Check out the recipe: www.allrecipes.com/Recipe/260576/Spatzle-aka-Spaetzle/

As someone who comes from the region where Spätzle were invented, I gotta say you nailed this recipe. Except for the cayenne, but hey. You are the Jesse Pinkman of the cooking world, so that's your signature ingredient. A tip, Spätzle is amazing with copious amounts of cheese (Kässpätzle - basically made like Mac n Cheese) and caramellized onions.

German here. Small things i learned from my mother: There are 3 types of spätzle that im aware of. 1. Small ones like yours called knepfle or knöpfle done with a Spätzlehobel 2. Long, thin and irregular done with a special board (Spätzlebrett) on which you cut the dough directly into the water 3. Long and thicker ones that are pressed with something kinda like a potato press (might actually work :D) called a Spätzleschwob The consistency of dough you need depends on the method of making the Spätzle. In my opinion the thicker the dough the better but with a very thick dough you can only use method number 2 which is def. the most time consuming. method number 3 is a great compromise. When it comes to dishes: As a side dish as is. pour some sauce or gravy on those bad boys and enjoy. prefered method would be number 2 as a side dish with browned butter like in the video (little tip even more butter and some breadcrumbs make them very nutty and delicious).This works well for ones you froze. Pref. method nr. 3 Käsespätzle (cheese-spätzle) a dish on its own. molten cheese (has to be good cheese), spätzle, crispy onions do i have to say more? any method you want. And here are some tips for your spätzle-making journey : Use a slightly courser grind of flour if possible (the dough is thicker without beeing even stickier than it already is) there is special Spätzle-flour but i think thats hard to find outside of germany You dont need yogurt or creme fraiche they just need some water (some people dont even use water and just use flour, eggs and salt) Never do small batches of dough. way too much work... especially bc they freeze very well. But do do small batches in the water itself or they'll stick together A rolling boil could destroy them so just stir/swirl the water before dropping them in They are done when they float to the top Have a second pot with cold water next to your boiling pot to transfer them to, the cold water stops the cooking and they loose the starch-coating and wont clump afterwards. thats very important if you want to freeze them.

As someone who comes from the region where Spätzle were invented and I made them a lot: Spätlze are made just by 1 egg per 100gramm flour. and a little water. That's it! Put them in saltet water to boil until they float on the top. then they're done. Small ones like you made are called "Knöpfle" means little buttons. longer ones are spätzle. which ones you make depends on the amount of water you put in. the more liquid the batter, the longer they get. greetings from a swabian

My mother-in-law who was from Switzerland taught me how to make Spaetzle. I love allowing it to cool a bit on a sheet pan and then into the frying pan with some butter. So yummy. She added a bit of cream of wheat and Freshly ground nutmeg in her recipe. The kids always liked theirs with cheese. Precious memories. I treasure her pan to this day. God rest her soul

In Switzerland we layer the cooked "knöpfli" with grated cheese between the layers, then toss on a Rolex watch for garnish.

My trick is I put the batter in a ziplock bag and cut a corner bottom end off slightly. Then use it as a pastry bag and squirt it in to the boiling water. A lot easier!

I made this for dinner tonigjt and my wife loved it. Too bad I'm sleeping on the couch tonight because I did his intonation all evening and my wife can't stand my voice.

I made these tonight. So easy, uncomplicated and delicious. They were added to chicken soup.

The narrator makes me feel like I'm on a roller coaster the way his voice goes up and down 😂🤣😂

So you made some dumplings. You think your spaetzle now or somethin?

“Thats looking very gut...” 😂

You are continuously in mid sentence tone with commas, rarely hitting the lower tones heard to notify the end of the sentence. My heart is elevated the whole time and you won't stop squeezing it with your vice grip. I'm going to die.

This guy kills me!!!! "Ok, there's a very old German saying... That I just made up".

2:15 It's gonna work "grate"

I made this last night for my fiancé and his brothers and they loved it and were very impressed. They're German and we were in Germany last Oktoberfest and they said it was the real deal :) I was very proud. Thanks chef!

