Schnüsch

Schnüsch belongs to Schleswig-Holstein and to summer, when the garden gives you a little of everything and none of it needs bullying. New potatoes, carrots, kohlrabi, peas, beans, milk, butter. Pale food, not brown food. Das ist kein Bierzelt.

In Angeln and around Flensburg you see it as a milk stew, sometimes with Katenschinken, smoked ham, served beside it or laid over the bowl. Farther north, across the Danish line, the related snysk can be looser and more soup-like. Im Norden anders, im Süden anders, and here the north is speaking softly.

The technique is simple and easy to ruin: add the vegetables in order of stubbornness. Potatoes and carrots go first because they need time to soften and give the broth body. Kohlrabi follows. Beans need enough cooking to lose their raw squeak. Peas go last because they turn dull and tired if you make them wait. The milk must never boil hard, because a rolling boil splits the sauce and turns a clean garden stew into curds and apology.

Keep the trimmings honest. Pea pods, parsley stems, kohlrabi leaves if they're fresh, they can scent the first water and then leave the pot. Weggeworfen wird nichts, but the bowl stays tidy. Schön ist, was schmeckt.