Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Food & Drink

Keep Oktoberfest Going Year-Round with Jaegerschnitzel

By

The annual German tradition of Oktoberfest may be over now, but that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a delicious German beer or meal outside of Germany’s biggest party month. (Want to learn more about Oktoberfest? Check out the episode of Beards, Booze, and Bacon on it here.)

If you’re going to keep your Oktoberfest going year-round, you’re going to need two things. First, you’ll need beer. Lots of beer. That seems like a fairly simple thing to accomplish: go to the store, buy beer. Done. However, with great amounts of beer comes the great need to eat something too.

Jaegerschnitzel
Sam Slaughter/The Manual

The good thing about German food is that it could not be more perfect for soaking up booze. From various cuts of meat, to frying things to lots and lots of potatoes and pasta, no matter where you look on a German menu, you’re going to find yourself a drinking buddy.

Recommended Videos

For us, no meal better encapsulates Oktoberfest than Jaegerschnitzel. German for “Hunter’s schnitzel” (schnitzel doesn’t have a direct translation, but cutlet would be pretty close), Jaegerschnitzel is a breaded and fried pork cutlet topped with a mushroom gravy and served with spaetzle, a type of German egg noodle.

Related

This Jaegerschnitzel comes to us from Chef Jason Thomson of Iron Hill Brewery and Restaurant, in Greenville, South Carolina. Iron Hill is a chain of 16 brewpubs located mainly in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware. Greenville is their newest location, which opened in mid-2018.

While the preparation may seem a little labor-intensive, we can tell you it is worth it. Not only is the jaeger sauce to-die-for, but the final meal is quite possibly the perfect way to soak up any and all beer you might be drinking.

Jaegerschnitzel

With Haricots Verts (Green Beans), Spätzle, and Roasted Mushroom Wee Heavy Ale Sauce

(Serves Four)

Jaegerschnitzel
Sam Slaughter/The Manual

Pork Cutlets

Ingredients:

  • 2 lb pork loin (eight 4-oz boneless pork loin chops)
  • 2 cups panko bread crumbs
  • 5 oz canola oil
  • Salt and pepper, to taste

Method:

  1. Cover pork with plastic wrap and pound until one quarter-inch thick.
  2. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
  3. Coat both sides evenly with panko breadcrumbs.
  4. Heat 2 oz canola oil over medium high heat in skillet.
  5. Lightly fry for 2 minutes each side and reserve.

Roasted Mushroom Wee Heavy Ale Sauce

Ingredients:

  • 2-2.5 lb sliced white mushrooms
  • .5 cup white onion (minced)
  • .5 oz garlic (minced)
  • .75 cup tomato puree
  • 8 oz Iron Hill Brewery Wee Heavy Ale
  • 2 cups demi-glace
  • .5 cup chicken stock
  • .5 oz fresh tarragon (minced)
  • .5 oz fresh parsley (minced)
  • 2 tsp ground black pepper
  • 1 tsp salt
  • Corn Starch

Method:

  1. Place mushrooms on cookie sheet and drizzle with .5 oz canola oil.
  2. Season with salt and pepper.
  3. Heat oven to 400 degrees and cook mushrooms for 8 minutes or until roasted.
  4. Meanwhile In a large saucepan, heat oil and sauté onions until translucent.
  5. Add garlic and sauté for 2-3 minutes.
  6. Add roasted mushrooms, tomato purée and Wee Heavy Ale.
  7. Bring to a brief boil, lower heat and simmer to reduce volume by half.
  8. Add demi-glace and chicken stock and continue to reduce (20-30 minutes).
  9. Add tarragon and parsley.
  10. Simmer for an additional 5 minutes stirring as needed.
  11. Check the seasoning and adjust thickness with corn starch if needed and

Spätzle and Haricot Verts

Ingredients:

  • 4 egg yolks
  • 1 whole egg
  • 25 cups milk
  • 3 cups all-purpose flour
  • .25 tsp nutmeg
  • .5 tsp kosher salt
  • .25 tsp black pepper
  • .5 oz canola oil
  • .5 oz salt
  • 2 tbsp unsalted butter
  • 1 lb haricots verts (green beans)
  • Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

  1. Mix egg yolks, whole egg, and milk together in a large mixing bowl.
  2. Whisk dry ingredients in a large bowl.
  3. Incorporate wet and dry ingredients together, then cover and refrigerate for one hour.
  4. Meanwhile, boil the water in a large pot and add salt and canola oil.
  5. Place a perforated pan or cheese grater over the pot of water.
  6. Force one-third of the mixture through the holes, stir for one minute and remove.
  7. Reserve and repeat the steps with the remainder of the dough.
  8. Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to boil.
  9. Plunge haricot verts into the water 3-4 minutes.
  10. Drain to shock the haricot verts in an ice bath.
  11. Remove from ice bath and reserve.
  12. Prepare sauté pan to medium high heat.
  13. Add 2 ounces butter, sauté spätzle to golden brown and reserve.
  14. Toss in fresh parsley and season with salt and pepper.
  15. Heat 1tsp oil in the same pan and quickly sauté haricot verts to get them to room temp.
  16. Remove from heat and season with salt and pepper.