Best use of späztle I remember was in Austria. It was pan friend in brown butter, just like with Chef John, and then served underneath a hugely robust venison stew. It was just heavenly. Not so much into venison anymore, but with a beef stew, or even something wildly different like split-pea soup, they are so delicious.

I live in Stuttgart which is the Spätzle capital of Germany. Your recipe is great and while the idea of using a cheese grater is ingenious, the resulting noodles are more like what we call Knöple (which means little buttons) since they are rather on the dumplings side. They are still authentic and very good. Spätzle are usually thinner and traditionally they're made with a special wooden board and a flat knife by spreading the dough on the board and then scraping the dough into boiling water with the knife. If you're interested in how they're made, search for Making of Spätzle here in KZfaq. It's a short video of an older woman showing someone how it's done.

Yes käsespätzle ! This is my favorite dish, ever since I was a young child. The memories this brings back of going on holidays to Germany, Austria and Swiss. They make this dish in different countries and regions, not just Germany. None of them add cayenne, their loss. Just when I thought I couldn't love this channel more. They say the way to a man's heart is through his stomach. Thank you so much, Chef John!

Ah Chef, we love you! Yes, your pronunciation made me hide under the table. But your execution was actually pretty damn near perfect. Your sense of humour and the fact you don't take yourself too serious makes each video you make an absolute joy to watch. I am so happy to have found this channel.

I had a family member that recently passed that was an absolute expert at making spatzle. Most delicious noodles ever. With a little bit of salt, they’re seriously so addicting.

Hey Chef John, you forgot the most important ingredient: Some grated nutmeg for the dough! With fine greetings from Germany ;-)

Can you even taste the cayenne anymore, Chef John? Can you?

My father would put two to eight eggs, the more eggs the more yellow your Spätzle gets. And of course he used much more flour in order to make a large batch in order to make lunch the next day, which consisted of Spätzle, onions, eggs, and chopped bacon. It was so good!

My Slovak grandmother taught me how to make haluski, which are very similar. The dough consists of just flour, egg, a little salt, and milk, and is thicker, not liquid. It is put on a wet, hand held cutting board, and sliced off in little bits into the boiling water. It can be served many ways. The simplest is just to fry some bacon, toss the haluski in the fat, and crumble the crisp bacon on it. It is also served with the rich sweet cream gravy in traditional Slovak style chicken paprikash.

Nice. In Hungary we have a very similar one. We call it "nokedli". It has loads of ways to make it but the method is the same. We serve it with stews or eggs. It's the fastest side dish ever. Love it.

Everytime I hear Chef John's intro I get all giddy and warm inside!

This winter I did make this recipe with the cider braised pork shoulder. It was a great pairing. I was surprised at how much I liked the spaetzle. I think it’d make a wonderful chicken and dumplings also.

"I would make these even if they were hard and complicated"....I have made these every holiday but did not do the butter step. I can hardly wait to do so....I cannot tell you how much I love your channel...the expert advice, the happy chef, the lighthearted humor, the excellent tutorials...thank you soooo much.

