Unfortunately, I don’t pass through Germany’s Pfalz region too often (it’s a lusty wine-growing area that I love, just to the east of France’s Alsace). But, when I do get there, the top of my gastronomic list is the uber-hearty local specialty of saumagen (pronounced ZOW-mahg-en).
Yup. “Sau” means pig (as in sow), and “magen” means stomach. So what we have here, mein freund, is a stuffed pig’s stomach! And it is spectacular.
Full disclosure, for those of you assessing my opinion: I’m also a haggis fan, another dish with inexplicably bad press. The Scotties, as you know, like to stuff a sheep’s stomach with meat (and oats), but the Deutsch make their equivalent with pig. I swear to you, if you were served saumagen (or haggis) without identification, you’d simply say “what a delicious sausage!”
Of course, things were a little different about 30 years ago. The first time I passed through the Pfalz (then known as the Rheinpfalz, always known in English as The Palatinate), the “magen” part was more apparent; you might get a hunk of a stuffed pig’s stomach. These days it has gotten a lot tamer. The stomach is stuffed with ground pork, cubes of potato, and a range of subtle spices (nutmeg, coriander seed, white pepper, etc.) The whole thing is cured, then boiled…then cut into big, round, regular slices about 1/4″ thick, which you buy at the local butcher. At serving time, the slices are warmed by a quick sizzle in a pan.
Anyway, I have a big case of saumagen love, no matter what the format. So when I got to the Pfalz this spring on a wine trip, I made sure to get me some saumagen quickly. It was easy. I was staying at the Deidesheimer Hof, in Deidesheim, where Pfalz-born Helmut Kohl regularly wolfed the stuff down and served it to such distinguished visitors as Maggie Thatcher, Mikhail Gorbachev, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton. Kohl made this local dish known throughout Germany (though political enemies regularly inveighed against his passion for saumagen as an example of his “provincialism”).
Screw them. Soon after my evening arrival on a spring night, I marched down into the dining room of the Deidesheimer Hof—which is now a Michelin one-star, and therefore possibly de-saumagenized—and tremblingly asked if they still serve saumagen. Big “ja!” Big smile. And out came a gorgeous plate of saumagen, bratwurst, liver dumplings, sauerkraut and mashed potatoes.
I was happy, but not satisfied. I had 36 hours more in the Pfalz to go, and I wanted more saumagen! But there were winery lunches and dinners planned, and I suspected my big saumagen moment had come and gone.
The very next day I showed up at a winery in the Pfalz called Weingut Wageck Pfaffman, where I was supposed to taste some older wines, current wines, barrel samples, and share some lunch.
When I got there just after noon, we tasted a few bottles, but then the winemaker said “my Mom has lunch ready, so we can taste more during lunch, then more after.” It sounded like a good plan, but it was the “Mom” part that had my eyebrows twitching.
En route to the family dining room, we walked through the kitchen—where I met the gemütlichkeit Mom—who was griddling something in a pan. My piggy hopes soared. I looked in said pan.
YES!
Saumagen. With bratwurst. And liver dumplings in a bubbling pot. And sauerkraut, and mashed potatoes. That’s when I discovered that these five things together are a Pfalz staple. Saumagen is ALWAYS served with the others, just as the one-star had done the night before.
With a 2008 Wageck Pfaffman Riesling Schützenhaus, I was in pig heaven. With fried onions on the liver dumplings, yet!
