Chufi

Slemp This is an old fashioned Dutch winterdrink. And I mean really oldfashioned - you can't buy this anywhere, and I don't know anyone who makes it, and I don't know many people younger than 70 who actually know what it is! This is the kind of thing you want to drink by the fireplace after a long walk in the crisp and cold outdoors. It looks like hot milk, and it is, but with warm spicy flavors, and the little kick of black tea. No alcohol, although a tiny drop of brandy wouldn't hurt it I guess! Spices: piece of cinnamon, 2 cloves, pinch of saffron, 1 tablespoon black tealeaves. (optional: piece of mace). Tie this together in a piece of cheesecloth, or put in a tea-egg. I use one of those disposable teabags. Put this in 500 ml. milk. Add 1 tablespoon of sugar (you can add more later if you like). (I made less, which is why my 500 ml. jar isn't full!) Leave to steep in a cool place, but not in the fridge, for about 2 hours. Put milk & spicebag in a small pan and slowly bring to the boil. Simmer on low for a couple of minutes, be carefull it doesn't boil too hard. taste, and add extra sugar if you like. Remove the spices. Strain into small cups or glasses (to keep the skin that has most likely formed on top behind) and serve hot. Some recipes tell you to thicken the drink with a cornstarchslurry or with an eggyolk. I feel the milk (especially if you use a nice and creamy full-fatmilk) is rich enough as it is, but if you like it thicker and more egg-noggy, you could thicken it.

Ribollita: basically the recipe from Jamie O.'s Italy book, except I sauteed the vegetable base in lard, used celeriac instead of celery, and another type of bean. Oh and pecorino on top. regualr curly kale instead of cavolo nero (can't get that here - at least not easily). While sauteeing the vegetables, some crushed fennel seeds are added and I think that was a great flavoring for the kale and beans.

Also, for marzipan, the almonds are more finely ground. At least that's the difference between Dutch marzipan and almond paste. Maybe American almond paste is smoother? Anyway, this is the Dutch recipe for almond paste. This one is quite coarse, so it's not that hard to make at home, and is used in all the famous Dutch december pastries such as this one Grind 125 grams of blanched almonds with 125 grams of sugar, until you have a paste. Knead in 1 egg. Optional: a bit of lemon zest (I usually don't add that until I use the paste for baking) My recipebook from the fifties says it will keep in the fridge (and improve in flavor) for 4 weeks, but I've never tried that!

I called both my grandmothers oma, which is simply the Dutch word for grandmother. One was always happy and cheerful, but in bad health - she was already in a wheelchair and nursinghome when I was born, so I never saw her in a kitchen. But from the family stories, I gather she was not much of a cook! But she was smart, and creative, and kind. Whenever I made a lifechange (move abroad, go to university, whatever) she wrote me a card with the words "I hope it will bring you what you expect from it". My other oma could cook, but suffered from depression, and when I was growing up, she was already leaving all the cooking to my grandfather and 2 of her daughters. But my mother speaks with fondness of the food that was prepared at the farm when she was young, and some of my oma's recipes were transported to me via my mother. I am always sad though that I did not know my mothers mother when she was still in reasonable good health - I bet we would have had fun in the kitchen! Thanks Rachel for bringing up some memories.

Oh, Rachel. I love your posts. A whole week of that! Your beautiful writing! And PICTURES too!! This is going to be a truly wonderful week.

Tonight we had the green plantain soup that markemorse linked to upthread.. sort of. When I looked at the recipe I thought that it was just a pureed vegetable soup, which I make all the time, but with green plantain as one of the more unusual ingredients. So I just simmered the plantain with some leeks and carrots in broth, added some bay and cumin, and pureed. It was very good, rich and creamy. I also made pizza with red onions, rosemary and gorgonzola.

Thin slices, deepfried, to use as a garnish for the salad?

cod, olives and blue cheese would be a bad marriage

olives and cod

Our vegetarian dinner: A really thick, silky smooth leek & potatosoup. Garnished with a big heap of panfried chestnut mushrooms. Quesadillas with refried beans, chillies, cilantro, cheddar, sour cream. I love the combination of leeks and mushrooms. Mushrooms, dry-fried so they give up their moisture, end up with that savoury chewy bite that I need even more when there's no meat on the plate. It's all about textures and contrasts.

apronstrings, I am honoured that the humble Dutch 'gevulde koek' will feature at your Thanksgiving! I hope the finished pastries taste as good the dough!

avocado.

actually, that market trip with you was the first time I thought of doing this. I had so much fun that I thought : I wish I could do this for a living! This thread is becoming what I hoped it would be: a source of encouragement and inspiration. The materialization of my plans might take a little while, but I will certainly report about my progress here. Thank you, all!

