My good friend Helene from Masala Herb graciously offered to make one of my favorite desserts, Salzburger Nockerl. The dessert resembles the hillsides surrounding the city of Salzburg and it’s a dessert you can prepare in 30 minutes but must serve the minute it comes out of the oven like a soufflé.
Helene lives in Goa, India with her husband but she is originally from near Salzburg, Austria. When I told her that Salzburg was one of my favorite cities to visit and that Salzburger Nockerl was a favorite dessert, she said she’d be happy to do a guest post for me. I couldn’t say yes fast enough. She’s in Goa and it’s pretty warm there so she was worried that the dessert might not look the same as it did in Austria but how wonderful of her to make it just for me.
I had this dessert the first time after a wonderful meal before a traditional Mozart concert. Another dish from the same meal was lemon soup. When they told me they were bringing it first I couldn’t imagine lemon soup but it’s tangy and perfect for a first course. I’ll make this for you soon.
Here’s Helene’s post!
Hi there! I don’t think I have to introduce myself here, as Maureen did that pretty well already a couple of months back in an interview on Orgasmic Chef.. Since I jumped in for Maureen today, she had asked me to come up with a little treat for your senses, which is quite popular and known in my home town corner in Austria. This particular “light” dessert is called the Salzburger Nockerl.
I bet some of you might have heard or had the chance to come across this sweet dessert before, or you might even be one of the rare professional Salzburger Nockerl cooks and lovers, but you hadn’t seen my typical traditional recipe yet!
This recipe will certainly beat it all and help you in creating your own at home without hassle and cursing. You have to know that I studied Hotel Management in the Salzburger region and this recipe was one of the main ones in our college time, that is why I have been using only the one that was given to us at the time. I never changed anything and I honestly wouldn’t suggest doing so.
I have to confess I hadn’t dared to make the recipe in Goa before, simply because I had no oven for a very long time. I know that it can be made in a pan as well but we were told differently in college by our teacher. Anyway, Maureen had asked me looong ago to share my school time recipe, but seriously I was never in the mood in the last 2 months to even give it a go. If you are intending to try it out for the first time then you ll have to consider these points before grabbing a bowl and eggs.
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A hand mixer to beat the egg whites stiff is absolutely necessary.
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You have to work quickly and neat otherwise it can get messy and really ugly.
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Don’t try to even think of changing an ingredients or two, stick to the recipe.
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If your oven is the turning type like mine, then consider that the traditional Triangle shape (like a mountain) might suck down a bit because of the constant movement while baking.
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Grease your baking pan well with melted unsalted butter before adding the fluffy dough or it will stick when trying to remove the Nockerl out after baking
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Keep to the baking timing in the recipe for the best result
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Serve right after baking as quickly as possible, because the Salzburger Nockerl is a Soufflé type and as we know Soufflé tend to suck in, in minutes if not even seconds after taking them out from the hot oven environment.
Following these rules will help you achieve the perfect most desired dessert from the Salzburger region. The ingredients are pretty simple and the technique as well. I would even go so far to say that it can be made in under 30 minutes if you follow the steps correctly. The size of my Nockerl are a bit smaller then the once served in Salzburg, so if you feel making bigger sized Nockerl, then feel free to do so.
- 5 Egg Whites
- 60 gram Powdered Sugar
- 3 Egg Yolks
- 7 drops Vanilla Essence
- 20 gram White flour
- Powdered sugar for the topping
- Start by separating the Egg whites and Egg yolks. Keep the egg yolks aside. Grab a Hand mixer ( I used a normal whisk, I had no choice) and beat your whites fluffy to a white stiff snow. Do the test to see if it’s stiff enough by turning the bowl upside down, if the snow stays where it is, it is ready.
- Now, carefully fold in your powdered sugar into the snow. Fold, do NOT mix! The snow has to stay fluffy and airy!
- Add the Vanilla to the beaten egg yolk and mix. Fold into the snow the yolk mixture.
- Preheat the oven now to 180 C!
- Sieve your white flour into the Snow mixture and fold it in as well. See that the ingredients are incorporated but don’t overdo it with the folding in because we need it to remain nice blown up and fluffy.
- Next, butter a long baking mold.
- With one of those pastry cards, take out a nice amount of the snow mixture, by pressing it towards the corner of the mixing bowl, so that a triangle shape gets formed. Quickly move the pastry to the buttered baking mold and continue to take out 2-5 more batch of Nockerl of the mixing bowl and place them carefully onto the mold, right next to each other. They can touch each other and most probably that will anyway happen by itself. Place them quickly into the oven and bake them at 180 for about 10 minutes or until golden but soft inside. I kept mine 10 ½ minutes because I calculated the fact that my oven rotates inside, so please keep an eye on them for the first time!
- Once finished baked, sprinkle powdered sugar on top and serve quickly!
Thanks Helene! This is very close to what I had in Salzburg except ours was served over a raspberry coulis. I can’t wait to put one of these in my mouth!