Is This E-Knoephla?
Two new Midwestern recipes, plus North Dakota knoephla highlights
Howdy from Kansas City! I know it’s been a while. Sorry about that. After a busy and sometimes challenging couple of years, punctuated by a divorce, some professional changes, and a move from one side of the Midwest to the other, I’ll admit, I’m still figuring out how to balance Midwesterner with the 9-5 and freelance assignments that pay the bills. (A reminder: Paid subscriptions have been suspended since 2022, meaning that none of you have been charged for your patience.)
If you’re like me, your inbox is flooded with Substack newsletters, and I want to be sure Midwesterner continues to feel both surprising and substantive—which means investing time in research, recipe testing, interviews, etc. It’s slow going sometimes. I hope you’ll hang in there for stories about Illinois barbecue, taco pizza, the Kansas City agua fresca I crave on hot afternoons (coming next week!), and much more.
I’m trying not to let the perfect be the enemy of the good—as a writer and a recipe developer. This week, Serious Eats published two of the recipes that have taken up a lot of my time for the past few months. I can’t tell you how much North Dakota knoephla soup I made between February and April, but it was enough that I don’t know if I’ll be able to eat knoephla again til next winter… which is when I’ll be ready for cream-and-dumpling soup again, anyway. I was able to figure out that I rolled 128 Iowa ham balls in pursuit of porcine perfection (with help from my soon-to-be mother-in-law, Iowan Jill Cook, who’s been making them for decades).
In the headnote for the Serious Eats knoephla soup recipe, I mentioned getting a speeding ticket outside Lawrence Welk’s hometown while I was in North Dakota earlier this year, but I didn’t get into all the soups I tried in a knoephla-heavy (and I mean heavy) few days of focused research.
After consulting our growing library of Dakota-specific books, and local experts including Rick Gion of Prairie Public Broadcasting in Fargo, Jeremy Kopp of the Germans from Russia Collection at NDSU, and the anonymous posters of r/northdakota, r/fargo, and r/bismarck, Liz and I were able to taste nearly all of the most popular knoephla soups east of Mandan. (We’re doing the western Dakotas this summer, and I hear I have to get one more bowl at the Country Rose Café in Dickinson.)
My top three, in no particular order—each, conveniently, representing a different approach to the dish:
The buttery, celery-infused knoephla soup (which I suspect might include both celery seed and sage, for a stuffing-like flavor profile) at Rolling Hills Restaurant in Mandan, a 24/7 truck stop diner on I-94. (Cross-country drivers, take note.)
The knoephla soup at Brick Oven Bakery in Bismarck—thick, loaded with potatoes, carrots, celery, and chewy dumplings (“like a chowder or stew,” I wrote), and recommended by the bartender at Pirogue, a local fine-dining institution.
The curried pumpkin knoephla soup, tinted yellow by warming vadouvan curry powder and topped with crunchy fried onions and chives, at Huckleberry House in Bismarck, a charming New Midwestern spot on the Missouri River.
E-mail me for more North Dakota recommendations, try making my knoephla soup before it’s too hot out, and watch your inbox for another Midwesterner, with a new recipe, next week.