A great recipe for a great dish! I've been making these since I was first introduced to them in high school (ahem…45 years ago) at a dinner put on by my German language teacher/class. There are spätzle presses you can buy-get an all metal one if you do-which work more or less wonderfully for making the right size/shape of noodle, but of course the old school version has you plop several spoonfuls down on a small, wetted wooden cutting board and scrape-say with the edge end of a large spatula-little 'rolls' of batter directly into the boiling water. Another 'you surely already have this implement in your kitchen' which works well is a standard box grater…holding the grater by its handle sideways, and with the largest holes facing DOWN toward the water, you put several spoonfuls of batter inside the grater (over the boiling water) and then scrape the batter into the water using a spatula inserted into the grater through its bottom 'end.' The results are teardrop shapes very comparable to Chef John's flat grater results. Some tips from experience: 1. Spätzle are one recipe where not a tiny but even a GENEROUS grating of fresh nutmeg added to the batter is a wonderful addition. 2. If your spätzle tend to come out a little too dense/heavy, then add (something like) 1/8th Teaspoon of baking powder to the batter to make them slightly lighter. It doesn't take much. 3. Fresh out of the boiling water, spätzle are a bit larger (due to being water-logged) than they will end up being once drained. So some shrinkage is normal. 4. When in doubt, mix the batter EXTRA WELL and, if possible, at least 15-20 minutes before the dumplings are cooked. Extra mixing and/or waiting time allows the gluten to develop better. 5. The tinier the spätzle are, the better. All of us will manage to drop a honking, too-big glob of batter into the water from time to time, and to my taste the gi-normous dumplings which result don't taste quite as good as the littler ones do. So get/keep 'em all as small as possible. 6. The cooking water doesn't have to be at a rolling boil, and a near-boil is actually fine. If you like to cook these dumplings at a rolling boil and have a lot to make, keep a glass of cold water handy to replenish the pot water from time to time and to moderate the heavy boil at times when the pot is full of dumplings and is more likely to boil over (because a layer of floating dumplings helps retain the heat in the pot). 7. AIM your dumplings into the pot as well as you can. Any batter that drips onto the side of the pan (either inside or outside) or which falls onto the burner below is of course a lost cause. 8. Some recognition, acquired over time by experience, of what is a proper batter consistency is really necessary because the size of eggs can vary and will affect how moist the batter ends up being (i.e., two medium eggs will make a less moist batter than will two jumbo eggs). If in doubt about egg-to-flour ratio due to the varying size of eggs, I would recommend erring on the side of using an additional egg. 9. Black or white pepper, in addition to a modest amount of salt, is a nice addition to the batter as well. Spätzle cooked in salted cooking water are better than if cooked in plain water, but be careful to not overdo it when you salt the water. 10. Spätzle are a nice substitute for potatoes or pasta, and they go well with almost any roast meat/gravy meal. I've even made my own homemade ground turkey breakfast sausage and eaten that over spätzle. (Brown the broken-up sausage in butter and/or oil, add a couple Tablespoons of flour to make a roux, add milk to make a sawmill-style gravy, perhaps add a dollop of sour cream, then season with salt, pepper, and thyme and serve over the dumplings.)

@Chef John / Food Wishes I'm German and these are actually "Knöpfle" which translates to "small buttons", they originally come from Schwaben, one of the seven Parts of Bavaria (I'm living there). It's called buttons because one end turns blunt when the dough-drop hits the surface of the water, while the other end remains pointy. For real Spätzle you need a narrow and wet board where you spread on a thin layer of dough. Then you need some sort of spatula shaped like a butter-knive or a dough-card to scrape of small shavings of that dough right into the boiling water. ....there you are, otherwise you are always doing a great job and sorry for my broken english :)

Those look lovely, and as a Swabian, thanks for presenting our favorite side dish to the world.

When my life looks dark and I don't see any reason in doing anything or achieving anything in life, I go on youtube and watch this man's videos. Chef John, you're what gets me up in the morning. You're the voice of God (or some other higher power). I'm sure of it

I enjoy listening to your sense of humor! It kills me every time! The food is never complicated to make and is always delicious looking!

hmm, I am not an expert and there is a discussion about it in Germany (only outside Swabia I think) too but in my opinion you made "Knöpfle" not Spätzle. Spätzle are cut with a blunt knife or something comparable from a cutting board directly into the water, but very tasty are Spätzle as well as Knöpfle. PS: as a German student of law I think cayenne in Spätzle dough is quite illegal ;-)

This is about the fifth version of Spaetzle I've watched and love to watch all the tools used to form them. My Mom used to roll bits between her hands to get the noodle shape, then I've watched it with the wooden paddle and knife, two different gadgets that were bought, and now this upside-down grater. This seems like the simplest version and I have one of those graters already. I use this recipe and had formed them with a knife and thin cutting board (replacing Cayenne with freshly ground white pepper and omitting the sour cream/yoghurt addition too). Most recipes use water instead of milk. I will make these when I need some quick comfort food soup in a big mug. I usually make a few crepes, roll them up, and slice one across the roll to form thin noodles. I cheat and use some Oxo beef flavoring powder in a mug of boiling water and then add some crepe or spaetzle noodles. Thanks for sharing your technique.

The casualness of the phrase "but hey that's their loss" and "okay forget the exact measurements" made me subscribe. Love this channel already.

