A thousand likes!

Just the other day I was on The Dutch Table page on Facebook saying that I was planning a surprise when the counter hit 1,000. That was April 12th. And in less than a month we've hit this milestone, I am so excited!!

So, in good Dutch fashion, we'll celebrate with cake. This weekend I'll post the recipe for a taart, but can't pick which one: mokka (mocca) or hazelnootschuim (hazelnut meringue)? You decide!

And to celebrate even more, I'd like to give the new Janny de Moor book, Recipes from my Dutch Kitchen (in English), to a random reader. The book is due August 12th of this year.

In order to get in the drawing, post a comment in the next ten days, until May 20th, with your favorite memory, favorite dish or request. Or just say hi and let us know you like the website! That can be either below this post, or on the post of your liking.

Past comments also count, so if you've posted in the past, no need to post again, unless you'd like to share something. I'll pick a random number, seek out that post and you may be the winner! Anonymous postings don't count.....

Thank you all for your likes, I am so grateful!

Gemberbolus

The last day in April, Queen's Day, with all its joyous festivities, is offset by a much more sobering and serious couple of days in early May.

It is on May 4th that the Dutch remember the victims, both military and civilian, of the war. Not just the Second World War but since 1961, Holland also remembers those who were killed during peace operations elsewhere.

On May 5th, the country celebrates Liberation Day, to commemorate the end of Nazi German occupation. Freed predominantly by Canadian troops, the war could not have ended soon enough for the Dutch citizens, as provisions were extremely scarce and many died during the hunger winter of 1944/45.

But for many, Liberation Day came too late. Amsterdam had a thriving Jewish population that influenced art, music, and all other aspects of life. Even the city's moniker, Mokum, was the Jewish name for the city: a "safe haven". Jews fled to the north from Spain and Portugal during the Inquisition, and found Amsterdam a welcoming city, hence the nickname. Until the war. Some fled, some hid, but many were taken away and were not heard from again. It's a dark page in our country's history. 

So today, in honor of those that lost their lives during those atrocious times, I'm baking a gemberbolus, or ginger roll. A traditional baked good that can still be found in many Dutch bakeries around Amsterdam, the ginger studded pastry is probably one of the most famous Jewish contributions to the city's baking repertoire. The bun is traditionally baked and served in an aluminum cup because it's very, very sticky.  

Gemberbolus

7 ounces of crystallized ginger

1 cup of water

3/4 cup and 3 tablespoons milk

2 teaspoons active dry yeast

3 cups of flour
1 teaspoon salt

11 tablespoons sugar, divided

3 teaspoons cinnamon, divided
1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

6 tablespoons butter, divided, room temperature

Bring the cup of water and the ginger to a boil, turn down the heat and let it simmer for ten minutes. Set aside to cool. In the meantime, warm up the milk to 110F, add the yeast and let it proof. Mix it in with the flour and the salt, and add one tablespoon of sugar, and two teaspoons cinnamon. Mix well, add the egg and two tablespoons of butter, and knead the dough until it's soft and pillowy.

Oil a bowl, add the dough, cover and let it rise. In the meantime, drain the ginger but save the water. Add the ginger, 2 tablespoons of soaking water and 2 tablespoons sugar to a blender, and purée the mixture. Stir in a teaspoon vanilla.

Take four tablespoons of water, 4 tablespoons of sugar, two tablespoons of soaking water and 4 tablespoons butter and put it on the stove in a small saucepan. Bring it slowly to a boil, then let it simmer for ten minutes until you have a buttery syrup. Set aside to cool. The syrup will thicken as it cools.

Punch down the dough, and divide into 12 equal parts.

Mix four tablespoons sugar with one teaspoon cinnamon. Sprinkle a teaspoon on your countertop. Roll each piece of dough into a small ball, then roll it out into a rectangle on top of the sugar. Put a line of ginger purée in the middle of the dough, lengthwise, and fold the dough over to the top. Fold one more time, pinch the seams and carefully roll the dough in the sugar. Now take one side of the dough and roll it, roly-poly wise, onto itself. Tuck in the end piece. Do this with all the pieces of dough.

Turn on the oven to 350F. Brush the inside of the aluminum cups (or a muffin pan) with the syrup, and place each gemberbolus in a cup. You can put a little bit of ginger purée in the middle, if you wish. Cover the rolls and let them rest for about fifteen minutes while the oven heats up.

Before you place the rolls in the oven, pour a tablespoon of syrup over each bolus. Place your cups or muffin pan on a baking sheet, and bake the bolusses in about fifteen minutes. They don't need to be golden brown, just cooked in the middle. (Temp 190F, they're done).

Brush the rolls with more syrup when they come out of the oven, and let them cool. Eat warm, cold or heated up.

Oranjebitter

In April, on the 27th of April, the Kingdom of the Netherlands will explode into a big, orange frenzy. The whole country turns into one huge party: live concerts, yardsales and food, food, food everywhere. What's the joyous occasion? It's King's Day!

