The Family Recipe Box
Every family has The One. That legendary recipe. The one that shows up at every gathering, passed down through generations and known by heart. At some point, it becomes more than just food—it’s a plateful of memories, a bowlful of love, a recipe for connection.
In our Family Recipe Box series, we celebrate a different Allrecipes Allstar each month by sharing the story behind their treasured family dish—along with everything you need to bring it to your table, too. Because recipes this meaningful deserve to be passed on. And at Allrecipes, you’re part of the family.
Name: Sophie Sadler
Location: Kansas City
Family recipe: Klößchen (Mini Potato Dumplings)
Who developed the recipe: Great-Grandma Lydia
When it became a family tradition: The 1940s
The humble potato turns into something magical in the hands of Oma, if you ask Allrecipes Allstar Sophie Sadler—and anyone in her family.
“Klößchen has been part of my life for as long as I can remember,” Sophie says. “My twin sister, Jeanne, and I always requested it for lunch, but my Oma wasn’t always too excited about making it because it’s quite labor-intensive. But she still always made it for us.”
Allrecipes / Sophie Sadler
By the time Sophie and Jeanne were 7, they would head to Oma’s home after grade school, which is where Oma passed along her secrets for the recipe that dates back at least to Sophie’s great-grandma, Lydia. Sophie admits that “peeling and cutting the onions was always my least favorite part. Without fail, I would always cry.” But she actually looked forward to peeling the potatoes because “I made it a competition to see if I could peel the longest strip of potato skin!”
After whipping up mini potato dumplings at Oma’s hip about 100 times, Sophie moved to the United States for college—and now feels confident enough to whip this up in her Kansas City kitchen. (Still, it was an unforgettable moment for Sophie when she returned to Germany last summer to make it again with Oma.) As of this fall, countless more home cooks can get in on the fun, since Sophie included the family heirloom Klößchen recipe in her first cookbook.
“It’s perfect for inviting a friend or family member over so you can team up to peel and grate the potatoes while listening to your favorite music and dancing in the kitchen,” Sophie tells us. It’s worth the effort; once you combine the parboiled potato dumplings with scrambled eggs and top them with caramelized onions and crispy bacon, “nobody will be able to resist,” she confirms.
The Klößchen recipe below—which only uses six ingredients—is the exact same one Oma follows to this day because “I want it to forever taste like what it did in my Oma’s kitchen. And it does,” Sophie says.
To ensure that you don’t “lose part of your knuckle when shredding all the potatoes that go into this dish, I highly recommend investing in some protective no-cut gloves,” Sophie suggests. Once you get down to the stubby ends, reserve the potato remnants to boil for mashed potatoes or stir into soups or stews.
Sophie Sadler