Pontormo, great idea. A lot of my meals are vegetarian, sometimes this happens without my even noticing it. For me, eating vegetarian dinners is a way to enjoy the vegetables of the season more, to be creative with vegetables, and to keep the costs of my dinners down. Also, when I do eat meat I like the meat to be free-range/organic, and sometimes I don't have access to that kind of meat, and my dinners turn vegetarian. I hope this thread will be an inspiration for those days.

The last ones I had were much more green than yellow, (and extremely knobbly) and they were the most fragrant and aromatic I ever tasted.

Her hands are beautiful. But it's her face I can't stop looking at. The friendliest, kindest eyes. The proud smile as she's standing there next to the liquid gold pouring from the vessel. Just beautiful. Thank you for this post divina!

here's my weird dinner: lentil soup with bayleaves and turmeric savoury millet cake with rosemary celeriac/pear/carrot salad with chillies and celery seed. The millet cake was supposed to red pepper, broccoli and zucchini in it, but I forgot to buy the broccoli and zucchini, so it had red peppers and eggplant! The lentil soup was really delicious, but I suspect that had much to do with the lovely duckstock from my freezer. The milletcake was interesting, and I can see this has potential, but it would be much better if the vegetables were sauteed first before mixing with the millet and baking. It's all just a little bit too bland and healthy. The salad was just plain weird. Celeriac, carrots, pears, pinenuts, balsamic vinegar, chillies, coriander. No oil no salt (I did add salt!)

That's very interesting. Also, that's why all your replies are so incredibly helpful, all of us together think of things I by myself could never think of.

Divina, that boar is in my recipe file. It looks so good. I am very sorry about the licence-trouble.. I hope it will be allright.. Thank you so much for this week. I learned a lot, and really enjoyed spending time with you at the market, in the shops and your kitchen.

Daniel, your mexican food looks great! lapin, that soup sounds delicious! I let Dennis pick out another book and 3 times, he picked a book that I cook from often, so I decided to pick one myself. Not randomly, so I hope I'm not cheating. It's Savoring spices and herbs by Julie Sahni.. I've had this book for years and I often look through it to see if anything looks interesting, and some things do, but there's something weird about the recipes.. they all seem contrived, complicated (not technique- but flavor-wise). But I want to give it a try so tomorrow I'm cooking a couple of dishes from it.

Christine, let me know next time you're here, you could be my guinea pig

Thank you, everybody, for your thoughtful replies. I have been toying with this idea for some time. There is an International school right across the street from my house. Every morning I see the parents (mostly the mums) drop off their children and I was thinking thay would be a place to start! I could hang up flyers in the school or something. I agree that the best thing would be, if I could offer something special, extra, something people couldn't have easy access to by themselves. If I have a good relationship with my cheeseguy, and he knows I'm coming in with a little group of 'students', he could have something prepared for tasting - which would be a very different experience from coming in unannounced. Something like that. Peter Green's remark about the difference between gastro-tourism and expatriates who just want to get some information is a good one. I need to know what my clients would expect from me, but for that, I have to be clear about the various things I have to offer. Just thinking out loud here. I really appreciate all the input.

I know, divina! Your blog was such good timing. I have been thinking about this for some time and your blog is really inspiring! I have a big issue with money I did lots of catering in the past, and one of my problems always was that I find it very difficult to ask people for money. I need to listen to what you said in your blog, that you actually got more clients when you raised your prices, because people just don't take you seriously when you undercharge.

let's say you're an expat, recently moved to a new country (because you or your spouse got a job there, for example). You love food and cooking, but the food in your new home is strange to you, you don't know where to shop, and you don't speak the language. A local foodie comes along and offers you help. I'm thinking of offering this kind of service. Information about Dutch food, shopping for food in Amsterdam, maybe some Dutch cooking classes, insiders information about the Dutch/Amsterdam food scene, touring the market and specialty shops, a cheese tour, beer tour, jenever info, etc... If you had to chance to sign up for this, what would you expect and what would you be most interested in? Would you be willing to pay for something like this? How much? Do you think this is something suitable for expats only, or would you be interested in it if you were visiting Amsterdam as a tourist as well? thanks for thinking along with me on this one.

If you have Paula Wolfert's Slow meditteranean kitchen, make the slowroasted Turkish quinces. They are cooked in the oven for 5-7 hours with no other flavorings then lemonjuice and 2 cloves. i made them recently and they came out as the best I ever prepared. I think the flavor of poached/roasted quince is so strong and special, that I don't like to do much with them, but rather eat them as they are maybe with a little joghurt and some biscuits for dessert. They are also really good in a lamb tagine, the same way you would use prunes. With flavorings of cinnamon, honey, and a sprinkling of sesameseeds.