Wursteplatte with Potatoes and Paprika Cream Gravy

Wursteplatte with Potatoes and Paprika Cream Gravy is a comforting meal of mixed sausages with kraut, potatoes and creamy paprika gravy.

Wursteplatte with Potatoes and Paprika Cream Gravy

By Sue Lau | Palatable Pastime

It’s been some years since I mastered seasoning and cooking up an acceptable pot of sauerkraut. My mother, bless her heart, would open a can and just dump it in a pot and heat it and the deluxe version of that was the same except for adding spareribs. Dad seemed to like it. It was classic 1960’s fare. But my brothers and I would have rather had limb torn from limb than eat it. Yeah, it was that good.

So my bad luck of having to sit at the table until I “cleaned my plate” continued in a way after I married Bill. He comes from heavily German roots and has a deep love for sauerkraut. I have fought my way through the struggles of it, as I needed to be able to enjoy the kraut he so wanted for dinner. And this, after decades of success, is just another way of seasoning it (as there is more than one good way.) It’s called “wursteplatte”, incidentally, because it is just a dinner of wursts/sausages on a plate with appropriate side dishes.

In my kitchen today, no longer the young bride, I can set my sights towards new and interesting sauces, and even new and unexpected ways to eat sauerkraut. I have even expanded into desserts! But this recipe wraps itself around the sauce- which is at once a gravy for mashed as well as carry the character of paprikash. You can split the recipe up as you will- serve the sauce maybe with chicken, or bypass the sauce and serve the wursts on buns with the kraut and maybe horseradish.

For Oktoberfest, this can be part of the fun to experiment how to change things up in the kitchen. Go crazy and make it your own with your own special touches.

Sometimes, mad experimentation can go foul, like the pumpkin spice cocktail I made earlier (the dish drain drank it more readily than I did), but sometimes the things a person plays around with in the kitchen can be a revelation. And that’s where all the fun in cooking lies- if cooking is just a chore for you, put some fun back into it by trying something new.

And always, enjoy. Until tomorrow-

~Sue

Wursteplatte with Potatoes and Paprika Cream Gravy

Servings: 4
Time: 4hr 15mins
Difficulty: easy
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Ingredients:

1 large onion, chopped
2 pounds sauerkraut, drained
1 cup apple cider
1 tablespoon paprika
2 tablespoons Dusseldorf mustard or other German mustard
3 tablespoons dill pickle brine
1/4 cup Riesling wine (sweet German white wine)
1 pound mettwurst or smoked sausages
1 pound Nuernberger bratwurst or other cooked bratwurst

Paprika Cream Gravy:

3 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon paprika
salt and black pepper to taste
2 cups chicken broth
1/2 cup sour cream
whipped/mashed potatoes or cooked egg noodles (optional)

Method:

Place onion, kraut, cider, paprika, mustard, pickle brine, and white wine in a slow cooker, cover and cook on high for 3 hours.
Place sausages on top of kraut, cover again and cook on high for another hour.
Prepare your mashed potatoes or noodles if you are having that, and keep warm.
To prepare gravy, melt butter in a large skillet and stir the flour into it.
Whisk in the paprika, salt, pepper and chicken broth and cook, stirring, over low heat until gravy thickens.
Remove gravy from heat and whisk in the sour cream.
Serve gravy with potatoes or noodles on a plate with kraut and sausages.

From the kitchen of palatablepastime.com