Cream of Chicken Soup the Dutch way Three years ago I published the historical version of this soup on Coquinaria, from a seventeenth-century French cookbook. For that soup you needed partridges and cockscombs (not mushrooms, but the real thing), so I do not expect many people to have prepared that soup. That may be completely…
Traditional
Recipes for Dutch Santa Claus
In the Netherlands the birthday of Saint Nicholas – or Sinterklaas in Dutch – is celebrated on the eve of 5 December. It is mainly a feast for children, but when the children stop ‘believing’ the feast becomes even more fun. In my family we celebrate the Dutch equivalent of Secret Santa, which does not…
Dutch speculaas with almond paste
Speculaasjes are good, speculaas with almond paste is better. The version bought in Dutch shops is often a little on the dry side, but maybe that is just me. The recipe on this page is enough for almost 4 pounds of very rich (=fat) stuffed speculaas. It is easy to make the half amount, however, even…
Speculaasjes – Traditional Dutch Cookies
Speculaas or speculoos is one of the Dutch culinary specialties. It is a spiced cookie, made with wooden forms or moulds. They are typically winterfood, and especially associated with the feast of ‘Sint Nicolaas’ or Saint Nicholas, the original Santa Claus. This feast is celebrated on 5 or 6 December. Speculaas is very old, the…
Peperkoek, the Dutch version of gingerbread
A delicious treat This ‘pepper cake’ is very popular in the Netherlands, and is known under several other names, like ontbijtkoek (breakfast cake) and kruidkoek (spice cake), or connected to regions like Groninger koek or Deventer koek. It is promoted by the food industry as a healthy snack, because it contains no fat. However, sweeteners like honey and sugar constitute more than 50% of…
Chinese tea-eggs
Decorative and delicate in taste This is a very special way to serve hardboiled eggs. You prepare them in advance, all you need to do is peel them before serving them. The result is beautiful marbled eggs with the subtle taste of spices. Do not be put off by the long boiling time, the eggs…
Almond paste
Rich and sweet Almond paste has been around since medieval times. Hardly anyone makes it at home nowadays. It is for sale in stores, sometimes with substitutes as beans or apricot kernels instead of almonds. There is nothing wrong with that, but the original paste is with almonds, so here is a recipe with them….
Dutch Bishop Wine
Although actually it’s English! The Dutch consider Bishop wine as a typically Dutch mulled wine for Sint Nicholas Eve. But it appears that its origins are not Dutch at all. According to the large Woordenboek der Nederlandsche Taal (Lexicon of the Dutch Language, published in installments from 1864 to 1998), bisschopswijn has English roots. The name indicates the…
Stamppot – Traditional Dutch Winterfare
Warming, loving, substantial food While I am writing this (2 December 2010) it’s freezing cold outside, the canal in front of my house is frozen, and everything is covered with a layer of snow. Apparently I live near a salt depot, for in the last half hour I have counted five gritting lorries loaded with…
Traditional Dutch potato salad
Russian Salad the Dutch way I suppose Russian Salad is a popular dish all over the world, but I wonder whether it is as connected with festive holidays as in the Netherlands, where it is called Hussar’s Salad (‘Huzarensalade’). It is a traditional dish on New Year’s Eve, presented as a clock with the hands…
To make a trifle
Straight to the recipe Mrs Beeton’s calorie bomb Our Christmas dinner from 2011 was themed Austen and Dickens. The recipe on this page was the dessert: trifle. An enjoyable dish to prepare, but a veritable mountain of sugar and liquor at the close of the meal. The dish can be prepared almost completely in advance;…
Eggs for Easter
why? Don’t you love eating eggs with Easter? But why all those eggs, what is their connection with Easter? Many people think more about the Easter bunny and chocolate than the religious feast. The (easter) egg symbolizes eternity, resurrection and fertility, and there are several ancient, heathen or Roman predecessors of Easter which I won’t go…
Beef Stock
Back to the list with recipes for stock and soup You’ll never get a good beef stock without meat and bones. In some supermarkets in the Netherlands you can buy soup packages to make your own stock, but what they provide is a miserable quantity, barely enough for one cup of soup. That’s why so many recipes…
Dutch bitterballen from leftover oxtail meat
With oxtail meat and stock and dried ceps For the family Christmas dinner in 2014 I had prepared an old-fashioned clear oxtail consommé as first course. I ended up with leftover stock and a lot of leftover meat from the oxtail. I froze part of the meat with 3 cups of the stock, and when two months later…
Clear Oxtail Soup
Haute cuisine for the Middle Class In my youth we used to eat oxtail soup as the first course of our Christmas dinner. My mother did not really like cooking, so the rest of the year our dinner fare was simple. If she did serve soup, it was prepared from a can or stock cube….