Koninginnesoep

Happy Birthday, Queen Beatrix!!
(Courtesy of eo.nl)

Hip Hip Hurray, it's the Queen's birthday! The whole country is going nuts on April 30th: huge yard sales everywhere (yard- or garage sales are not a common occurence in Holland), open air concerts, food fairs....everybody will be in a festive mood today. To show your support, either for the Royal family or just for partying in general, wear something orange. A wig, a shirt......it's all good. Eat some orange cake, have an orange beer.....and enjoy Queen's Day.

Queen's Day started officially on August 31st, 1890 to celebrate the birthday of the then Queen of the Netherlands, Wilhelmina, and was a yearly festivity until 1948 when her daughter, Juliana, took over the reigns. Juliana was born on April 30th, so Queen's Day moved to early Spring. By the time Beatrix, daughter of Juliana and current Queen of the Netherlands became Head of State in 1980, it was such a tradition to have all the outside activities, that she didn't have the heart to move Queen's Day to her day of birth, January 31st. Which is just as well. The weather cannot be guaranteed to be sunny and pleasant at the end of April, but it's bound to be a heck of a lot better than on January 31st! Beatrix kept April 30th as the date for this colorful national celebration.

Traditionally, the Queen visits one or two locations in the country where she's greeted by the local authorities, given a tour and has the opportunity to show, perhaps feigned, interest in the local sights. Noblesse oblige. This year, she is visiting the two towns of Thorn and Weert in the province of Limburg. Smart move! They'll probably fete her with a nice slice of Limburg vlaai......

There is no food directly related to Queen's Day. Yes, the icing on the cakes will be orange. The tompoezen will have changed their pink icing to sunny orange, there will be orange beer, orange desserts, and many other orange food items. I may even give those orange tompoezen a go tomorrow, I'm always game for dessert.

However, there is one item that holds it own today: Koninginnesoep. A fairly late comer to the Dutch kitchen, a recipe for Queen's Soup appeared for the first time around the 1900's and has been a steady regular at celebratory events. It's a creamy, chicken-stock based soup that will please everybody in your family, and is easy and quick to make. Which is a good thing, today is after all a holiday!

Koninginnesoep
6 cups of seasoned chicken stock
2 cups of whole milk or half-and-half
1/2 cup of peas
1/2 cup of diced carrots
2 cups of cooked chicken meat, diced
1 tablespoon of ground almonds

Warm the stock, add the vegetables and boil until they're tender. Whisk in the milk and bring back up to temperature, but don't boil anymore, the milk might curdle. Stir in the chicken and the almonds, let the soup simmer for another five minutes, then taste and adjust if needed.

Serve royally!

Paastaart

Holland celebrates Easter in a similar way as it does Christmas, with two days. In the case of Easter, First Easter Day is always on Sunday, Second Easter Day is on the Monday following and is often a holiday.

The gathering of family and friends around the breakfast, lunch or dinner table is key on First Easter Day. Stores are closed, children are dressed in their "Paasbest" (Easter Best) with new clothes and shoes. Eggs are colored, hidden and if lucky, all found. If it's not celebrated with an extensive brunch with rolls like paashaasjes, bread toppings, a couple of warm egg dishes and large amounts of coffee, the family will get together for a late lunch or early dinner. Lamb is a traditional dish served for Easter.

Friends and family will also spend time enjoying each other's company over a cup or two of coffee or tea, and with that ofcourse comes something sweet: a Paastaart, or Easter cake. Decorated with fluffy whipped cream, a light biscuit batter and an adult amount of advocaat, this Easter cake will put a smile on your face.

Paastaart
4 eggs

3/4 cup (150 grams) granulated sugar
3/4 cup (100 grams) flour
1/4 cup (35 grams) corn starch
1.5 cups (375 grams) heavy whipping cream
4 tablespoons (30 grams) powdered sugar
yellow food coloring
chocolate easter eggs
1/2 cup (100 grams) chocolate hail
1 cup (235 ml) advocaat

Beat the four eggs with the sugar until foamy. The batter should drip off the whisk in a broad, thick ribbon. Preheat the oven to 320F/160C. Butter and flour an 8' (20 cm) spring form. Sift the flour and the cornstarch together and then carefully fold into the batter: do this carefully as you don't want to loose all the air.

Place the form into the oven and bake for about 25 minutes. Do not open the door of the oven the first twenty minutes as the cake will deflate.

In the meantime, beat the whipped cream with the powdered sugar. Add three or four drops of yellow food coloring while you are beating, if you want it to be yellow, but plain white will also do just fine. Remove the cake from the oven, let it cool and remove it from the form. Split the cake in half lengthwise and spread 1/2 the amount of advocaat on the bottom half. Replace the upper part. Spread the whipped cream on the side of the cake and generously on the top.

