Spätzle (Spaetzle) (homemade southern German pasta)

This is a wheat flour and egg based homemade pasta, originally from the South-West of Germany (Swabia which used to be a Land of its own but now is part of Baden-Württemberg). Spätzle are usually served with the Sunday roast.

For all of your hunting for a spaetzle press - I now have a link to a UK supplier that does a potato ricer with an attachment that works well for spaetzle! You can find it here (this is a UK website). Thank you Joan Wells for letting me know!

Ingredients (per person)

100 g strong wheat flour
one egg
a pinch of salt
some lukewarm water
a knob of butter

Preparation

Preparing the Spätzle
	Here are our ingredients (with the Spätzle press left of the salt shaker)
	Add the egg and a pinch of salt to the flour.
	Stir with a wooden spoon.
	Add some lukewarm water and stir again until the consistency is right.
	This is what the dough should look like when you have reached the right consistency. If you have added too much water, you can balance that out by adding a bit more flour. I tend to let the dough set for about half an hour before proceesing.
	Bring lots of water with a pinch of salt added to a boil. Now place the Spätzle press over the saucepan and put one portion at a time into the press.
	Press the handle down. When you are at the end of its course, cut off the hanging Spätzle with a knife or a spatula. Traditionally, bits of dough are put on a wooden board and scraped into the boiling water using the back of a knife ... I've done that before, but it is very time consuming and also requires a fair amount of practice - so best use a Spätzle press as shown here.
	Your hob should be on full power. After about 30 seconds, the Spätzle will start to surface.
	When they have all surfaced, take them out trying to drain off as much of the water as possible. Make sure you have taken them all out, bring the water back to a boil and process the next batch.
	Put them in a dish and add a knob of butter if you like.
	Mix the melted butter into the Spätzle and serve. Alternatively, you can put the buttered Spätzle into the oven at 200 degrees centigrade for 15 to 20 minutes and then serve.

Best with ...

Stew, roast, anything that produces a nice gravy!

