#40 – QUARK DUMPLINGS at CAFE KATJA

Once again Time Out New York released their Top 100 Dishes of the year and once again, I’m going to eat my way through every one. And no price point or subway delay will stop me. In no particular order, here’s my take on their Top 100.

I’m officially finished with my dumpling search (although more reviews will continue to appear from time to time), but as most of you know I was limiting it to Chinese dumplings. Every culture has their own version of dumplings and if I tried all the possibilities all over the city from all over the world, I’d be writing about dumplings for the rest of my life. And I’d probably be a tad bit fatter for it.

But since Time Out listed the quark dumplings at  neighborhood Austrian spot, Cafe Katja, as one of their Top 100 Dishes, I made an exception. I had been to this spot years earlier and enjoyed their German beers, European comfort food, and friendly, quaint ambiance. In fact, I was brought here two years ago because the marinated herring salad was on Time Out’s list in 2008. I guess somebody at Time Out really loves this place.

And they’re not the only one. It’s amazing how crowded Cafe Katja was on a snowy Tuesday night, especially considering most of the other restaurants on the block were practically vacant. It still didn’t take too long to get a table for two and we quickly ordered the herring salad once again, a pretzel, and the emmentaler sausage. The quark dumplings are not listed on the menu as a side order (although Time Out assured us you could request it), but they do come with the sausage. So we asked for them on the side to make sure to get a good close-up photo and as to not let any other flavors get in the way.

The pretzel was a great beginning to the meal and the lightest dish of the night. It was soft and tender with some killer dipping sauces: butter and a spiced paprika-laced cheese spread called liptauer (different from the cholesterol medicine). The herring salad was a little heavier and creamier than I remembered, but featured a generous portion of salty, smoked fish with potatoes for texture and dill for zest.

Emmentaler is a swiss cheese and it was braided throughout the pork sausage. Quark is a soft, German cheese that has a tangy flavor similar to cream cheese. Turns out the sausage dish was as much a cheese dish as a meat one. In addition to the ingredients in the sausage and dumplings, they were bathing in a creamy, cheesy sauce that hit dairy overload.

These dumplings were rather big (there were only three and that was plenty) and were a distant relative to gnocchi. Instead of potato, the quark cheese made them incredibly soft and rich. They felt bready, but in actuality I believe it was just the unique light texture of the cheese. They were heavy in flavor and sauce, but light and airy in texture and bite.

I enjoyed them, but can’t say I left with anything other than a ridiculously full stomach. Why must all dumplings be total gutbombs? And believe me, after my dumpling search, I should know.

Would Cafe Katja’s Quark Dumplings make my Top 100 of the year? They have a very unique flavor and texture that are different than most dumplings and get a 7 out of 10 for that combination alone.