Stokvis

Stokvis, or stick fish, not to be confused with fish stick, is a dried piece of cod. Fresh cod is caught, cleaned and stuck on a stick and left to dry in the cold Northern wind. Several months later, you have a dried up, leathery, rock-hard piece of fish. The main reason to dry fish is, ofcourse, to preserve it, often up to a year. In order to make the fish palatable again, it needs to be soaked for at least 24 hours in water to soften the tissue, refreshing the water every six to 8 hours. 

Who in the world would want to eat that? I'm glad you asked. Stokvis is quite popular in a variety of cultures: northern countries such as Norway and Sweden, southern regions like Portugal and Spain, and ofcourse Holland, or the Netherlands are all countries that regularly integrate the delicate flavor of this dried-up finny food into their daily meals.

Stokvis is hard to find in the United States but the salted bacalao, known in Dutch as klipvis, available in the seafood department of larger grocery stores, will do just fine for this purpose: the only difference between one and the other is that bacalao has been salted extensively and the skin, tail and bones have been already removed. Soaking and refreshing the water becomes even more important in this case.

Up until the Second World War, stokvis was very popular in Holland. It was very affordable and the high amount of protein provided a very nutritious meal. The lengthy prepare time and the characteristic smell made it eventually an unpopular dish. Nowadays, it is one of the more expensive foods to consume, but it has never reached its pre-war popularity.

Stokvis is traditionally served on New Year's Day in various provinces, like Friesland and Zeeland. Steamed white rice, boiled potatoes, fried onions, a lick of mustard and warm creamy buttersauce are side dishes to the fish. It doesn't sound like much, and the color combination is terrible (white, yellow, brown, yellow and beige....not appetizing!) but once you mix the buttersauce in with the rice, mashing the potatoes and mixing in the onions, it all of a sudden becomes a very honest, almost heartwarming meal and most certainly worth the effort.

Stokvis

1 case of cod

Plenty of water

1 cup of white rice

4 potatoes, peeled and quartered
1 onion, peeled and sliced

1 stick of butter

1 tablespoon of cornstarch

White pepper to taste

Soak the cod in cold water for 24 hours, refreshing the water every eight hours or according to instructions on the box. The fish doesn't take long to cook once it's soaked so time it accordingly. Both rice and potatoes usually take about twenty minutes, that's enough for the fish to be ready.

Boil rice per instructions (usually one cup of rice on two cups of water, bring to a boil, cover, simmer for twenty minutes) as well as the potatoes (add enough water to a pan to cover, add a teaspoon of salt, bring to a boil, cover and medium boil for twenty minutes or until done).

Fry the onion slices in one tablespoon of butter until golden. Set aside. Melt the rest of the butter in the pan but do not brown. When it's warm, add half a cup of water, bring back up to temperature. Add the cornstarch to a little bit of water, mix and stir into the warm sauce. Stir until it thickens and makes a nice creamy sauce.

When all is done, place a  piece of fish on a plate and surround it with rice and potatoes. Pour the warm buttersauce over the rice and potatoes, add some fried onions on top and sprinkle some white pepper to taste. Add some mustard if you wish and enjoy your meal!

Frikandellen

In several days time, on January 29th, Holland will be the scene for another highly culinary event: the annual Frikandellen Eating competition. Held for the seventh year and hosted by the Men's Choir of Heukelum, a small town in the province of Gelderland, twenty contestants will compete for the challenge trophy and, oh joy, the Golden Frikandel.

Gelderland is no stranger to interesting sausages: it is supposedly the birthplace of Gelderse kookworst and rookworst. In Dutch, worst means sausage which may, on the whole, not be totally coincidental, as the meat used for many of these sausages is not exactly the best. The Gelderse version is made of lean pork, seasoned with a particular set of spices and slightly smoked over oak and beech, then eaten either cold (kookworst) as luncheon meat or boiled (rookworst) with split pea soup or boerenkool, that lovely wintery dish of mashed potatoes with kale.