To Serve

  1. Plate on cutlet in the center of the plate.
  2. Spoon generous amount of Wee Heavy Ale sauce over the pork.
  3. Place some green beans to the right of the pork.
  4. Place spätzle to the left.
  5. Serve with a frosty glass of Vienna red lager and enjoy.

Editors’ Recommendations

Sam Slaughter
Sam Slaughter
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Sam Slaughter was the Food and Drink Editor for The Manual. Born and raised in New Jersey, he’s called the South home for…
Can’t Go Out? Make Your Own Teriyaki Chicken
Teriyaki Chicken Recipe

OK, we're all pretty much stuck in our houses by now with whatever you picked up at the grocery store. You managed to get some chicken, some frozen veggies, and an assortment of other things that you're not totally sure what to do with (Hello, bag of canned mackerel in oil!). Come dinner time, when you're trying to figure out how to stave off cabin fever and feed yourself, we have a suggestion for an easy, delicious meal that you can make with your provisions: chicken teriyaki.

Now, you could make this a little more complicated — you could make your own teriyaki sauce or dice your own vegetables — but we're not about that in this case. Instead, all you need to do is buy pre-made sauce and frozen chopped vegetables.  Then in under a half-hour, you can have a nice, fresh meal that looks like it came from your local hibachi joint (sans pageantry, of course, unless you added that in yourself). As long as you hide the bags that the veggies came in, this could also easily be turned into a great date meal, as you cover the different food groups and you won't feel weighed down after.

Read more
Gather (most of) a pour-over coffee system for $116 at Amazon
The Hario V60 Ceramic Coffee Dripper on a white background.

Have you been looking for coffee maker deals and thinking you’d prefer to create your own full pour-over system? Right now, Amazon has the deals for you, with great discounts on a coffee dripper and an electric gooseneck kettle. We’ll take a look at how each works separately, but you can combine them to make most of a full pour-over system. All you need to do is add some filters and you can start making some great blends, like the Cafe Grumpy festive coffee that’s available right now. If you still need to learn what pour-over coffee is, we can help you with that too. Here’s a look at the deals involved.
Hario V60 Ceramic Coffee Dripper -- $27 $30 12% off

If you’re learning all about how to make pour over coffee, you know how vital a coffee dripper is. The Hario V60 Ceramic Coffee Dripper is specially designed to produce an evenly brewed cup of coffee. It’s made from durable Japanese ceramic so it retains heat to ensure a balanced temperature throughout the brewing cycle. It has a minimalist look with a single large hole, which improves pour flow and provides you plenty of choice: Pour quickly for a light flavor or more slowly for a rich and deep taste. If you’ve been studying the differences between pour over and drip coffee, you’ll soon see what a world of difference a good coffee dripper makes.

Read more
Can you make great coffee in a single serve? Klatch Coffee’s answer
Is there a better option than K-Cups?
Crazy Goat coffee

While K-Cups can be appealing to coffee drinkers who value convenience at home or in the office, they're not the right choice for everyone. Although it's a fast and easy way to prepare a single cup of coffee, there are a few downsides to the system — namely that K-cup pods can be difficult to recycle (and while refillable pods exist, that depends on the user choosing that option, which isn't always a given considering quick and convenient are two of the main appeals of the system). We interviewed Klatch Coffee's expert roaster, Heather Perry, to learn more about the specialty roaster's approach to single-serve coffee.
Klatch Coffee's single-serve coffee alternatives

Klatch Coffee's single-serving Bruvi pods make it easy to enjoy high-quality, specialty coffee wherever you are. The brand has partnered with a few select providers who share their vision, one of which is Bruvi.
"Bruvi is an improved pod coffee system with a couple of unique features," Perry said. "First is taste and quality; the proprietary brewing system brews to the same high standards as specialty coffee roasters like Klatch Coffee, including adjusting the brewing parameters to match our brewing recipe. That’s why premium coffee from roasters like Klatch is offered on the Bruvi platform. Second, Bruvi’s B-Pods are enzyme-infused and designed to be tossed in the trash, making them guilt-free. B-Pods degrade faster in the landfill without leaving microplastics behind."
It’s also worth noting that for coffee drinkers who only want a single cup at a time, single-serve brewing can be more efficient on resources like water, coffee, and energy. Pre-portioned coffee doesn’t spill, and machines only heat the water needed for a single cup. There’s no waste from discarding leftover coffee from a large pot.

Read more