First observed as a national holiday in 1885, the celebration started as Princess Day, to honor then princess Wilhelmina's fifth birthday, on August 31st. When she became queen in 1890, at the very young age of 10, it was renamed Queen's Day, a title it has held since. When her daughter Juliana became queen, in 1948, Queen's Day moved from August 31st to April 30th, Juliana's birthday.

The logical step would have been to move the national holiday to January, the now former queen Beatrix's birthday, when she succeeded her mother Juliana in 1980. But by then, the traditional outdoor activities around Queen's Day had taken such root that moving to January would have quite possibly rendered all activities impossible to maintain. When William Alexander took the throne in 2013, and since then Queen's Day has become King's day, and celebrated on his birthday, April 27th. This Royal Day is, per definition, a festivity celebrated with others: outside, in parks, on the street, on the canals. It's the one day a year where, in a country that does not know weekly yard or garage sales, everybody displays all their sellable wares for others to buy.

It's also the one day a year, except for some national soccer events, that food will be colored orange: orange tompoezen, orange potato chips, orange cakes and, let's not forget that old traditional Dutch drink, the oranjebitter. Few like it, and even fewer people will order it outside of Queen's Day, but one cannot imagine this national holiday without a shot of bitter, orange-flavored booze.

Bitters are alcoholic beverages that are flavored with herbs, fruit and/or spices. Oranjelikeur, similar to a bitter but with the addition of sugar, was first heard of in 1620, but gained national appreciation after a member of the house of Orange, Willem I, became the nation's king in 1814. The drink was reintroduced, now as a nationalistic and patriotic beverage, and has remained as such ever since.

For a long time, bitters were very popular, but we like our beverages sweet nowadays, so slowly but surely the bitter manufacturers have been adding sugar back into the drink. Still nowhere as sweet as a liqueur, this oranjebitter does have some sugar to sweeten the flavor.

If you don't care for it as a beverage, try it sweetened over ice cream or in hot tea.

Oranjebitter
1 teaspoon whole aniseed
6 cardamom pods
1 large orange
1 large lemon
2 cups (500 ml) vodka
3 tablespoons sugar
1 star anise
1 cinnamon stick

For the syrup
1 cup (236 ml) water
1 cup (200 grams) sugar

Scrub the orange and lemon, and peel thinly, without much pith. Juice the fruit and save the seeds. Dry the fruit peels and the seeds in a warmed oven or on a hot air vent, until crisp.

In a mortar, bruise the dried peel, the dried seeds, the aniseed, cardamom pods, and the three tablespoons of sugar with a couple of good stomps from the pestle: you're not grinding it, just breaking it up a bit. Scrape everything into a clean, large mason jar. Pour two cups of vodka on top and two cups of water, and the orange and lemon juice. Add the star anise and the cinnamon stick, give everything a good swirl and screw the lid on the jar.

Place the jar in a dark, room temperature area, such as your kitchen cabinet or in the broom closet by the water heater. Give it a careful shake every two or three days.

After three weeks, taste-test and see if you like the strength of the flavors. If yes, good. If not, screw the lid back on and let the jar sit for another week.

Now carefully line a strainer with a wet paper coffee filter on top of a clean jar, and pour the liquid into the strainer. Clear, golden orange liquid should now filter into the vessel below.

In the meantime, bring a cup of water and a cup of sugar carefully to a boil, stir it until the sugar has dissolved, and let it cool. Add enough to the oranjebitter to bring it up to the level of sweetness you like. Multiple tastings will be in order ;-). Whatever is left, serve cold over ice or straight.

Happy King's Day!!!

You can "enhance" the oranjebitter with a drop of red and yellow food coloring, to give it a more commercial orange look, or add a drop of orange essence to increase the orange flavor.

Rabarbermoes

As soon as we come out of the cold winter months, the first signs of spring (and of good eating) are on their way. Peultjes, or peas, are carefully poking their head out of the soil, and regardless of whether the IJsheiligen (the ice saints, more about these frosty figures later!) decide to freeze these first garden treasures or not, some vegetables are hardy enough to enjoy the cooler temperatures.

Rhubarb is one of those old-fashioned, ubiquitous vegetables that grows abundantly in fields, near homes and in gardens all over the country. It's a hardy plant that appeared on the Dutch gardening panorama in the early 1900s, and consequently showed up in the kitchen, although in a very limited variety: mainly as a side dish, jam, a compote or as a moes, or sauce.

Although rhubarb is an acquired taste, many do like the tangy, slightly astringent flavor. As a side dish, the stalks (either green or red, depending on the variety) are simmered down into a stringy, tangy supersour unsweetened vegetable moes and served either cold or warm with potatoes and meat. Not everybody's favorite choice of vegetable, I am sure, but rhubarb is supposedly very healthy, so there you go.

