Bayerischer Meerrettich

Appearance & taste

Bayerischer Meerrettich is sold as roots (raw product) or processed. The prepared, ready-to-eat horseradish consists of the grated raw product with vinegar, oil and spices according to traditional recipes; it must contain a minimum proportion of horseradish. The horseradish for it comes 100 % from Bavaria, the other ingredients not necessarily.

According to the specification, a particular pungency and a spicy aroma are characteristic. The preparation has a rustic, consistently pungent and spicy note, is light-coloured without dark specks and highly viscous.

Production

At the end of February, when the frost is over, the clamps in which the cuttings, the Fechser, have overwintered are opened. They are then kept in a bright room until they sprout, and in April they are laid in the beds tilted slightly upwards with the “head towards the east, to the rising morning sun”. From the beginning of May they are “topped”: each Fechser is half uncovered, and only the strongest shoot is left so that single-headed roots grow later. Until the harvest, each root is dug out and buried again at least once to remove side shoots, usually by hand; such roots may only grow at the end of the root, because they are the next year’s cuttings. In October a machine loosens the soil, and the roots are pulled out by hand. Horseradish should only be grown on the same field every three years.

The roots are hand-sorted, trimmed, washed, freshly grated and refined with the ingredients; anything not processed immediately is stored in a cold room. According to the specification, over the centuries the businesses have developed methods that subject the horseradish to only small mechanical forces so that it loses little of its pungency. It is preserved only by sulphuring.

Origin & history

It is grown on suitable soils in Bavaria, above all in Middle and Upper Franconia; processing traditionally takes place especially in the districts of Erlangen-Höchstadt, Neustadt an der Aisch/Bad Windsheim and Forchheim. The mean annual temperature is 8.5 °C, about 600 mm of rain falls, and the soils are loose, sandy and loamy. According to the specification, this leads to higher glucosinolate contents than in other growing areas.

According to tradition, Margrave Johannes Alchemista is said to have introduced horseradish on the Regnitz in the 15th century. The book “Die Nymphe Noris” of 1650 speaks of the “Böhmischen Kraen im Knoblauchsland”, and in 1787 Johann Füssel mentions field cultivation between Forchheim and Erlangen in his travel diary. After the opening of the Ludwig-Donau-Kanal in 1846, the horseradish was shipped from Baiersdorf to Austria, Hungary, Russia and the USA, among other places. Since 1912 producers in and around Baiersdorf have also offered it grated. According to the specification, the area around Baiersdorf is the growing area with the richest tradition in the world and is still the most important in Germany today.