Germans are big fans of the dumplings. Some are made from bread, others from potatoes, and all of them taste pretty fantastic. Of the two, bread dumplings are a bit easier to make and there’s really very few ingredients or steps involved. It’s really a matter of perfecting your rolling technique and making sure there are no stray dry crumbs to throw off your dumplings while they boil.
If you live in Germany, you may be lucky enough to buy the dumpling bread by the bagful. Knödelbrot (dumpling bread) is sold by the bagful with exactly 400g of pre-shredded bread. You only need to add the ingredients, roll the dumplings up, boil them and enjoy. It doesn’t get much more simple than that. But if you have a bunch of stale rolls, bread heels or even big dough pretzels (although those are often reserved for special dumplings), you can make your own dumpling bread. Just shred the bread into large chunks with your hands or a food processor. I usually save all my leftover rolls for stuffing mix or French toast in the freezer so I’m glad to find yet another use for them. It’s easiest if you already have the bread cut up or chunked before you put it in the freezer because some breads harden after freezing and thawing.
As I mentioned, part of the difficulty of making bread dumplings is rolling them into balls. I’ve included some tips in the recipe below which should help. You want to use an even amount of pressure so that they become compact and tight, but you also need to make sure that none of the bread pieces stick out anywhere. If you glance over your dumplings before they go into the water and you notice a flap of bread sticking out, just poke it back into the dumpling with your finger and roll the dumpling until the hole has closed up. And always make sure you wet your hand before you handle the dumpling dough. This will keep it from sticking to you and allow you to form nice, smooth dumpling balls.
Bavarian Bread Dumplings
- Yield: About 7 fist-sized dumplings 1x
- Cuisine: German
Ingredients
- 400 g (about 14 oz) bread, broken into chunks
- About 250 ml (1 cup) milk, warmed
- 2 eggs, beaten
- 1 tablespoon dried parsley
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 dash pepper
Instructions
- Put the bread chunks into a large bowl and pour milk over top. Cover and let sit 10 minutes until the milk is absorbed, tossing once halfway through.
- Add egg, salt, parsley and pepper and knead into the bread until a dough-like mixture forms.
- Add water to a large pot, salt lightly and bring to a boil.
- Wet your hands and take about a fistful of dumpling mix. Hold one hand on top and one below; keep one hand still and apply a bit of pressure as you roll the mix into a ball.
- Place all dumplings into the pot at the same time and cook at low heat for 20 minutes. They float almost immediately but will be slightly browned when finished.
Notes
Serve with your favorite meal, like Schweinebraten with stewed German red cabbage.
My mom made bread dumplings and boiled them like that but then we would eat the dumplings with the water that had thickened up a little bit because of some of the dumplings falling in the only thing is is I think she is nutmeg or some other spices do you have a recipe like that I would love to find it thank you
Hi Jamie. Maybe someone else has heard of it. Sounds like it would be good, though!
Has anybody heard of cuda Swiss? It’s bread dough boiled and then mixed with butter and brown sugar
Thanks- my grandma made these for a lot of meals that included gravy, and she’d use a few day old homemade bread. I think she put them in the oven to finish them off after boiling- made a set of them and they turned out great.
Celery root Schneitzel could be a vegetarian alternate
Thanks for the recipe, I often cook goulash as some of my partners family are Austrian & he loves it, but we usually just have bread rolls with it & I have always wanted to do dumplings as that’s what they have in Austria so I am saving this page & going to give them a try next time 🙂 thanks