Frankwin's "broodje frikandel"

So what is a frikandel? It's a skinless deep-fried sausage, made of chicken, pork and beef. It can be served by itself or with mayo, in a roll (broodje frikandel) or cut open and doused in mayo, (curry) ketchup and minced onion. This culinary concoction is called a "frikandel speciaal". This savory sausage is Holland's number one snack, only every so often bumped off its champion position by number two, the kroket, the big brother of the bitterballen. Fried snacks such as these are traditionally sold in neighborhood "snack bars" or "automatieken", like the Febo.

Kroketten, bitterballen and frikandellen are also the top three fried snacks most missed by Dutch expatriates. The first two are fairly easy to make, but I had never tried my hand at making frikandellen until this weekend. It's a bit of a hassle but you'll be surprised at how close to the real thing this recipe is. So get your mayo, ketchup and onions ready, because it's time for a frikandel!

Frikandellen

1 pound of beef
1 pound of pork
8 oz of chicken
3 teaspoons of salt
1 teaspoon of black peper
1 teaspoon of ground allspice
1 teaspoon of ground nutmeg
3 teaspoons of onion powder
3/4 cup of whipping cream

Grind the meat very, very fine and blend together with the spices and the cream. Watch out for the motor if you do this on your food processor, and do small batches to prevent overheating the appliance.

Many thanks to Frankwin for
the recipe and all the help!

Bring a large pan with water to a boil. If you have a sausage grinder or stuffer, just hang the end of the tube over the pan of boiling water. If you don't, you can make this contraption to push the meaty mush into a sausage shape: take a 16oz soda bottle, preferably with straight edges, and cut off the bottom. Find a glass or something solid that fits snug inside the bottle so that you can push the ground meat through the opening. You are going to need a lot of strength to do this! Please make sure the pan with boiling water cannot be bumped off the stove and keep kids, pets and impatient eaters out of the kitchen. Safety first!

Now fill the bottle with the meat, tap it tight so that there are no air pockets and hold the bottle over the water. Push the meat through the opening and have someone else cut the string of meat every ten inches or so. The meat will shrink at least a third in the water, so the longer the better. Frikandellen measure on average a good seven inches long.

Allow the meat to boil for five to six minutes, on a medium boil, then retrieve the sausages and dry them on a cooling rack.

Once they've cooled, you can freeze them for future use, or you can crank up the deep-fryer. Straight from the cooling rack, they need about 3 to four minutes in the hot oil (fry at 375F). For frikandellen speciaal you can cut them lengthwise, about 2/3s in, before you fry them.

Serve with mayo, with a bun or "speciaal". If you start training now, you might still be in time to participate in the National Frikandellen Eating competition this year. Good luck!!

Suikerwafels

It's not until you bite into a suikerwafel for the first time that you realize that not all waffles are equal. Some shine, some just eh...waffle, I guess. The batter-type waffles that we serve during St. Maarten's have their own charm; they're fluffy, tender and can be outfitted with the most exciting bursts of flavor: sweetened whipped cream, fresh fruit, gooey chocolate syrup...you name it.

But it's the suikerwafel, or sugar waffle, that sets itself apart from all other waffles. The dough is yeast-based and vanilla-infused, and creates a beautiful chewy, heavy pastry. Within all that golden goodness, the waffle holds delicious pockets of crumbly pearl sugar. This, ladies and gentlemen, is a WAFFLE!

These pastries were originally known as Luikse Wafels, waffles from Liège (Belgium), but have no similarity to the Belgian waffles as we know them in the United States, except for its easily recognizable grid pattern. Whereas those Belgian waffles are consumed for breakfast, with syrup or whipped cream and fresh fruit, these sugar waffles are eaten as a snack, a pastry or as a quick pick-me-up with a cup of coffee, but hardly ever as a breakfast item. Now...I'm not saying that's not a good idea!

Look at that sugar!

