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Heringtopf (Marinated Herring)

Finally a good German favorite, after all those fussy French dishes. And this truly is one of my favorites.
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Ingredients

  • Herrings fresh, 2 lbs. (1 kg), see Note below
  • Lemons 2
  • Salt
  • Onion 3
  • Apples 14 oz. (400 g)
  • Pickles from a jar, 5 oz. (150 g)
  • Whipping cream 1 cup (200 g)
  • Sour cream or crème fraiche ¾ cup (150 g)
  • Lemon juice 3 Tbsp.
  • Pepper

Instructions

  • Filet the herring. Rinse and dry the filets. Place them in a single layer in a baking pan or dish. Salt the filets. Pour the juice from the two lemons on the filets. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight. (The lemon juice “cooks” the fish. If you find the result to be too acidic, pour a little bit of olive oil on the filets before the lemon juice next time around.)
  • The next day… Bring 1 cup (250 ml) of water to a boil. Add ¼ tsp. of salt. Peel, halve and thinly slice the onions. Blanche the onion slices in the boiling water. Remove and let dry.
  • Peel, quarter and slice the apples.
  • Slice the pickles.
  • Mix the whipping cream, sour cream and lemon juice together. Salt and pepper.
  • Add in the onions, apples and pickles.
  • Add the herring cut-up in pieces.
  • Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours if using fresh herring, at least 12 hours for smoked herring. You can't go wrong with a little extra marination so error on the side of overnight.
  • Serve with cooked, peeled potatoes.

Notes

Herring: The recipe uses fresh herring filets. If you find smoked herring filets (called “matje”) you can also use them but rinse them first and make sure you marinate all the ingredients together for at least 12 hours. Another polite note on fresh herring: they say that it only keeps 1-2 days in the refrigerator. I read this when we were already on day 3 and counting. We went ahead and used the fish anyway but I’ll be honest that we were a bit on edge wondering which bite would be the one that would send us to examine the tiles around the toilet for the rest of the evening. In the end, we came out just fine, but next time I will use the herring sooner.