Homemade Egg Noodles (Kielke)

So as this is my first blog post, I thought, what better recipe to start off with, than the meal that started it all (well, part of the meal anyway).  Egg noodles, or kielke as the Mennonites call it.  Though I was too young to really remember this story firsthand, my foster mother tells me this story almost every visit that we have.  When my older sisters and I first moved into my foster mothers house, I was 18 months, and we were all very malnourished.  So my foster mother thought that she would make us homemade chicken noodle soup (heina sup?) as a first impression, welcoming meal. Boy, were we both in for a surprise!  

We all sat around the table as one by one she started filling our bowls up with soup, with the same smile she always wore while feeding someone one of her homemade meals.  She always says how she couldn’t wait for us to take our first bite because we probably had never had a meal this delicious in our life!  As she filled up our bowls, my sisters started to scream, and me, being scared by their screams, started bawling as well.  In a panic, she started yelling, half in English, half in Low German asking us “Vot ast de problem?!”.  My sisters then started shouting back “Worms! Worms! She’s trying to feed us worms!”  At that point, my foster mother started howling with laughter, confusing everyone at the table.  After calming us down, she explained to us that they were in fact noodles, they just looked different because they were homemade, and convinced us to take a bite.  Reluctantly, one by one, we all took a spoonful of what we still thought were worms-in-a-bowl.  We then realized that this was the best thing that we had ever eaten and not only finished our bowl, (including me, a baby), but continued to ask for more until we had finished the entire pot.  My foster mother says that for the next couple of days, we continued to ask for this soup. 

There are many different variations to Mennonite style egg noodles, but this is the one that I prefer to use.  Not only is it a great dough to use for soup noodles, but can also be made thicker and served with cream gravy (schmont fat) served alongside farmer sausage, ham, chicken, etc.

First, you’re going to need flour (3 cups to start), 1/2 a teaspoon of salt (optional depending on how salty your soup broth is), 3 eggs, and 1/2 cup of milk. 

Put all ingredients in a mixing bowl and mix on low until the dough is slightly sticky. 

By this time the dough is quite tough so I add about 1/4-1/2 cup more of flour and knead it by hand on the counter until all of the flour is incorporated.  Then roll the dough out into a long loaf and cut sections about 1.5 inches wide. 

I then flatten the sections and flour both sides.

Then set your pasta machine to the thickest setting, and roll each section through, sprinkling flour on it before placing the next flattened section on top.

I then roll each flattened piece out again on a thinner setting, cut the pile in half, and roll it once more on an even thinner setting (if the dough is not thin enough, it will not cut the soup noodles properly, kielke noodles do not have to be as thin).  Sprinkling flour on them as I go so the pieces don’t stick together. 

Then I cut my piles of rolled out dough into sections wide enough to fit through the pasta maker, and start rolling!  (I use the thicker setting for kielke noodles).

Make sure you’re sprinkling more flour on the noodles as you cut them so they don’t clump together.  I like to transfer my noodles onto a pan to make it easier to bring them to the stove to cook. You can also put the whole pan in the freezer, and then transfer the frozen noodles to a bag to have on hand for a later time. 

Once the noodles are all cut and ready, place them in a pot of boiling water, stirring frequently so they don’t clump together, and boil for about 3 minutes.  When done, strain your noodles and rinse with cold water to stop the cooking process.  Then add to soup.  Serve and enjoy!

[wp_ad_camp_4]