This is my friend Tina. She's awesome. She just had a birthday the other day, too. She has my blog with the apps on her phone so she can read it instantly. When I don't post, she gets very upset with me.
So, here you go, Tina! A post FOR you and ABOUT you! :)
Tina was so kind to allow me to interview her earlier this spring for the Eureka paper. The story ran last week for Mother's Day. I hope you all like it!
By Laura Melius
Keeping German traditions
alive is important to Tina (Neuharth) Boe.
What better way to hand down her family’s heritage than through German
foods?
Boe, a 1998 graduate of EHS
and daughter of Charles and Marilyn of Eureka, now resides near Hatton,
ND, with her husband, Dana, and their three children,
Spencer (9), Lincoln (5) and Lillian (4).
Since the Boe family is
Norwegian, the German treats from Tina’s kitchen were a new experience for her
husband. Now, dumplings, knepfla, and
kuchen are among their family’s favorite German foods.
“The kids call
knepfla “little dumplings,” Tina said. “My oldest always requests dumplings for
his birthday.”
Even though Tina
makes many German foods, kuchen is her favorite to make because it reminds her
of her grandma. Her grandma, Frieda Trautman of Eureka, first taught her how to make kuchen.
Within the last
five years, Tina decided to learn to replicate her grandma’s recipe. As with
most recipes handed down from grandparents, it was not easy and required some
trial and error.
“My grandma
didn’t have a written recipe, so when she first showed me I was writing things
down constantly. By the end, I had to condense the recipe because she was
always adding more flour or more milk. I now have the recipe written for all
measurements. And you can’t ½ the recipe either,” Tina explained.
As German bakers
know, kuchen requires several ingredients and quite a lot of time to bake the
large number each recipe makes. She plans ahead and buys her ingredients, such
as half and half, eggs, flour, and sugar when they are on sale. Baking days are
reserved for weekends. Her recipe makes 16 big kuchen, and since she is only
able to bake eight at a time, it does take awhile to finish the project.
“I keep telling
my husband I need a second oven,” she said. “I found a pan that makes small
ones so that is new to me. My kitchen counter is full when I am done.”
As far as kitchen
tools, Tina has her favorites.
“I love my
Kitchen-Aid mixer for mixing the dough. I have a wooden handled metal spoon
that my grandma gave me and I use all the time, for everything. I also have
inherited some aprons from my grandma that I love to wear,” she said.
Her children not
only reap the benefits of eating kuchen, but they help in the kitchen as
well.
“My oldest is
good at cracking the eggs,” she said. “The younger ones like to help with
putting the chocolate chips in the kuchen.”
Speaking of chocolate chips, chocolate chip is a favorite
kuchen flavor of Tina’s family. She also makes many other varieties, including
traditional flavors of strawberry rhubarb, cheese, and blueberry, taking the
extra step of cooking down fresh or frozen fruit to make her filling. She has
also experimented with flavors like caramel, peanut butter chocolate chip,
white chocolate and macadamia nut, peanut butter and jelly, and s’mores.
Tina’s extended
family is not only the recipient of her delicious kuchen.
“I share with
co-workers and friends. Since I am in a Norwegian community, it is new to them
and we do a lot of goodie trading,” she said.
Making kuchen is
more than just baking to Tina. It’s passing down tradition and making new
memories with her own children.
“It’s the
memories,” she said. “When we were little, we would help carry the strudles to
the pan. Our arms were not that big, so we were not able to carry many. Now
it’s fun to have my kids help.”
The greatest
compliment she has received is one all German bakers aspire to.
“My dad said that it was better than my grandmas and my grandma
agreed,” she said.
