Canadian Thanksgiving

       
          So, I realize that Canadian Thanksgiving was over a week ago. My blogging activity has been somewhat less than regular, but I'm finally sitting down to write about the feast that I, with the help of A (the resident Canadian), prepared for my host family. Since a friend and I are going to Paris this weekend, I figured I'd better get this post written before I write another one filled with ravings about French pastries, cheese, and wine!

          Since I love cooking and I knew that my friend A was a bit depressed about not being home for one of the biggest family holidays of the year (and we had nothing better to do on a lazy, rainy Sunday than eat, of course!), I figured we'd celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving in style: stuffing our faces until it was hard to move. I learned a few things about Canadian Thanksgiving in the process: A. It's basically celebrated the same way as good ole American Thanksgiving; B. It's celebrated the second Monday in October, before Halloween (weird...); C. It serves as a day to remember all that we are thankful for, common to the holiday season across the world.

          This was not the first time I had cooked Thanksgiving dinner for a bunch of people. During my semester abroad in Australia, one of my German friends approached me with the proposition "hey Ava, you're American and you can cook, would you make a few of us a real American Thanksgiving dinner?" to which I replied "sure! Just get together a list of people who want to join in and let me know how many I'll be cooking for!" Well, 'a few' turned into twenty six of my closest international friends. I didn't mind, though that day of cooking was a bit stressful, since I also had to pack up ALL of my things from the whole semester to move out of my apartment that same day. I did, however, with the borrowed use of two other apartments' ovens, manage to prepare a grand feast that everyone thoroughly enjoyed and get everything in my room successfully packed.

          On to this year's Canadian Thanksgiving in the Netherlands. And before I talk about the cooking, let me just tell you, going to the grocery store on the bakfiets in the torrential rain (because, of course, there had to be a monsoon outside, appropriate for Canadian Thanksgiving) is not fun. But it was totally worth it. 

          We decided not to make everything that might be present at a Canadian Thanksgiving, but we did make plenty. First, we chose to bake a chicken instead of a turkey for a few good reasons: we could not find a turkey, turkeys are expensive, they take too long to cook, and there were only 7 of us, so a chicken was plenty big enough. The fixings and side dishes included: homemade stuffing, sweet potato casserole, mashed potatoes, brown gravy, croissants, brussel sprouts, and a from-scratch pumpkin pie for dessert. We even found some cranberry sauce at the Albert Heijn! 

          For the stuffing, we used this Betty Crocker recipe, though I did add about two cups of chicken broth because it was a bit too dry and some garlic powder, as I am wont to do, to the recipe. When it was done cooking on the stovetop, we stuffed the chicken full and then spread the rest in a casserole dish to bake on its own. 

          The chicken I simply coated with olive oil and seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic, and onion powder. After being seasoned and stuffed, it was ready to go in the oven! It baked for 15 minutes at 425°F/218°C, then I reduced the temperature of the oven to 375°F/190°C and let it back for about an hour longer. I covered the stuffing in the casserole dish with aluminum foil and placed it in the oven, covered, for 30 minutes at 325°F/162°C, then another 15 minutes uncovered. 

          For the sweet potato casserole (all American, but I couldn't resist), I used my daddy's recipe. I cooked the sweet potatoes in the microwave first, until they were tender. Then, I peeled them to mix up the casserole; however, I was in for a surprise when I removed the peels, which I already thought were strange because they were a purpley color. The insides were white! Definitely not the bright orange I was expecting! 

          But, since they smelled and tasted just like regular old sweet potatoes, it all turned out just fine! I mixed the sweet potatoes up with about 1 stick of butter, brown sugar to taste, and three eggs. The brown sugar in the Netherlands is something else that's a bit different. It's very dark brown, so it colors foods pretty heavily, but it tastes closer to white sugar than to the American brown sugar I'm used to. It served its purpose just fine here, though. I spread the mixture in a baking dish and baked it at 325°F/162°C (with the stuffing), for about 45 minutes, then topped it with some pecans and baked it at around 425°F/218°C for about 10 minutes. Finally, right before we were ready to set the table, I topped the casserole with marshmallows and put it on to broil until the marshmallows were roasted golden brown. The marshmallows here, however, are also a bit different. They taste more like peeps than like normal s'more-type marshmallows and, for some reason, they deflated almost immediately after the casserole was removed from the oven, but, once again, it all tasted fine! 

          For the mashed potatoes, I followed my usual parmesan-garlic mashed potato recipe. A peeled and washed the potatoes for me, then I boiled them until they were tender. After they were done, I mashed them up with a few tablespoons of butter, about 3 tablespoons of sour cream, a splash of milk, approximately 1/2 cup of shredded parmesan cheese, and salt, pepper, and garlic powder to taste. To go with them (and with everything else as it so wonderfully does), I prepared brown gravy from a package of Southeastern Mills Brown Gravy Mix that my mama sent me in my wonderfully colossal care package. 

          A cooked the brussel sprouts (something she has every Thanksgiving, I'm told, though I don't know why... Bleh! ;) and they turned out great! (for brussel sprouts...) She boiled them  and then tossed them with plenty of butter, salt, and pepper. 

          The croissants came in a can and were easy to bake up right before everyone was ready to eat! A lovely accompaniment to any meal! 

