Rote Grütze: part of this nutritious FABULOUS breakfast!

"So what's Rote Grütze?" you may ask. As well you may, especially if you're not German.

Well, it's a sort of red-berry pudding, popular in Scandinavia and parts of North Germany. The exact name varies depending on the region. It's usually served as a dessert, with cream or vanilla sauce on top.

When Miss V and I went to Seattle the other day, we stopped by a German deli in Pike Place Market and came upon a 3-pack of this:

Looked positively Deutschlicious, and the price was right, so I picked it up.

Of course, there was one niggling little problem. I don't actually speak, read or write enough German to make this
understandable. So I had the makings of a potentially delicious taste treat, but I didn't know how to figure out the directions.

OR DID I?

This is one of the minor quotidian triumphs of the Internet: it has created a generation of more adventurous cooks. I can pick up a spice packet with directions in a language I'm not even close to comprehending, transcribe that puppy into Babelfish and be able to suss out the cooking method enough to create a tasty collation. I was even able to figure out what EL meant, though Babelfish choked on it, by looking it up in a number of other places online (for the record, it's the German contraction of "tablespoon"). And if I like the way a make-ahead packet turns out, I can go fishing for recipes to make it from scratch next time.

So what did I do with this minor wonder of German cuisine? Well, after dumping a pale-pink powder into a bowl, adding sugar, stirring in a bit of water and watching it turn a shade of fuchsia pink not found in the natural world, I cooked it up, let it cool and made this:

Rote Grütze-strawberry parfait: breakfast of champions. Nutritious? Probably not, but a delectable way to start the day.

Here's to better living (and eating) through technology. Prost!