Sugar or other sweeteners like strawberries or pineapple are added during the preparation of jam, compote or sauce to add some additional flavor, although some will eat the stalk straight off the plant, often with a dash of salt. The leaves are poisonous, only the stalk is edible.

Rhubarb sauce can be made with just rhubarb (in which case the sugar is omitted and it's used as a savory condiment with meats) or with the sweet combination of strawberries, like in today's moes. Try pouring the sauce warm or cold over hangop, yoghurt, or make it into a fruit vlaai. A thicker sauce can be achieved by slowly simmering away some of the moisture, and can make a great rhubarb jam for beschuit or a slice of bread !

Rabarbermoes
2 lbs (1 kg) rhubarb stalks
2 cups (300 grams) strawberries
1/2 cup (100 grams) sugar
Pinch of salt

Wash and cut the rhubarb stalks into one-inch pieces. Wash the strawberries, hull, and slice them. Add the rhubarb and the strawberries to a Dutch oven or thick bottomed pan, add the sugar and salt, and toss. Pour half a cup of water in the pan, and slowly bring to a simmer. Cover the pot, and let the mixture simmer for twenty minutes, making sure the sauce doesn't burn.

When the rhubarb breaks up into stringy pieces, the sauce is done. Taste. Adjust the sweetness if necessary.

If you want jam, thicken the sauce with pectine according to the instructions on the package for canning, or with a little bit of cornstarch slurry for immediate consumption.

Gerookte Paling

"They'll be in next week", the fishmonger said when I called to see what happened to my order. "We're flying them in from Atlanta, so they'll still be alive when they get here. You don't mind killing them yourself, do you?". And he excused himself and hung up.

I sat there for a minute, wondering. I love food, and I love to eat. But I'm not very good at killing things. I mean, I don't mind squishing the odd ant that has found a way into my kitchen, or making a mosquito shaped splash on my bedroom wall, but anything bigger than that.....not so much.

So I talked to Frankwin, a Dutch friend who grew up in the province of Zeeland and had experience with these things. And to our sous-chef who was going to go into this eel adventure with me. And I looked online to see what the most humane way to have an eel go from icky slimey to yummie smokey was, and it seemed that there was no easy way.

All week I read about eels. How they start as little glass eels and swim their way around the ocean before finding a place to grow and get fat and tasty. How they have two skins, the outer one a slimy, icky one and a thinner black one, and that you have to strip the slimy one before you can do anything with the eel. And that there are very few eels left and so the price is high and the availability scarce. And how there's a better availability in other areas of the United States but somehow Idaho was not on the eel-map. Chris, a kind and encouraging reader of the blog, would even send me pictures of how to smoke eel (something he does frequently, and well!) and give me tips and suggestions for when the precious cargo would arrive.

Try to get the biggest pieces

But I did not get eel. Somehow the order was messed up, or they lost them on the plane, or something happened somewhere, but no eel for me. Which, quite honestly, was a bit of a relief, because I had not yet decided how I was going to tackle this whole eel-killing business. Phew!!

Nevertheless, the desire for smoked eel kept making waves in the back of my head, figuratively speaking. Imagine my surprise when I walked into the Asian market in Boise, shopping for completely unrelated items, and my eye spotted the word "eel" on a package in the freezer. Yes!!! Yellow eel steak from Vietnam, neatly cut into four inch pieces, peeled off its squishy coat, and best of all, frozen stiff. Deader than dead, and ready for cooking.

Smoked eel is a Dutch delicacy. The eel is long, fat and meaty, and one eel will easily feed two people. Gerookte paling, or smoked eel, is available at the visboer (fishmonger) or at one of the many local herring shacks around town. It's one of the many types of fish that people buy as a snack, much like the smoked mackerel or herring. Yellow eel is a younger, therefore thinner eel, but will do to get a taste of gerookte paling.

Gerookte Paling

Swimming in brine

2 packages (14oz each) frozen yellow eel
2 cups water
1 heaping tablespoon salt
Hickory chips

Thaw the eel, rinse it and place it in a container. Dissolve 1 tablespoon of salt in two cups of water and pour over the eel, making sure they're covered. Brine the eel in the fridge for at least three hours but not much more.

Pour off the brine, rinse the eel, pat it dry with some paper towels and allow it to air dry on a cookie rack or grill rack, something that will allow for air circulation. Smoke will adhere best to dry matter, so make sure the eel has a chance to dry on all sides. A small fan placed on the fish will speed things up. Don't spend more than thirty minutes.

Start the smoker and place hickory chips on your tray. Place the eel on the racks, close and smoke on low temperature for approximately 30 minutes. The skin will be golden and slightly wrinkly. Don't smoke the eel too hot, because the fat will cook out of it, and you'll be left with fish sticks, and not the right kind!

To eat the eel, especially the thinner yellow eel, it's easier to insert both thumbs into the rib cavity and gently pull the sides apart. Peel the meat off the skin (or the other way around, whatever comes easiest) and snack away! Bones and skin are not edible.

Eet Smakelijk!