It is really nice if you add a little freshly grated nutmeg to the flour as well.

my grossmere and mother used to put the spaetzle dough on a kitchen plate, tip the plate over slightly and CUT the spaetzle off the plate with a butter knife into the boiling water; we always had it as a side dish with sweetened tomato sauce over the top, normally with fried pork chops; now I have to go and try that again!

I love this guys voice, he sounds so friendly and he's so charismatic!

Hi, i am from germany and i like your videos a lot. Your Spätzle how you made it, is called "Knöpfle" means little buttons. Standard Spätzle are longer in shape.

I love it when my mom cooks up some homemade Spätzle, especially when she "roasts" them in the pan for a bit so that theyre nice and tender / soft but with a thin and crunchy outer layer

There's a wonderful German butcher/restaurant in Richmond Virginia called Metzger's that makes a mushroom spatzle that's out of this world. They do saute it a bit more aggressively, until a few of the pieces have some browning on them, and mix in some sautéed mushrooms. That, under a piece of slow-cooked meat, or a super-crispy pork schnitzel, is just phenomenal.

Well done! Friendly voice, no long stories about your personal life, just about the spatzle. Thank you!

Those are nice looking Spätzle/Knöpfle you made! A original swabian spätzledough uses even simpler ingredients, just flour, eggs, water and salt. The dough is normally firmer so you can prepare it the traditional way by scraping it from the board (but only swabian grandmas have perfected this technique). I would love to see you take on more german food!

Spatzle pronunciation: Sh-petz-le "Sh" - like a librarian, but not as long (sh, not shhhhhhhh!) "Petz" - like more than one animal companion. "Le" - as you would say "Let it be" but without the T (and the "it be" )

I'm a Norwegian cook. In 1978 I learned how to make spätzle in Hotel Engel, Listal , Suisse! Especially now in the fall, the Spätzle is important as an accompaniment to game dishes In Norway this is a unknow dish. Love the Spätzle

My Aunt used to make this when I was a child, but she sprinkled cinnamon on it. We usually ate this with pork chops, but occasionally she would make some and add it to her home-made cream of potato soup. I lived with my Aunt and Uncle on their farm and she made everything from scratch. For the longest time I thought you could only get things like flour, salt, sugar and stuff like that from the grocery store. I never set foot inside a grocery store until I was 10 years old. They had 4 children of their own and we could have gone shopping with her, but we had to be on on Sunday *Church* behaviour, or we could stay home and play outside. I always opted to stay home so I could play outside. I'm 60 now and I still make her recipes and I try to get farm grown produce to make them taste like hers.

The way this guy talks kills me. Makes me think of the guy on the chills channel, only happy and excited. Very informative. New subscriber!

I love the variety you give us!! I had this in Germany a long time ago, and this brings memories back and a new recipe to discover! Thank you chef, keep it up!

That “narrator”, is Chef John. The one who has developed his version of these luscious recipes. His manner of speaking is his cheerful and jovial way of expressing himself. If you are not used to his “delivery”… mute the sound and go to where he has his recipes printed. He is a great guy. Humorous;😁👍🏻 great sense of humor. Enjoyyyye 😁🌺

I like that you show the different consistencies so we can reach the one wanted. Thank you!

As long as the holes are at least this big, it's gonna work grate.

In Slovakia we make these kind of pasta consists of raw mixed potatoes flour and water if needed and salt. Than we cook it same way. But instead of butter we add some melted bacon cubes and our national cheese called bryndza. In some occasions you can add on top of it sour cream and baked smoked paprika sausage similar to chorizo. We called it halusky (pasta) s bryndzou or bryndzove halusky Edit: Its considered as our national food, also only Slovakian people make bryndza.