Use the chocolate sprinkles to decorate the sides of the cake. Pipe twirlie bits with the rest of the whipped cream on top and strategically place the chocolate Easter eggs on top. Pour the rest of the advocaat in the middle of the cake, refrigerate for at least 30 minutes and serve.

This cake contains alcohol and should be served to adults only! Vrolijk Pasen!!

Aspergesoep

"Aspergesoep is afvalsoep" I read somewhere on the internet, and I'd have to agree: asparagus soup is made with all the waste from an asparagus dinner. But what a soup! The sweet earthy flavor of the asparagus and the soft, silky mouthfeel is comforting but not heavy.

After you prepare asparagus for dinner, boil the skins and the end pieces in the remaining asparagus water, cover and simmer for a good thirty minutes, then put the liquid through a sieve. You should have about four to five cups of vegetable broth. Add half a bouillon cube of chicken stock to the broth.

Save four or five asparagus from dinner, and cut them into three or four pieces. Keep the heads and add the rest to the soup. Purée into a homogenous whole. Now melt two tablespoons of butter in a pan, add two heaping tablespoons of flour, stir until you have a paste and add in a ladle full of hot soup. Keep stirring and add one or two more ladles of soup...then pour everything into the big pot, stir until it all comes together and simmer it for another five minutes.

Cut up the remaining ham of your dinner in small dice, and chop some parsley. Taste the soup and adjust it with salt if needed, then stir in 1/4 cup of cream or whole milk. Divide the asparagus points over four bowls, ladle the hot soup on top, sprinkle with parsley and enjoy!

Asperges

"Cut here", my grandma said, pointing her knife at a seemingly random point in the sand. "Cut where?" I asked. I didn't see any difference between the area she indicated and the rest of the raised bed. Or any of the other 300 rows of sandy mounds we were standing amongst, for that matter. "Right here", she laughed, plunging the knife into the sandy soil and pulling up the biggest, whitest asparagus I had ever seen.

It was early Spring, and I must have been about 8 years old. My grandma Pauline had taken me to one of the many asparagus fields outside of the small town where I grew up in Limburg. During those early months, she would often join the asparagus harvesters out in the field to cut the growth for the day, and many, many days we enjoyed freshly cut asparagus, straight from the field.

White asparagus, contrary to the green ones that we are more accostumed to here in the US, grow below the surface in beds of loose sand. The moment their little heads see the light of day, the top hardens, changes color and alters its delicate flavor, so it's imperative that the vegetable is harvested right before surfacing.

Asperges are harvested from early Spring until June 24th. Brabant and the northern part of Limburg are the two areas that are famous for the quality, and the quantity, of its asparagus. During harvesting time, pretty much each village in the area will host an asparagus fest, feed or fair. The vegetable, nicknamed "white gold" because of the exorbitant prices it can fetch on the market, draws fans and foodies from far across the international borders.

The vegetable is easy to keep: wrap the stalks in a moist towel and keep it in the crisper for a couple of days. It also freezes fairly well: wash the asparagus, peel and pack them in a plastic bag, then freeze. When you are ready to cook, just remove the package from the freezer, unwrap the stalks and place the frozen vegetables straight into the boiling water.

White asparagus are traditionally served boiled, with eggs and ham, or with a Hollandaise sauce. They can be served cold, as a salad or starter, or warm as a main dish. Because of the whiteness of the vegetable, and being one of the first ones to show up on the table after a cold winter, asperges are a typical Easter dish.

Asparagus
1 lb of white asparagus
Water
Pinch of salt
4 eggs, hard boiled
1 tablespoon of parsley, chopped
4 slices of ham

Carefuly rinse the stalks, pat dry, and peel the asparagus with a vegetable peeler. The stalks are very fragile and will easily snap, so place them on a cutting board laying down, and while holding the stalk with one hand, peel the outer skin off, starting about 1/3 from the top. Cut about an inch from the bottom since that is usually a bitter, hard part. Don't throw the peels or the end pieces away, save them for asparagus soup. 

Put enough water in a pot that the stalks are barely covered, add the asparagus and bring to a boil. Depending on the freshness and size of the asparagus, it may take from 5 -20 minutes before the vegetable is cooked. It's ready to eat when the stalk is easily pierced with a fork.

In the meantime, remove the egg yolks from the boiled eggs and chop. When the asparagus are ready, take out of the water (keep the water for soup), drain for a minute and place the stalks on top of the ham on a serving platter. Decorate the white stalks with the chopped egg yolk, and sprinkle the chopped parsley over it. 

Saveur's Best Blog Award Nominations

 

Saveur, the top culinary magazine of America, is accepting nominations for their 2011 Best Blog Awards. If you enjoy reading this blog, please consider submitting it! It would be a great way to get the Dutch kitchen on the culinary map.

Here's the link: http://www.saveur.com/article/Kitchen/Nominations-2011-Best-Food-Blog-Awards.

Thank you!
Nicole