10	This is very useful because the consitency of the dough is quite critical and without the picture you really don't know what it should be like neil.boddy@gs.com
10	Thanks to you, I can make pasta. Thaks for the hard work you put in
10	WOW... NICE RECIPE. GREAT PICTURES!
10	I JUST MADE MY FIRST DISH WITH BUTTER AND SWISS CHEESE AND FRIED ONIONS ON TOP. WOULD LIKE THE BREADCRUMBS TOO NEXT
10	Thank You sooo much! I have long been looking a descent reciepy of that "misterious Speatzel-dish" my husband-to-be keeps talking about , even made a blob of gue once:))Sure, it couldn't have beeb more clear than your step-by-step illustrated "dummie's guide"...I shall try right now....
10	Buen site. Me encanta esta receta y la herramienta muy util. La compre en mi ultima visita a Koeln. Gracias por la receta
10	Thank you! Very helpful, especially the photos and description of the correct consistency of the batter. (I was thinking it was more like noodle dough, which would have been wrong!)
7	good info easy done
10	A GEM> You are fantastic. love it. mairead christine.
10	This definitely rates a 12. Thank you very much for loading this recipe up! I am addicted to this dish when I first eaten it as a side to a veal and mushroom dish. I have tried to make the noodles many times and despite the deceptively simple recipe and ingredients, I always getting it wrong. Your pictures are invaluable. I enjoy pan frying the noodles in butter till slightly crispy with some diced kaiser fleisch and onions, then smothered in pork gravy.
10	Just like I remember from when I lived in southern Germany in the late 1970's. Great recipe goes excellent with breaded schnitzel's.
10	made this tonight, used a potato ricer instead of a spatzle press and it turned out really well. Thanks for your recipes, hope you add more soon
8	An interesting presentation for spatzle. I have never seen it as a long noodle like shape similar to fettuccine noodles. My son got all excited for this version so I will try it with my dough recipe.
10	I'm going to try this - looks yum
10	As a young lad, I was given a spatzle press by a German family friend and we made wonderful spatzle. But over the years the recipe was lost and disaster after disaster ensued, normally involving red-faced straining over a boiling pan with a too-stiff mixture. This recipe and pictures are just what I needed - I'm off to make it for lunch with my son now... thank you!
10	Love the pictures! Great recipe!
10	the easiest clearest recipe I have found thanks :)
10	never heard of it before but would like to try it. your recipes look very very appetizing.
10	We ate spatzle in a restaurant recently and loved it. Now I can attempt to recreate it, thanks to you recipe & pictures. Thank you.
10	Question answered!
10	I am half German, and I like spatzle with a good roast. I have eaten German food all my life. My daughter needs a quick receipe for a Brownie event and I wanted to make spatzle and needed a good recxiepe. Thanks for sharing this recieipe
10	how many dry spaetzle for 8 persons this page was very informative
10	Outstanding! The photos illustrate the process so well that they actually capture the essence of a recipe that relies more on the proper consistency rather than precise measurements. It's been more than 50 years since I watched my great aunt make spaetzle. Now I will try it. Thank you!
10	My Wife makes Spaetzle this way. Her mother sent her a press years ago. We have Spaetzle,Gravy with chunks of beef and German potato salad. Great Meal Sent Your recipe to all my daughter & grand children. Thank you for the recipe. Tony
10	could one use a potato ricer instead of the SpÃ¤tzle pressNULL Great recipe otherwise, I have this site well bookmarked
10	Fantastic with the photos! Thank you, from the USA!
10	AWSOME SAME AS MY MOTHERS RECIPE!!!!!
10	This is the best recipe I have ever found. They come out perfect.
10	I have a spatzle maker a german friend gave me 15 years ago I had lost the reciepe thank you for this.
9	Pictures most helpful
10	great!! love the pictures. the recipe is wonderful. i triple the recipe and add an extra egg... makes them a little fluffier, i think. :)
10	delicious
10	Great Pics and directions
8	I'm in the USA and I /do/ know what a knob of butter is - it's obvious from the context - but I didn't know what a hob was until I looked it up. Good word! A very good recipe, too.
10	Good recipe p.s. Only a Knob wouldn't know what a knob of butter is
9	Just what I was looking for - specailly to see what the consistency should be. I use my Moulie which works very well.
10	This is a great way to show somebody how to cook this. You should show other German recipes like this.
10	I needed to see a picture to get the consistency of the dough correct - very helpful.
10	i grew up eating spaetzel instead of potatoes or rice... my parents are both from germany. my dad made his own press as it was not available here in canada.. now i have my own press and i would rather have this noodle then any other side dish.
10	Great work!! For the person who commented they didn't know what a knob of butter was, they should've looked more carefully the penultimate photo.
10	Great page. Love the pictures. It helps a lot to know what things should look like.
10	Thanks for the wonderrful additional pictures...
10	My Omi taught me to make Spatzle when I was young. I have now taught my children to make Spatzle. I remember Omi when we make it. I never thought of cooking spatzle leftovers with bacon, onions or cheese. I guess because we rarely have leftovers. But next time, I'll make extra and try these leftover recipes.
10	My mother is German so I grew up eating this stuff! She is from Ulm and her family always browned some breadcrumbs in butter then added the cooked Spatzle until warm. I haven't found that variation anywhere else.
9	Very informative! I'm just going to try it now. I'll let you know how your recipe worked!
10	Excellent instructions, great pictures as well.
10	Brilliant - thanks ...my family love them fried up with some crispy bacon and them sprinkled with cheese.
10	Brilliant. Just what I was looking for.
10	Wunderbar! Danke!
10	Excellent I have some dried Spatzle which I brought home from Austria so will try making it. For all you who like Austrian/German food next time you go to the Spar get some Eierschwammerl sauce to go with pork or chicken it is lovely

Side Dishes:

Spätzle (Spaetzle) (homemade southern German pasta)

Ingredients (per person)

Preparation

Best with ...