OPB’s “Superabundant” explores the stories behind the foods of the Pacific Northwest with videos, articles and this weekly newsletter. Every week, Heather Arndt Anderson, a Portland-based culinary historian, food writer and ecologist, highlights different aspects of the region’s food ecosystem. This week she offers a recipe for creamy wild mushroom stew with bread dumplings.

Click here to subscribe. For previous stories, go here.

I’m sure I don’t need to tell you, but bread is magical — it is transient; metamorphic.

Think about it: Just as you can use leftover porridge to make bread (this may have been how the very first bread was made), you can use leftover bread for so many different dishes, like some kind of delectable ouroboros. It’s great for absorbing bright and oily salad dressings as in fattoush and panzanella, you can turn it into a rich and savory sauce or you can soak it in broth to make soups like pappa al pomodoro and sopa de ajo.

The apex of all stale bread upcycling, however, is turning it into dumplings. Bread dumplings, or semmelknödel (meaning “kneaded bread rolls”), make a wonderfully hearty and comforting meatless main dish, you can stuff them with diced meat or serve them alongside a roast. Though we don’t see semmelknödel very often in the U.S., one of its descendants is pretty common. Do you know what they’re called? Read on to find out!

Umatilla water quality battle simmers

OPB’s Antonio Sierra reports that the Oregon Nitrate Reduction Plan, a legal olive branch offered by Eastern Oregon agriculture industry last month, tries to assuage concerns of residents impacted by agricultural water pollution, which has been linked to various cancers. For some residents, it’s too little too late, but the large-scale agriculture companies argue that the plan should be enough to drop the lawsuits.

A love letter to 25 Portland restaurants

The New York Times published its Portland list in its “Where to Eat: 25 Best” series, and it’s nice to see smaller, locals-only places like Akadi, Ki’ikibáa and Tulip Shop Tavern standing in company with longtime media darlings like Le Pigeon and Coquine (it’s cool that a venerated grandpa joint like RingSide got a little sugar too).

Cranberries float, but this year their prices may sink

The Capital Press reported last week that 2024 is slated to be a more productive year for cranberry farmers in Oregon, New Jersey and Massachusetts (the top three cranberry states after Wisconsin, which produces more than half the national crop). While this is causing speculation that the prices will fall, that also means your Thanksgiving leftovers sandwich just got a teeny bit more affordable. [Note: Forecast data were incorrectly reported in the Capital Press story. The correct numbers can be found here.]

Beer yeast could help cure cancer

Oh, beer — is there anything you can’t do? Scientists in Virginia and Germany have discovered a cellular adaptation in beer yeast (Schizosaccharomyces pombe) that allows it to resume function after stress-induced dormancy. Cancer cells also do this, so studying the mechanism in yeast cells (which are similar to human cells) can uncover new information about how to make cancer cells hibernate permanently.

And other booze news

Oregon breweries and cideries made us proud at the Great American Beer Festival last week, bringing home a total of 33 medals. Now if we just can drum up more enthusiasm for our local wineries — sales of Oregon wines have been down this year despite increased production.

If the cooler, darker days are already bringing you down, might I suggest putting on your best squirrel impression and picking up every shiny acorn and horse chestnut you see? (It couldn’t hurt.) Grab a few pretty leaves too, while you’re at it. Keep an eye out for American chestnuts, walnuts and ginkgo nuts too, and if you really know what you’re doing, treat yourself to a little mushroom foray. Pack a nice lunch and a thermos of hot apple cider, make a day of it. It’s good for you.

Watch the Forest Fungi episode of “Superabundant”

Despite widespread fires that consumed millions of acres of habitat in August, reports from Eastern Oregon point to a good year for upland game birds, especially quail and chukar. It turns out that a couple of good precipitation years were a greater buffer against disturbance than wildlife biologists could predict. Waterfowl are also expected to make pretty good hunting overall, but, as our colleagues at Jefferson Public Radio report, avian botulism is still hitting wild birds hard in Klamath Basin.

Now that it’s cooling off (except for those lucky folks in Medford who can expect another week of the 70s), it’s a good time to start planting fruit trees and shrubs; sow greens, beets, peas and crucifers (broccoli, cauliflower, kale and radish) too. Wetter weather means it’s also time to yank squash and cucumber plants, especially if they’ve got powdery mildew like I do. Tomatoes in protected spots still seem to be ripening, if slowly. My single tomatillo plant continues to drop fruit every day (that’s how you know they’re ripe, but catch them before the slugs do!). My garlic chives are majorly going to seed — if you want to grow it in your own garden, send me an email with your mailing address and I’ll mail you some seeds. Sow it now and you’ll have buchu muchim come spring.

