German vs informal. Sorta like:
> 
> Was machst du heute? (informal)
> 
> ...



I think that's something else. Everything I have read about high and low German talks about geographical differences.


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## CWS4322 (Aug 3, 2014)

I could give you a run for your money comparing high German and low German dialects as a linguist, spent 4 years during undergraduate studies comparing German dialects and 2 more years playing with the same to earn my M.A. in linguistics (German and French). I also lived in northern Germany (Oldenburg) where there were a lot of people who spoke plattdeutsch--and there was a weekly newspaper written in pd.  

From a cook's perspective, the difference would be regional cooking and not based on whether one spoke high German or a dialect. I'm suggesting the appropriate subject title for this thread would be regional German cooking--and this would include Swiss and Austrian dishes as well. Just sayin'.


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## Oldvine (Aug 3, 2014)

I completely understood that it was not simply about potato salad but continued using the "potato salad" example in my comments.   I could have switched and used rye bread for my example adding that my grandma, that spoke high German, baked rye bread that tasted exactly as yummy as the neighbor lady's, that spoke low German.  My point was that I've never heard of a difference of high or low in German cooking.   Maybe family style as compared to nobility.  But even nobility had family style meals now and then.  Different regions in different countries have different versions of recipes.  My grandfather fled Germany leaving family members in the "nobility".  They eventually lost that status but still they spoke high German but, apparently without knowing it, were eating low German meals.  I don't feel that adding information or not understanding something is being testy.   It should be thought of as discussion.


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## GotGarlic (Aug 3, 2014)

I'm sorry, Oldvine. I didn't get that from your previous post, I think since you mentioned that there are potato salad recipes that aren't German.

CWS, I think you're right about regional differences regarding cooking rather than the German dialect one speaks.


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## Mad Cook (Aug 3, 2014)

Kathleen said:


> A long time ago, in German class with Herr McGlothlin, *we were taught that high-German meant it came from the highlands and low-German was the low lands*.  Typically, we were told that low lands have a lot of farms.
> 
> Mind you, I'm quoting Herr McGlothlin who married Helga who made the BEST German potato salad bar none.  By the time I got to German IV, I'd forgotten to ask for the recipe.


Herr McGlothlin, now there's a good old German name  he probably meant in this sense Hochdeutsch - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

However, he could have been fudging the "class" question. According to my Scots friend, Rhona, who has lived in Regensburg for half a lifetime and my Viennese friend, Barbara, the High and Low thing is also a class/snobbery thing ie the aristocracy v the peasants.

Who knows what it means in the culinary usage.


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## taxlady (Aug 3, 2014)

Mad Cook said:


> Herr McGlothlin, now there's a good old German name  he probably meant in this sense Hochdeutsch - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
> 
> However, he could have been fudging the "class" question. According to my Scots friend, Rhona, who has lived in Regensburg for half a lifetime and my Viennese friend, Barbara, the High and Low thing is also a class/snobbery thing ie the aristocracy v the peasants.
> 
> Who knows what it means in the culinary usage.


The OP also wrote the title as, "Comparing high German vs. low German cooking". Later, the OP wrote "platt deuch". Platt doesn't mean low. It means dialect. So, I think it's about the cooking of those who speak that dialect, but until the OP chimes in, we won't know for sure.


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## jennyema (Aug 3, 2014)

I took German for 8 years in school and was fluent till I went off to college .... I thought low and high was a regional thing, too.

But my father was shipped off to Germany during the Korean War (lucky!) and my mother took a Euopean vacation which included a visit with her GI boyfriend and then married him and lived for 6 years in Bavaria.

My mother is an excellent cook and brought back many recipes, includind kartoffle salat (spelling) which was served warm from the bacon grease and always had vinegar and a bit of sugar.  No pickles.  But she also omitted pickles from her rouladen too.  I guess she just didn't like them.


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## Oldvine (Aug 3, 2014)

I was pretty fluent in German too.  I had to be. Grandma could not see that well so I read to her.  It's a fond memory.   Some times while I read, she baked or cooked from memory.  But after she died, no one wanted to speak German including the cousins that spoke only German in their homes.


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## Kathleen (Aug 5, 2014)

Mad Cook said:


> Herr McGlothlin, now there's a good old German name  he probably meant in this sense Hochdeutsch - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
> 
> However, he could have been fudging the "class" question. According to my Scots friend, Rhona, who has lived in Regensburg for half a lifetime and my Viennese friend, Barbara, the High and Low thing is also a class/snobbery thing ie the aristocracy v the peasants.
> 
> Who knows what it means in the culinary usage.



Yep, I'm sure that is exactly what he meant.  He would tell us that we were learning high German and may have trouble understanding someone from the low lands as they spoke "low German."  I didn't get the idea that it was about class or formality at all.  He would compare it to someone who learned English in the UK speaking to someone who was born and raised in deep in the southern country of the States. Native English speakers would navigate it, but a new learner to English would struggle in that situation. It made sense to us.