Dear Chef...omg..I made this yesterday for the hubby with braised short ribs..it Was OUT OF THIS WORLD!!! And so easy....I used gluten free wheat flour, Greek yougart, goats milk,perfection..however my cheese thing did not work lol so thank goodness for zip lock bags... I mean easy and so good. ...our new favorite...will try and upload a pick to you

My brother spent a month in Germany in high school, his host family taught him to make spaetzle, he layered the dumplings with cheddar cheese and black pepper, so rich but so good!! Thank you for this quick recipe, Ive been craving spaetzle for years!!💕

Oh, yeah! Winter is coming! We LOVE spaetzle. I usually make a big batch and serve it with rouladen or kassler rippchen. Schnitzel is also good! Gotta find my spaetzle presse now and do a grocery shop! Great idea, Chef John! ❤️

Actually in Germany, we almost never eat these without some kind of sauce. Most of the time some standard meat sauce, but almost never dry. :) Nice video!

My Hungarian grandmother made her version (nokedli) of this batter recipe in exactly the same way...same consistency. Instead of using any implement to force batter through, she'd place it on a wooden board, wet a knife, section off a ribbon of batter, and scrape small cuts of the ribbon into the water. It made for larger, fluffier and less stringy 'noodles'...best thing ever under chicken paprikas (or on their own). Nice video!!!

My mom was Hungarian. When she made spatzle, she just put the batter on a wood cutting board and flicked off small bits of the batter into a pot of boiling water. That worked really well.

To this day my favorite dish is spaetzle with sauerkraut and keilbasa.

I often have problems with dripping before I push. My wife doesn't like me bringing flour into the bedroom though.

Back in the late 60's Green Giant had a vegetable dish that had spaetzle in it and i really liked it. They combined spaetzle, green beans and i think there were slivered almonds in it. I loved the little spaetzle in it.

Hey Chef John, you asked in the blog, why it´s called Spätzle and Spaetzle. In Germany we use ä, ö and ü. Because most languages don´t have this letters in international context we write this words with ae, oe and ue, for example in email adresses. A real "schwäbische Hausfrau" would not use the grinder or a press but the spätzle are "geschabt". You scratch the dough with a paddle from a wooden board in tiny pieces. Love your channel and have tried a lot of recipes. All of them were great. Thank you!!! Love and greetings from germany.

I have my grandmother's spätzle machine. It was made from a melted down hand grenade... sans explosives obviously

Have you made any videos on steel cut oats? I feel like you'd make them decadent and hearty. Now that it's fall I'm craving something warm for breakfast that isn't instant.

Nice to see that people from other countries around the world appreciate these classic German recipes. First of all, I have to commend you because I think yours looked pretty great, but as someone who grew up eating these all the time when I visited my grandparents and occasinally helping my grandma with the cooking I'd say that the batter was still a bit too thin maybe. At least for the real og Swabian technic of placing the batter on a wooden cutting board and then scraping the Spätzle off one by one with a scrapig tool. Which by the way you really should use because if done right, it produces nice, lengthy, evenly thick Spätzle. But of course its a bit more labour-intensive.

I made this from your recipe, there are several different versions. I think the sour cream made it smooth and creamy. I think yours is the best because you add the melted butter which keeps the noodles separate and not clumping together before you serve them. Thank you, so much, I used the same quantity and it was plenty for 3 people.

Faster and easier than pasta? Sign me up.

Hey, Chef John, my Food Wish is Taiwanese Beef Noodle Soup. There used to be an Asian restaurant where I live that had it and it's one of my all-time favorite dishes. Sadly it closed down and was replaced with an Indian restaurant. I like Indian food but there was already a number of Indian restaurants in my town. I've never been able to find Taiwanese Beef Noodle Soup since.

I'm German, living in THE German Spätzle city in the Southern part of Germany. If you want to make Spätzle the RIGHT and TRADITIONAL way the only tool you use is a wooden breakfast board and a knife. And with your knife you'll scrape the dough along the breakfast board. That's how Spätzle are done. They are scraped and not rasped!

Chef John never disappoints me - As a German i must say, you did very, very well and made this dish quite accurate (apart of the Cayenne - But hey.. You would`nt be Chef John without that signature). I love to eat Spätzle with Mushroom Ragout or a good beef stew. We get them as good instant products here, but now i`m gonna make them just like you did!