Just like the stroopwafels vendors in Holland, you can find small food trucks throughout the various cities in Belgium that sell these suikerwafels. They (the waffles) made their way to Holland and are now a standard fare in the cookie aisle and on street markets, but are also sold at the oliebollenkramen during the wintertime. The last several years suikerwafels seem to play a much more prominent role than before, a welcome addition to our already quite extensive cookie and pastry selection!

Suikerwafels
3 1/2 cups of flour, divided
2 heaping teaspoons of active dry yeast
3/4 cup of milk, warm
Pinch of salt
2 teaspoons of vanilla flavoring (or 1 sachet vanilla sugar)
3 eggs
2 sticks of butter, room temperature
1 cup of Belgian pearl sugar*

Put three cups of flour in a bowl, saving the half cup for later. Dissolve the yeast in the warm milk, set it aside for a couple of minutes to proof. Add the salt to the flour. Pour in the yeasty milk, add the vanilla and stir until the dough comes together. Now add an egg and keep stirring (I let the mixer do the work!). When the dough has absorbed the first egg, add the second one, and repeat the process with the third.

When you can no longer tell the egg from the dough, carefully mix in the soft butter, bit by bit. If the dough has a hard time coming together, add one tablespoon of flour to help everything blend.

When the dough has come together (it will be slightly sticky), pull it out of the bowl, and knead it for a few minutes on the counter (you may need to dust your hands and the counter with a bit of flour to avoid it sticking!), then mix in the sugar. When all has come together beautifully, roll the dough into a log, cover it and let it rest for five minutes.

Cut the dough into 2 oz pieces (or 50 grams), and roll them into balls. Place them on a floured baking sheet or cutting board, and cover. Let them rise until puffy and tender, a good thirty minutes at room temperature.

In the meantime, heat your Belgian waffle iron. It should not need any greasing as there is plenty of butter in the dough, but you know your waffle iron best! Place a ball of dough on the griddle, push down the lid and bake until they're done.  I happen to have a two rectangles kind of waffle maker. If you have a round one that breaks the waffle into four sections, measure your dough out to 6 oz so that it'll make four smaller waffles at once.

Place a dough ball in the middle of the iron, push down the lid and bake as usual. Depending on the waffle iron, this can take anywhere from two to 5 minutes. Be careful, as the melted sugar is extremely hot and can cause severe burns. Let the waffles cool on a rack before eating, and cool the waffle maker (the machine, not you!) before cleaning. The burnt sugar is best wiped off with a damp cloth.

Makes approximately 24 waffles.

*If you can't find Belgian pearl sugar in the store, take the equivalent amount in sugar cubes, put them in a towel and give them a couple of good whacks with your rolling pin. Same thing!

Zeeuwse Bolus

"Come and eat poop? What an invitation!" my friend Naomi joyfully exclaims when I ask her and my friend Ann to come over for coffee and a Zeeuwse bolus. This Dutch baked delicacy from the SouthWestern province of Zeeland is colloquially called "turd", as the shape reminds one of eh...well....a lump of excrement, pardon my Dutch. Of course the pastry's name stems from the Latin word for ball, referring in this case to a ball of dough, and the nomenclature was adapted afterwards to describe the eh...other stuff. Unappetizing, for sure, but don't let that put you off this delectable treat!

Bolussen are traditional for various regions, mostly Amsterdam (a ginger bolus) and Zeeland (the cinnamon bolus). These Dutch bolussen were originally baked by Sephardic Jewish bakers in Holland and date back to the first half of the seventeenth century.

Since 1998, on the Tuesday of the twelfth week of the year, Zeeland holds baking competitions for their kind of bolus, and professional bakers strive for the famous Bolusbaker of the Year Award.

Bolussen are best consumed slightly warm and are a great substitute for cinnamon rolls or sticky buns. They are sticky and gooey but their tender texture makes up for the heavy sugar. Some eat their bolus with a thick layer of butter on the bottom (flat) side of the bolus. I have tried it, and I can't say I blame them! Especially salted butter seems to really match the sweetness of the bun.

