Chef Klaus
Bibbelsches Bohnesupp
The Saarland bean soup that waits until the beans are tender before the vinegar goes in, with bacon fat and potato doing the work properly.
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Pfälzer Grumbeersupp
Created by
A Palatinate potato soup from cheap roots and good fat, thickened by the potato itself, with a salty Dampfnudel ready to drink up the broth.
Soups & Stews
German
Comfort Food
Budget Friendly
One Pot
25 min
Active Time
45 min cook•1 hr 10 min total
Yield4 to 6 servings
Pfälzer Grumbeersupp belongs to the Palatinate, where Grumbeere means potatoes, and the soup sits in the part of the German table that knows how to feed people from a cellar basket. Potato, leek, carrot, celeriac, a little smoked bacon if the larder has it, and enough time for the roots to give themselves up. This is autumn and winter cooking, but it doesn't need a Sunday to justify itself.
The Palatinate argues about the partner more than the pot. Some houses serve it with Quetschekuche, plum cake, in late summer. Others put a salt-crusted Dampfnudel, a steamed yeast dumpling, right into the bowl so the crust goes savoury and the middle stays soft. Across the border in Saarland you meet close cousins with more sausage; further south the soup may be smoother and richer. Im Norden anders, im Süden anders. German food has no one version, and this one is Pfälzer.
The step that decides it is the sweating at the beginning and the mashing at the end. Cook the leek, onion, carrot, and celeriac slowly in bacon fat or butter before the water goes in, because raw roots boiled in plain water taste thin no matter how long you stare at them. Then simmer, don't thrash it, until the floury potatoes fall apart and thicken the soup themselves. Not flour. Not a packet. Nicht aus dem Glas.
I leave some pieces whole and crush the rest against the side of the pot. That gives you body without making baby food. Taste at the end, because potatoes drink salt like a thirsty man drinks beer. Würzen, Fett, Salz zum Schluss.
The potato became a German staple only after the eighteenth century, when rulers such as Frederick II of Prussia pushed cultivation through repeated potato orders, most famously in the 1750s and 1760s after crop failures and war had made grain unreliable. In the Palatinate, the dialect word Grumbeere comes from Grundbirne, earth pear, one of many regional German names that shows how locally the potato was adopted. The pairing of potato soup with Quetschekuche or a salty Dampfnudel is a Palatinate table habit, a sweet-savoury or bread-and-soup meal built from cheap fields, stored roots, and orchard fruit.
The technique, the tradition, and the story behind every dish.
Discover Culinary ExplorerIngredients
floury potatoes
Quantity
1kg
peeled and cut into 2cm chunks
leek
Quantity
1 large
cleaned and sliced
onion
Quantity
1
finely diced
carrots
Quantity
2
diced
celeriac
Quantity
200g
peeled and diced
smoked bacon (optional)
Quantity
80g
diced
butter or lard
Quantity
2 tablespoons
light pork stock, vegetable stock, or water
Quantity
1.2 litres
bay leaf
Quantity
1
dried marjoram
Quantity
1 teaspoon
freshly grated nutmeg
Quantity
1/4 teaspoon
salt and black pepper
Quantity
to taste
flat-leaf parsley
Quantity
2 tablespoons
chopped
salt-crusted Dampfnudeln (optional)
Quantity
4 to 6
to serve
| Ingredient | Quantity |
|---|---|
| floury potatoespeeled and cut into 2cm chunks | 1kg |
| leekcleaned and sliced | 1 large |
| onionfinely diced | 1 |
| carrotsdiced | 2 |
| celeriacpeeled and diced | 200g |
| smoked bacon (optional)diced | 80g |
| butter or lard | 2 tablespoons |
| light pork stock, vegetable stock, or water | 1.2 litres |
| bay leaf | 1 |
| dried marjoram | 1 teaspoon |
| freshly grated nutmeg | 1/4 teaspoon |
| salt and black pepper | to taste |
| flat-leaf parsleychopped | 2 tablespoons |
| salt-crusted Dampfnudeln (optional)to serve | 4 to 6 |
Equipment Needed
- •Heavy 4 to 5 litre soup pot
- •Potato masher
- •Sharp knife
- •Ladle
Instructions
- 1
Render the bacon
Put the bacon in a heavy pot with the butter or lard and cook it over medium-low heat until the fat runs and the bacon edges colour. Don't rush this. The fat is carrying the smoke through the whole soup, and browned bacon dropped in later tastes separate, like an afterthought.
For a meatless pot, skip the bacon and use butter with a spoon of neutral oil. You lose smoke, not the soup. Add a little more marjoram at the end. - 2
Sweat the roots
Add the onion, leek, carrot, and celeriac with a good pinch of salt and cook gently for 10 to 12 minutes, stirring often, until the leek softens and the roots smell sweet. Keep the colour pale. This slow sweating pulls flavour into the fat before the liquid dilutes it, which is why the soup tastes cooked instead of boiled.
- 3
Add potatoes
Stir in the potatoes, bay leaf, marjoram, and nutmeg, then pour in enough stock or water to just cover the vegetables. Use floury potatoes, the kind that fall apart when boiled, because their starch is the thickener. Waxy potatoes stay neat in the pot and leave you with broth and cubes.
- 4
Simmer gently
Bring the pot just to a boil, then turn it down to a steady simmer for 25 to 30 minutes, until the potatoes break when pressed against the side. Runter mit der Temperatur. A hard boil knocks the vegetables ragged and throws the starch around harshly; a simmer lets the potatoes soften and cloud the broth properly.
- 5
Crush for body
Remove the bay leaf, then crush about half the soup with a potato masher right in the pot, leaving enough pieces to remind you what you cooked. If you use a blender, pulse only briefly. The potato should thicken the soup, not turn elastic and glossy from being beaten to death.
- 6
Finish and serve
Taste hard now and season with salt and black pepper, because potatoes hide salt until the end. Stir in the parsley off the heat so it stays green and sharp. Ladle into warm bowls and set a salt-crusted Dampfnudel into each one if you're serving it the Palatinate way; the crust takes the soup, the soft middle stays tender, and Weggeworfen wird nichts.
Chef Tips
- •Use floury potatoes. In Germany you want mehligkochend; outside Germany, look for russet or another baking potato. The soup thickens because the potato collapses, not because you added flour.
- •Wash the leek after slicing it. Soil hides between the layers, and one gritty spoonful ruins a pot faster than weak stock does.
- •Stock is good, but water is honest here if the vegetables are fresh and the fat is right. A smoked rind or bacon end in the pot is better than a salty cube. Weggeworfen wird nichts.
- •Dampfnudel is optional, but if you serve it, use the salty-bottomed kind, not a sweet vanilla-sauce version. This is a soup bowl, not dessert.
Advance Preparation
- •The soup can be cooked one day ahead and chilled. Reheat it gently with a splash of water or stock, because potato soup thickens as it sits.
- •Add parsley only after reheating. Herbs left overnight in potato soup go dull, and there is no virtue in dull green flecks.
- •If serving Dampfnudeln, make or warm them separately and set them into the bowl at the table so the crust keeps its bite.
Frequently Asked Questions
Nutrition Information
1 serving (about 650g)
Calories
650 calories
Total Fat
19 g
Saturated Fat
9 g
Trans Fat
0 g
Unsaturated Fat
10 g
Cholesterol
60 mg
Sodium
1800 mg
Total Carbohydrates
104 g
Dietary Fiber
9 g
Sugars
12 g
Protein
18 g
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