Pellkartoffeln mit Quark und Leinöl

Pellkartoffeln mit Quark und Leinöl is eastern German weeknight food, strongest in Saxony, Lusatia, and Brandenburg, where flax grew well and the oil mill mattered as much as the butcher. It isn't feast food. It is the plate you set down when the day was long, the purse was thin, and the potatoes in the cellar still had work to do.

The regions split on the quark. In Saxony and Lusatia I keep it cool, sharp, and loose with a little milk, chives, onion, and salt; in Brandenburg you'll see it plainer, sometimes with cucumber or radish beside it. Further south the table reaches for butter or sour cream more quickly. Im Norden anders, im Süden anders. Here the linseed oil is not a garnish. It is the point.

The single technique is simple: cook the potatoes in their jackets and dress them while they're still hot, but keep the quark cold. The skin protects the potato from waterlogging, so the flesh stays dry and floury enough to drink the oil; the cold quark gives the hot potato its contrast, and if you warm it in the pot you've made a sour grey paste. Schön ist, was schmeckt, but paste is nobody's pride.

Use fresh linseed oil and smell it before you pour. Good Leinöl is nutty, grassy, and golden. Bitter or painty oil is dead oil. Nicht aus dem Glas if the glass has been standing open for months.