A Dutch orginal dessert Vla ( ), a kind of custard, is the favourite dessert for most Dutch people. It is ready-bought at supermarkets, and seldom prepared at home. In the past, custard was prepared with just eggs and milk (see this recipe for Custard with macaroons), but custard powder is also an excellent way…
Technique
Pickled anchovies
For the third course of the menu with adapted recipes in the edition of Het excellente kookboek (The Excellent Cookbook) we decided to put some anchovies on the table as well. There is a still life by the German painter Sebastian Stoskopff (1597-1657) with a dish filled with anchovies as centre piece. It looks like…
Roux and Béchamel sauce
The basis for al kinds of sauces Some of the recipes on Coquinaria describe how a soup, sauce or ragout is thickened with a roux. Many sauces in the classic French cuisine are based on this technique. Making a roux is not difficult. Just remember that the amounts of butter and flour must be the…
Tips & Tricks
On this page are some links to pages with tips, tricks and basic recipes concerning kitchenware, serving and eating meals, cooking techniques, and preparing ingredients. The instructions are also meant to help those who are real beginners, so maybe they are too extensive for the more experienced cooks. If there are variations on a basic…
Tamarind ice-cream
Straight to the recipe An exotic flavour from the nineteenth century Last year I had the good fortune to attend a Georgian Cookery Course by the British food historian Ivan Day. He does not bother his pupils with adapted recipes, but lets them work with the original cookery books and if possible with contemporary cooking tools and…
Basics – Fresh chestnuts
Sweet chestnuts (Castanea sativa) are an autumn treat. In the Netherlands the harvest is not always good, the chestnuts are only ripe enough to eat after hot summers. Do not confuse sweet chestnuts with horse chestnuts, these are bitter and toxic. See the picture above for the differences. To prepare gathered chestnuts, take them out…
Basis recipe – Mayonnaise
To the page with Tips & Tricks If but one tablespoon is needed, just use mayonnaise from a jar. But in some dishes mayonnaise is an important ingredient, and then it is very rewarding to make one’s own. When buying mayonnaise in a store, always check the list of ingredients. Water should never be listed,…
Basic Recipe – Making Almond Milk
To the page with Tips & Tricks For people who are lactose-intolerant or follow a vegan diet, almond milk is one of the possible substitutions for milk from cow, goat or sheep. It is not difficult to make at home. A good thing, because shop-bought almond milk often contains sugar and other additives like thickening…
A visit to the butcher
Recently I joined Carolina Verhoeven, who until 2010 owned the Culinary Historical Museum in Appelscha (in the North of The Netherlands) and is now head of the Culinary Heritage Centre in a visit to the biological butcher shop of Bernard Roosendaal in Drachtstercompagnie. Slagerij Roosendaal was a biological/organic butcher’s. They also had live stock, and functioned…
A brief history of pasta – Part 2
To part 1 of the history of pasta When I published two macaroni recipes from World War I, I also added a page on the recent history of the production of macaronipasta. This page can be considered as the ‘prequel’ of that history section: pasta and macaroni from the Middle Ages to the eighteenth century….
Real Dutch kroket and bitterbal
The picture shows my daughter and some of her friends at her birthday party many years ago (in 2002). As part of the festivities they were preparing their own meal, the standard birthday fare for a lot of Dutch children in the past: kroketten, French fries and apple sauce, but everything made from scratch. They…
Dough – The basics
Straight to the list with basic recipes and historical recipes with dough Preparing dough is a question of touching and feeling. Basic ingredients are flour, water and salt. Eggs, butter and shortening can also be used, and instead of water other liquids can be added, like white wine. The recipes here are mostly based on…
Home Made Italian Pasta
The Italians are famous for their pasta. On this page you learn how to make fresh pasta, with eggs and without eggs, and for stuffed pasta like ravioli and tortellini. Asian pasta is also delicious. See here for recipes. And for those of you who are interested in the past, here are recipes for fresh pasta from the sixteenth century. And…
Puff pastry
On Coquinaria are several historical recipes for puff pastry. On this page is a modern version. While I was searching online I saw some recipes for puff pastry that are actually just for flaky dough. Puff pastry is a kind of flaky dough, but to make puff pastry it takes something extra. Because just folding…
Russian stock
Meat stock from the nineteenth century Soup is an important part of the Eastern-European kitchen. In the Gift for young housewives, a Russian cookery book that was first published in 1861, there is a recipe for basic bouillon that can be used for all kinds of soup. The recipes for the soups themselves contain variations…