Well it's taken awhile for the right shortcuts to make the German umlauts on my US keyboard but here are the secret combinations, tell all those who need to know and we can stop the head banging.
option u (release option and u) u .... ü
option u (release option and u) o .... ö
option u (release option and u) e .... ë
option u (release option and u) a .... ä
option s ....................................... ß