Zeeuwse bolussen

Ready to rise

3 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon of salt
2 tablespoons of powdered milk
1 tablespoon of sugar
1 1/4 cup of milk, warm
1 tablespoon of active dry yeast
6 tablespoons of butter, melted and at room temperature

For the sugar
2 cups of the darkest brown sugar you can find
1 heaping teaspoon of cinnamon, ground

Mix the flour, salt, powdered milk and sugar together. Dissolve the yeast in the warm milk and add to the dry mixture. Knead the dough for a good couple of minutes, then drizzle in the melted butter. Continue to knead for fifteen minutes, then place in a greased bowl, cover and let rise for fifteen minutes in a warm spot.

Punch down the dough carefully and divide into 2oz pieces. Roll each piece into a ball. Mix the brown sugar with the cinnamon and roll each ball through the sugary mix. Place the dough balls back into the bowl, cover and rise for another fifteen to thirty minutes.

Take each dough ball and carefully roll out to a rope, about 7 to 8 inches long. Roll each rope through more sugar and cinnamon, until fully covered. Pinch one end of the rope between your thumb and index finger and with the other hand roll the rope around your index finger in a circular fashion. Tuck the end of the rope underneath the bolus and place them on a sheet of parchment paper or on a silicon mat on a baking sheet. Leave about an inch and a half or two between the rolls. Sprinkle the rolls with more sugar. Cover and rise for at least an hour or until doubled in size.

Sprinkle the rest of the sugar on top of the rolls. Preheat the oven to 450F and bake the rolls puffy and done in seven to eight minutes. The sugar tends to burn rather quickly so keep an eye on the rolls. They will be gooey and sticky (so let them cool for a minute before you pick them up), and they will smell up your house something divine.

Enjoy with a good cup of coffee either by themselves or with a nice layer of butter spread on the flat side of the bolus.

Kokosmakronen

Beauty lies in simplicity. One of the many things I've learned on this quest to map the Dutch kitchen is that, quite often, the best dishes are the ones with just a few ingredients. Less is more, so to say.

I've mentioned before that the Dutch have an incredible cookie culture. The grocery stores stock shelves of the most amazing combinations, shapes, ingredients and flavors. Coffee and tea are consumed throughout the day and, preferably, in combination with a cookie. Or two. Because that's so gezellig.

Coconut macaroons, or kokosmakronen, are found in a variety of shapes and sizes. Some are small and high, others piped in a circle and flat. Some are yellow (depending on whether you include the egg yolk), others plain white, but the flavor and texture is always moist, coconutty and sweet. Kokosmakronen are usually baked on circles of edible potato starch paper, that I have not yet been able to locate, but they bake equally well on parchment paper or on a silicone mat. Make sure you keep the temperature low enough that the bottom of the cookies does not burn or get too toasted. Burnt coconut will leave a bitter taste and spoil the overall flavor of the cookie.

When you bake kokosmakronen, the smell of coconut will permeate the air and all, except for those who abhor this fibrous drupe, will wait with coffee in hand until the long, agonizing wait until you pull these golden beauties from the oven, is over. And that would be all of fifteen minutes, so go figure....The key is to wait until the cookies have cooled down sufficiently to allow the flavor to come forward. Better ofcourse is to eat them the next day, when the cookies have achieved that typical chewiness.

Kokosmakronen
2 egg whites
3/4 cup of sugar

1 1/2 cup of shredded coconut
Pinch of salt
2 tablespoons of self-rising flour

Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form, then slowly add in the sugar. Keep beating until the sugar has dissolved. Pinch some egg white between your fingers and rub them together. A little bit of grain is fine, but you want most of the sugar gone. Carefully fold in the coconut and the pinch of salt, then fold in the flour.

Heat the oven to 300F. Place small heaps of dough on a silicone mat or parchment paper, place it on a baking sheet and bake in the oven for approximately fifteen minutes or until golden. The cookies will still be a little bit soft in the center but will set after you remove them from the oven.

Makes about twenty small cookies.