For a host of reasons both politico-historical and culinary, German food has been so assimilated into this country that no one in Baltimore would go to German restaurants if they were still around, which is why almost none of them are. That's meant hard times for some of us; in my family, Thanksgiving without sauerkraut is, to borrow a phrase from Friedrich Nietzsche, "like a day without sauerkraut." If you want to get down in the tangy, doughy, deep brown palette of German food, the place to be is the annual sour beef dinner at Zion Lutheran Church near City Hall. It only happens once a year and there's exactly one option on the menu: a few slices of what's called sour beef and three spherical dumplings with gravy on top, plus cooked red cabbage, green beans, and a roll that comes with one of those little gold foil pats of butter.