Cuisine

Hidden EuroFood: Friesland

Dutch cuisine stems from the fertile location of the North Sea river delta of the European Plain and, surely, from the cosmopolitan and international attitude of the Dutch merchants and sailors. The Dutch Empire, in fact, during its Golden Age, enabled sugar, spices and exotic fruits to be imported. In 1711 the first exports of Indonesian coffee to the Netherlands occurred: the Dutch East India Company was the first one to import coffee on a large scale. In this period a tradition of spiced cookies called “speculaas” spread.

Maybe the most symbolic traditional dish in the Bami Goreng. Actually, in Netherland, you will find many Indonesian restaurants and all of them will have these fried egg noodles with onion, vegetables, garlic, meat, egg and chili. Another important food is the “Hollandse nieuwe haring” served with chopped raw onions, but the Dutch diet consists also of many dairy products including probably the most famous one: “Gouda cheese”.

These foods are usually served with the “Pannekoeken”, a Dutch pancake, probably the Dutch favourite food which can be eaten with sweet or savoury foods like cheese or the typical stroop, a treacly Dutch syrup. At the end of lunch or dinner the queen of Dutch desserts is the renowned Appeltaart: a recipe which dates back to 1514. In this weekly HiddenEuroFood we will focus on the Northeastern cuisine, within the provinces o Groningen, riesland, Drenthe, Overijssel and Gelderland.

In this region (that is the least populated of Netherlands) cuisine, especially near the coastal areas of Friesland, Groningen and parts of Overijssel, a large amount of fish and seafood is included. Also several types of dried sausages are found throughout the region. Most villages have their own variety usually smoked over wood chips, boiled in water and served with sauerkraut or the traditional stamppot. One of the most renowned is the rookworst called “Gelders”. Moreover, these provinces are home to rye bread and pastries. Usually they are heavily spiced with ginger or succade.

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