Käsespätzle mit Röstzwiebeln

Gretel always said that the Alps have their own kitchen, and Käsespätzle is the dish that proves it. This isn't Viennese food. It comes from Vorarlberg and Tyrol, from farmhouse kitchens where the cheese was made that morning and the eggs came from the yard. It's the kind of cooking where three or four ingredients, handled well, become something so satisfying you can't believe nobody's written an opera about it.

I first had proper Käsespätzle at a wooden Gasthaus table in the Bregenzerwald on one of our childhood trips through Austria. I was maybe nine. Gretel ordered it for me because she said I needed to understand that Austrian cooking wasn't only Torten and Strudel. The Spätzle came in a hot iron pan, the cheese still pulling in long strings when you lifted your fork, and on top, a tangle of onions fried so slowly they'd gone dark and sweet and almost crispy. I ate the entire portion and tried to order another.

The technique is straightforward but it asks you to pay attention. The dough should be wetter and stickier than you think is right. You press or scrape it into boiling water in rough, uneven pieces, and those irregular shapes are what catch the cheese and hold the sauce. Then you layer: Spätzle, grated cheese, Spätzle, more cheese, into a hot dish where everything melts together. The Röstzwiebeln go on at the very end, piled high, still warm from the pan. If the onions aren't deeply caramelized, almost mahogany, you haven't gone far enough. Patience with those onions is the difference between a good Käsespätzle and the kind that makes a whole table go quiet.