His voice just goes 📉📈📉📈📉📈📉

His way of speaking cracks me up man. It's so consistently funny.

just made this for my parents...thanks chef john for letting me off the chores hook tonight, you have a spaetzle place in my heart

I followed Chef's John's instructions to the T. I made Spatzle for a dozen people and it was fantastic! Thank you Chef John for another great video

We do toasted butter with bread crumbs oh my delish

The recipe I was waiting for, but never expected to get. Thanks Chef John! :)

I then add some poppy seeds and bake in the oven for 20 minutes. Brown crust on the bottom is to die for. Thanks for reminding me to make this!

I tried to watch it a second time, just to make sure that I didn't forget anything. But I could not! Your up-and-down voice made me feel dizzy! 🤣🤣🤣 Thank you for the wonderful recipe!

We always use a pinch of freshly grated nutmeg. I'll try the cayenne next time.

The way this guy finishes his sentences LMAO

My father was Swabian, and they did it differently, One water was used instead of milk. Two he would had at least two eggs to the flour and water and of course some salt. He would add more eggs to deeper the color of the spätzle the more eggs added the brighter yellow it became. Third he had a great big piston with long arms that he would force the dough out of the bottom into the salt-water mixture which turn the spätzle into long noodles and they were served with a sauce that was poured over them, sauerbraten to spinach in white sauce to lentils and what was left which would serve as breakfast or lunch the next day. He would fry with butter or oil onions, bacon, and eggs. Sometimes without bacon and often add celery and green peppers, using pepper, salt and even nutmeg. It was always good and cheap to make.

Granny & Grampa cooked Keilbasa in little rounds and added to the spietzles (spet-lees)!!! Brings back memories!!!😉👍💖

It’s like you have an inflection timer. “This is looking JUST ABOUT perfect.”

well actually this are Knöpfle :P Spätzle are longer and well .. more complicated to do. But its the same batter and anyway they are delicious. You could do Käsespätzle (Cheese Spätzle) Its like Mac and Cheese with Spätzle and is delicious

This channel is my comfort channel. Thank you chef John!

I made your Cider Braised Pork on Wednesday, and I'm going home to make this tonight. The pork is the best. I can hardly wait to pair it with this. You make me feel like I can cook!

Such an interesting way of inflecting the end of your sentences. Is that on purpose?

Happy braised-meat season, everyone!

I love that you eyeball things as opposed to giving exact measurements... Shows that cooking is an art!! Plus, your rhymes/puns are funny. Makes it fun and not so intimidating!!!

im glad you did this recipe, i tried looking it up once before and the recipe boiled down to "buy a bag of spatzle mix at the store, turn it into dough, use your special spatzle grater, then boil" which is great if you live in Germany but not so useful for the rest of the planet. The video actually had a big fancy thing that looked like a restaurant grade mandolin specifically for spatzle. I actually experimented with the cheese grater method but used the grating side and it shredded little bits of dough isntead of the little chunks you need.

Very suprising to see a recipe for Spätzle here. I prefere to make them with 500 g flour, 5 eggs, 150 ml water and about 20 g of salt. Works fine, too. The water should be very salty and boiling with a lot of bubbles and none of them will be sticking to the bottom. They freeze easily thats why I like to make a big batch.

Beautiful! It's different from a german spatzle with the milk and creme fraiche but they look great! We can buy 'spaetzle flour' in the supermarket Joe from Germany

I made your recipe tonight… had stew but no more potatoes… it was quite delicious! Thank you!

My house mate used to make this when I lived in Austria, long time ago now. He didn't use cream fresh and it was really tasty. He would prepare it with fried onions shopped into rings with melted cheese and black pepper. I'm going to make it right now. Thanks for reminding me of it. Great stuff!

Is there any correlation between spatzle and spatula ? Mayb we just found out the history of this far away Mac&Cheese essentially

Traditionally, a special wooden-board (one that has a thinning edge) and a large knife were used to form Spätzle; unfortunately, only a few people still master this technique. Anyone who's interested in seeing how Spätzle were made "back in the day," here's a link: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/Y79mesRqzbPRZI0.html Just FYI. : )

I‘m Swabian(Spätzle are Swabian) and man do these look good! They look perfect! Perfect!

And as always, thanks for your videos. I wish my 7th- grade home ec teacher was as entertaining as you!