Apples, pears and squash are still spectacular, but look out for local weirdos like medlars and pawpaws (you may have to befriend someone with a tree to find either) too, along with persimmons, pomegranates, quinces and hardy kiwis.

Lately, in the “Superabundant” kitchen

✨ Once in a while I get nostalgic cravings for the struggle meals of my childhood, and I’ll crack into a box of Jiffy cornbread mix or boxed potatoes au gratin stretched with diced ham. This time it was creamy Parmesan angel hair a là San Francisco with rotisserie chicken and cauliflower.

✨ I made a big batch of mapo tofu using soft tofu from America’s oldest tofu company (Portland’s own Ota Tofu) and ground pork, bolstered with lots of oily-funky doubanjiang and my own mala (numb-spicy) seasoning mix. Since it was the last warm and sunny afternoon on the horizon, I cooked it in a wok set over a crackling wood fire.

✨ The rest of the rotisserie chicken was shredded and simmered with the backlog of homegrown tomatillos and chiles in the fridge (I eat a ton of salsa verde this time of year!), a diced hobak summer squash, and lots of onions, garlic and herbs. To pad it out, I made chochoyotes, cute-as-a-button dumplings that remind me of pillowy masa gnocchi.

Recipe: Bread dumplings with creamy wild mushroom sauce

We could say that bread dumplings are as economical as they are simple to prepare, but this does semmelknödel a disservice. Are they a poster child for food waste reduction? Sure. Are they made from just four ingredients that you probably already have on hand? Indeed. But semmelknödel exemplify the synergy of simple, homestyle foods — they’re so much more than a way to use up stale bread.

Unlike their descendant, the matzo ball (aka kneydl in Yiddish), served almost universally in a brothy soup, semmelknödel are an all-purpose carb, as equally suited to goulash as they are gravy. Because it is autumn, and wild mushrooms are superabundant in these parts, here I’ve paired them with a creamy wild mushroom sauce (pilzrahmsoße). You can use any kind of stale bread for these — Kaiser rolls are the norm, but I just happened to have a stash of day-old baguettes in my freezer because my friendly neighborhood cheese-and-cracker snack shop gives them to me for free. Makes 12 dumplings

Ingredients

Semmelknödel

1 pound stale bread (such as 1 baguette, 5 Kaiser rolls, etc.)

1 cup milk

1 teaspoon neutral cooking oil

½ cup diced onion

2 eggs, lightly beaten

Salt and pepper

Mushroom sauce

3 tablespoons unsalted butter

½ pound mushrooms, any kind, chopped or broken into pieces

½ teaspoon caraway seeds

½ cup of diced onion

2 teaspoons kosher salt

¼ cup of flour

3 cups whole milk

A few pinches freshly grated nutmeg

½ teaspoon black pepper

Chopped fresh parsley, chervil and/or dill for garnish

Instructions

1. Cut or tear the bread into rough chunks, then arrange them in a shallow baking dish, cut side up. Pour the milk over the bread and let it soak, turning the bread as needed to ensure all the pieces get to sit in the milk and soften up, about one hour. When the bread has softened to the texture of a moist sponge (but not too mushy), blitz it in a food processor (or tear it up with your hands) until it forms a cohesive, pulpy mass of ¼-inch crumbs. Transfer to a bowl.
2. While the bread is soaking, heat the oil in a large pan over medium heat and saute the onions until they’re fragrant and translucent, about 3-5 minutes. Allow the onions to cool slightly, then mix them with the soaked bread, eggs and a few pinches of salt and pepper. Form into 12 balls, packing them fairly tightly to ensure they keep their shape.
3. In the same pan that you used to saute the onions, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the mushrooms, caraway seeds, diced onion and salt and cook, stirring frequently, until the mushrooms have softened and begun to brown on the edges and the onions are translucent, around 8-10 minutes.
4. Add the flour and stir it around to coat the mushrooms, adding more butter as needed to ensure it all comes together (it will still be a dry mess but that’s OK). Cook, stirring, until the flour becomes slightly toasty and fragrant, about 1-2 minutes. Pour in the milk, stirring to dissolve the flour, then add the nutmeg and pepper.
5. Reduce the heat to low and add the semmelknödel. Cover the pan and simmer for about 15 minutes, until the sauce is thickened (add more milk or water as needed to keep it from getting too thick) and the dumplings have firmed up and cooked through (they’ll be the texture of meatballs), turning gently about halfway through cooking to make sure they’re evenly coated with the sauce. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed, then serve with a sprinkle of fresh chopped herbs.

Get these recipes sent to your inbox every week. Don’t forget to tell a friend!