Dumpling

The term "dumpling" previously had a positive connotation in my mind. I would picture flaky, tasty apple dumplings from the bakery shelf. I'd imagine the feathery white dumplings that my mother would place over a steaming bowl of pork and sauerkraut. I'd recall those savory, filled pasta-like Chinese dumplings from The Dumpling House in lower Manhattan. Mention "dumpling" and I drool like a certain golden retriever I know over a bowl of Blue Buffalo kibble.

At least, I used to.

The bill of fare at the Steigl Beer Tent during Rupert Fest in Salzburg last Saturday included "Roast Ox with Dumpling". I wasn't real sure about the Roast Ox. Too many readings of "The Grinch" and its depiction of "Roast Beast" will do that. But how bad could it be if it included a dumpling? It took several liters of Stiegl to build up the courage to order the Roast Ox entree. The plate included a golf ball-sized lump of speckled white stuff immersed in gravy alongside a slab o' meat.

I cleverly deduced that the golf ball must be the dumpling and attempted to slice it with a steel knife (no plastic cutlery for Rupert Fest. Salzburg's patron saint insists on period authenticity and Rupie goes back to 600 AD). Knives must have been stronger then because this 21st century device wasn't doing the trick. It turns out that an Austrian dumpling must be based on Tolkien's Ring of Power, forged in the depths of Mount Doom and indestructible.

Equally indestructible was the Roast Ox. Apparently a few decades of pulling a plow (or whatever Austrian oxen do) really toughens you up. "Hans, let's sell ox meat to the tourists. They won't know any better and we won't have to make shoes out of it anymore."

Fortunately, Steigl came to the rescue. The accompanying gravy failed to tenderize either the Austrian dumpling or the ox meat, but good local beer cures all ills.