It also makes sense that regional cooking may differ too.  He told us that Beer and Brats were more Bavarian and most of us would think of Bavarian kind of food as "German."  Oh, and top it off with Black Forest Cherry Cake from the Black Forest (of course.)  We went to a restaurant while visiting Milwaukee that was known for its southern German food, which served what we would think of as "German" except they would not give us Bier.  

Rhineland, he told us, was good for food like sauerbrauten, sauces and stollen.  

We were told to "go north" for fish.  

I'm sure there is a lot of mingling of regional foods now.  I was in Berlin two years ago, and could find most anything.

It was high school and our German exchange student taught us a wonderful and highly inappropriate song that helped us remember the "three regions" of Deutschland.  The refrain translated to, "There's the highland Deutsch and the lowland Deutsch, the Rhineland Deutsch and the other [censored] [censored] (which referred to those who claimed to be German but really were a gazillion other nationalities.)  Other smaller areas in the country all seem to fall in to one of the three large regions: Northern, Southern, and Rhineland.

Wow...and I thought I remembered precious little from high school.  It must have been the graffiti wall in the back of the room.  All in German, of course.  First thing written on it: "Wo ist Pieter?  Im Boat mit Helga."  For the record, we had many things written about Pieter und Helga.


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## GotGarlic (Aug 5, 2014)

Kathleen, that matches what I learned from our exchange students. 

One additional thing: German chocolate cake isn't German at all! It was named for a man named German who developed the chocolate bar in the 1880s used in the cake recipe.


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## CraigC (Aug 5, 2014)

GotGarlic said:


> Kathleen, that matches what I learned from our exchange students.
> 
> One additional thing: German chocolate cake isn't German at all! It was named for a man named German who developed the chocolate bar in the 1880s used in the cake recipe.



Was he hispanic/latino where G and J are pronounced like an H?

What about Black Forest Cake?


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## taxlady (Aug 5, 2014)

CraigC said:


> Was he hispanic/latino where G and J are pronounced like an H?
> 
> What about Black Forest Cake?


Oh yeah, the Black Forest Cake is German. Black Forest cake - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Interestingly, the name "Black Forest cake" is sort of misleading too. "The cake is named not directly after the Black Forest (_Schwarzwald_) mountain range in southwestern Germany but rather from the specialty liquor of that region, known as _Schwarzwälder Kirsch(wasser)_ and distilled from tart cherries."

The German chocolate cake was originally called "German's chocolate cake".

"It owes its name to an American chocolate maker named Sam German, who  developed a formulation of dark baking chocolate that came to be used in  the cake recipe." from German chocolate cake - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


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## GotGarlic (Aug 5, 2014)

CraigC said:


> Was he hispanic/latino where G and J are pronounced like an H?
> 
> What about Black Forest Cake?



I don't think so. His first name was Sam - http://whatscookingamerica.net/History/Cakes/GermanChocolateCake.htm

Black Forest cake is named for the Black Forest in Germany.


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## taxlady (Aug 5, 2014)

The original name of the chocolate in "German's chocolate cake" was "Baker's German's Sweet Chocolate". Which is kind of funny, because "Baker's Chocolate" is another one of those names that is slightly misleading. It takes its name from one of the original partners, "Dr. Walter Baker".

GG, I think you were posting at the same time as me.


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## GotGarlic (Aug 5, 2014)

taxlady said:


> The original name of the chocolate in "German's chocolate cake" was "Baker's German's Sweet Chocolate". Which is kind of funny, because "Baker's Chocolate" is another one of those names that is slightly misleading. It takes its name from one of the original partners, "Dr. Walter Baker".
> 
> GG, I think you were posting at the same time as me.



Great minds, as they say


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## CWS4322 (Aug 5, 2014)

I happen to LOVE kale and pinkel. Pinkel has a very distinct texture and is available during the winter months in Northern Germany. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdqcIq6ZQ8s

I also like plum dumplings from Austria.

German, Austrian, Swiss Recipes for English Speakers - Regional Recipe Guide to Germany, Austria and Switzerland


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## CWS4322 (Aug 19, 2014)

I stumbled across this today looking for a recipe for cabbage rolls. TaxLady, you might want to check out the sauce.

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~newayne/misc/german-recipes.txt


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## cara (Dec 27, 2014)

came upon this while searching for german chocolate cake.... many moons later ;o)

The way potato salad is made depends on the region - the version with mayonnaise is typical for the north and the west - so if you want to, you can call it the Lowlands....
oil and vinegar are more south, towards the "highlands"...
unfortunately you find oil and vinegar also in recipes from the east, the former german regions of Ostpreussen (East-Prussia..?) and Schlesien, and there are also rather low lands..


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