Evening star., 1947-11-02
lust Between
Ourselves
BY Philip H. Love-

A little-known but nonetneless
real casualty of the First Worlo
War was smearcase.
Most readers of this column prop
ably have never even hearo Oh
smearcase, let alone eaten it IN lts
nroper form. And they prooaoly
don't know they just barely missed
drawing the same sort OF blanks
in connection with two other oe,
lightful foods, sauerbraten anu
sauerkraut.
During World War I everything
German became extremely unpop-
ular in this country. High schoois
and colleges discontinued the teach
ing of the German language. ana
in Baltimore, where I grew up, the
name of one of the principal streets
was changed, with much fanfare
from German to Redwood.
An effort was made to change the
name of sauerkraut. which is Ger
man for sour cabbage, to liberty
cabbage" Fortunately it did not
succeed.
ever, did not fare so we'll.
The name of sauerbraten was
changed to sour beef" which Is
approximately what the German
means. And the change destroyed
its character.
I happen to know about sauer-
braten because my maternal grand
mother was, as the saying is, Ger
man descent" and her sour beef
though she never called 1t that
was the best I've ever eaten.
Grandmother took a good sized
roast and soaked 1t overnight In
her own private mixture OF vinegar.
spices and water. Then she cooked
it-I don't know precisely how
with potato dumplings, and served
it with brown gravy, favored with
that same secret mixture. There
never was a more appetizing dish;
in fact, I can't even write about 1t
without getting hungry.
The secret of making good sauer-
braten, grandmother always said.
was in the overnight soaking. But
when the name was changed to sour
beef the soaking part of the recipe
somehow got lost. Nowadays peo-
pie prepare sour beef simply by TAX
ing a pot roast, whipping up few
dumplings and pouring a vinegar
gravy over the whole. 1t isn't sauer-
braten-and, for my money, 1t isn't
| fit to eat.
The trouble with smearcase was
/ that it's American name was too
much like the German: Schmierkase
-schmieren, to smear, plus kase,
cheese.
When milk sours, 1t becomes
clabber. In this country farmers
feed clabber to their hogs; city folks
dump it into their garbage cans. I
learned from grandmother. how
ever, that bowl of sweetened Clab-
ber is delightful dessert. The hogs
on the St. Marys County MD farm
where I spend my summer vacations
are always glad to see me head for
home.
Clabber is composed of curd and
whey. The curd that Is left after
, the whey has been pressed out Is
smearcase. There are three ways to
eat 1t: Cd With cream or milk and
sugar; ~ with salt and pepper,
and 90 spread on home made hreaa,
between thick layers of butter and
l.,,@{ rfofnr
No. /, either for breakfast, instead
of cereal, or as dessert at lunch
or dinner.
/ X X +
Il But to people born since World
War I, smearcase is cottage cheese"
a mound of white goo on which
grapes, apples, cucumbers, radishes
and hard-boiled eggs are piled to
make what passes for salad. Re-
Gently, bought a carton of cottage
cheese with the intention of eating
it in the good old-fashioned way,
but when I got it home, found some
sort of green stuff-spinach. maybe
mixed all through it. Even my
dog Butch turned up his nose at it.
For some strange reason. smear
case cake. which is wonderful with
coffee, did not disappear from the
market until the Second World War.
Now it, too, is gone-never to return.
1 fear.
Today's boys and girls. brought up
on sour beef and cottage cheese
salads, just don't know what they've
missed.