German Potato Pillekuchen – Rhineland Specialty

The German potato dish called “Pillekuchen or Pillekooken, Pillekauken, Schnibbelkuchen, Pinnekuchen, Pinnekeskuchen or Leinewebers Pfannkuchen”, is a German potato specialty from the region Nord-Rhine Westfalia (Nordrheinwestfalen) around Leverkusen, Wuppertal, Remscheid and Solingen and the Rhineland. It is a very inexpensive dish and you won’t find it in any restaurant. The name comes from the Rhineland dialect “pill” which means little piece or stripe.
This German potato dish is related to the Swiss dish Roesti and the Spanish Tortilla. Practically every ingredient from left overs can be used for this dish, such as pasta, vegetable, sausages, with or without meat such as the combination potatoes and spinach. The potatoes are baked with a pancake mix in the oven. A good side dish would be a salad such as lettuce, mache (Feldsalat), or mixed greens. Happy Cooking!

Ingredients German Potato Pillekuchen

100 g flour
1 egg
250 ml milk
salt, pepper, nutmeg, fresh herbs such as parsley, chives
1 kg potatoes (boiled in skin or raw)
3 onions
50 g ham and 50 g bacon
both caraway seeds and marjoram (oregano) are optional
2 tbsp clarified butter

Cooking Instructions Pillekuchen

– Make a dough out of flour, egg, milk, spices and fresh chopped herbs. It should be a thin pancake dough. It it is too thick add some more milk.
– Let dough at least 30 min rest.
– Cut ham and bacon into small cubes; chop onions fine.
If you use raw potatoes: wash and peel them, cut in thin slices.
– Melt  2 tbsp clarified butter in a skillet, add bacon and fry it, then onions.
– Add potatoes and fry until they are crunchy.
– After about 5 min add the ham and fry it too.
– Spice to taste with salt, pepper and if you like add also caraway seeds.
If you use boiled potatoes: boil the potatoes the day before, peel them after they are done and use them the next day.
– Cut potatoes in slices.
– melt clarified butter  in a skillet and fry the bacon, add potatoes and with onions and ham and fry until the potatoes are crunchy. The cooking time is less if you use boiled potatoes.
– Spice to taste.

Preheat oven to 350 F (don’t preheat if it is a convection oven).
Grease a fire proof form with butter, add the potatoes and pour the pancake mix over it.
Bake for about 30 min.

Tips
– When you boil the potatoes add some caraway seeds to the water instead of adding them directly to the dish.
– Use any left overs: meat, turkey, chicken, sausages or vegetable.
– Add some cheese over the pancake dough before you bake it.
– vegetarian: use spinach with the potatoes or any vegetable only (no meat, bacon).
– Spice it with cayenne pepper or use curry and turmeric for an Indian taste.

Recipe/photocredit