AI-generated Goetta is the breakfast meat of Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky: ground pork and beef simmered for hours with pinhead oats, onion and bay leaf, set in loaf pans, then sliced and fried. A good slice comes out of the pan with a dark, crisp, pebbly crust and a soft grey-brown inside. Locals eat it with a runny egg, argue about ketchup against syrup, and put it in sandwiches, omelettes and on pizza.
History
German immigrants came to Cincinnati from the 1830s, many from the north-western farm country around Oldenburg, Hanover and Westphalia. They brought Grützwurst, a sausage stretched with grain so a little meat lasted for several meals; the name goetta comes from the Low German word for groats. In Ohio, oats replaced the grains used back home, and cheap pork pushed out most of the offal. Families cooked it at home, and bags of Dorsel's pinhead oats, the region's main brand, carried a goetta recipe on the back. In 1946 the Glier family opened a small meat shop at 439 Pike Street in Covington; Glier's now sells several million pounds of goetta a year and runs Goettafest, eight days with 200,000 to 250,000 visitors.
Ingredients
Preparation
The oats simmer in salted water for about an hour until creamy. Ground pork and beef go in with onion, spices and stock, and the pot cooks uncovered on the lowest heat for three hours or more, stirred often so the oats don't scorch. Eckerlin Meats at Findlay Market lets its batch simmer four to five hours. The mixture is ready when a spoon stands upright in it. It is poured into lined loaf pans and left to set for at least twelve hours. To serve, cut slices at least 1 cm thick and fry them in a little oil or bacon fat, five to ten minutes a side, moving them as little as possible so the crust holds.
Taste
Savoury pork and beef with the nutty taste of toasted oats from the crust; bay and pepper stay in the background. Without the frying it tastes flat, which is why nobody eats goetta cold.
Texture
Chilled, it is a firm loaf whose cut face shows oat grains throughout. Fried, the outside turns dark brown and crunchy while the inside stays soft, almost like a thick porridge with meat.
Rituals & Traditions
Goettafest
Glier's started the festival as a thank-you party for customers. It now runs eight days on the Kentucky riverbank in Newport and Covington, with goetta in everything from mac and cheese to pizza.
Leave it alone in the pan
Cut thick slices, use a hot skillet with a little fat and don't move them until the underside has a crust. Turned too early, goetta falls apart.
Recipes
GLT (goetta, lettuce and tomato sandwich)
Goetta
Cincinnati's answer to the BLT swaps the bacon for crisp-fried slices of goetta. Diners like the Anchor Grill in Covington serve it, and the late Tucker's in Over-the-Rhine kept it as an off-menu favourite.
Homemade goetta
Goetta
How Cincinnati families make goetta at home: pinhead oats cooked slowly with ground pork and beef until a spoon stands up in the pot, then set overnight in loaf pans. This version follows the recipe Sara Bir published in Ohio Magazine. One batch makes two loaves that keep a week in the fridge or a year in the freezer.