          Last, but not least: the from-scratch, from 2 real pumpkins (only because you can't find canned pumpkin here), pumpkin pie. We basically followed this recipe, but I used pumpkin pie spice (another wonderful gift in the care package from my lovely mama), instead of all the other spices, heavy cream instead of evaporated milk (it's not Thanksgiving if everything's not incredibly fattening...), and brown sugar instead of white. For the pie crust, I crushed up a package of speculaas (Dutch Christmas ginger-bread type cookie), and mixed it with about 1/2 cup of melted butter. I then pressed the mixture into the bottom and sides of a tart dish and filled it with the pie filling. And, obviously, we bought whipped cream to go on top! 

          All in all, everything turned out fabulously and we were stuffed as full as the Thanksgiving chicken once we were done! I had a great time cooking for and celebrating Canadian Thanksgiving for the first time and can't wait till the fourth Thursday in November when it's time to celebrate American Thanksgiving! We'll definitely be having another feast then! Absolutely nothing wrong with celebrating two Thanksgivings in one year, in my opinion! 

Lekker!!!

          

          

Catching Up

          The past week has been eventful and uneventful all at the same time. Last week was the 3 Oktober Feest here in Leiden, which is the biggest festival and holiday in Leiden, rivaling even Christmas and Sinterklass, to my understanding. Naturally,  A and I and our new friend from California, P, had to go explore and join in the celebrations on Wednesday night and Thursday day. Though we didn't stay out all night as the host dad suggested we would be, we did enjoy the festivities. There were stages set up everywhere with live bands and DJs playing, as well as food and beer stands on every corner. We indulged in a few Heinekens (traditionally Dutch), had this delicious puff pastry thing with chocolate and whipped cream, and walked around listening to the different acts.

          We stayed till about 2:00 AM and then decided to head home, though not before grabbing some typical late night food: gyros (Greek, not Dutch, but Gyros:the Netherlands like Taco Bell:The US). I didn't cook anything fancy or time consuming last week just because it was such a hectic week, with host mom in New York, J with his broken leg, and M at play dates and not home for dinner half the week; thus, I thought this sign outside the gyro place adequately summed up my week:

          On Thursday, A and I went back to the festival to check it out in the day time. We walked around some more and ate some churros (again, not typical Dutch, but delicious fried fair food all the same), one of which A dropped! I'm still not sure if I've forgiven her. We rode the ferris wheel to get a good view (and pictures) of Leiden and the fair and the big windmill close to central station (it's Holland, so of course there was a windmill nearby), though we both found that ferris wheels are scarier than we remembered. Once again, a day devoid of cooking, but full of other activities. 

          On Saturday, my friend S came from Utrecht and we walked around Leiden for a few hours while we were waiting on my phone screen to get fixed. Shattered iPhone screen=no fun. We stopped for some bagels for lunch, which, according to trip advisor, were supposed to be the best bagels in Leiden. They were alright.

           On the way home we snagged a couple of the best treat that The Netherlands has to offer: stroopwafels! They're made with round, flat waffle cone type shells, with this caramel sauce sandwiched in-between and they are amazing. Especially when they're fresh and warm. Mmmm... Stroopwafels. This is what they look like:

          When we got home, A came over and we ordered pizza, ate it and ice cream and had a Halloween movie marathon: Hocus Pocus, Tower of Terror, and Interview with the Vampire. 

          Sunday morning afternoon, we got up and made ourselves a feast. Bacon stuffed pancakes and chocolate Nutella muffins. We fried up the bacon, then used a recipe that A's mom sent her for the pancakes and just poured a little batter in the pan, added the bacon, then poured more batter over the top. They were amazing. Unfortunately, we did not have any maple syrup, just schenkstroop, which is Dutch syrup that's good, but is a little more bitter than maple syrup. I got the idea from a recipe I came across on pinterest. The ones on pinterest looked a bit more like dippers. Ours were more like regualr oval shaped pancakes, but they were still lekker! 

           The chocolate Nutella muffins I bake just because I wanted to bake something. I made up a recipe using 1 cup of Nutella, 1/2 cup of flour, 2 eggs, 2 tablespoons of hotchocolate mix, and a teaspoon of baking powder. I mixed it all up, poured it into cupcake liners in a muffin tin and baked them at 175°C/350°F for about 30 minutes. While they were baking, I mixed up a glaze to go on top with sugar, hot chocolate mix, and melted butter. When they came out of the oven, I spooned the glaze on top while they were still hot so it would melt and drip down the sides a bit. 

          Sadly, our girls weekend had to come to an end, but I'm looking forward to another one soon! 

          Monday, I made Stromboli for dinner! 

          I was a bit sad that J didn't want to help me make the dough like he normally does, but his broken leg's got him feeling like he can't do much, poor baby. I used this recipe for the dough, though I might suggest finding another. This one turned out a bit sticky and didn't rise as well as it should've, though it still turned out ok. 

          After rolling out the dough on a pan with olive oil, I spread the sauce(s) on the dough and topped it with various toppings. I did my stromboli half and half. One half was traditional tomato sauce with cheese and pepperoni (or salami, rather) and the other half had a pesto base with cheese, pepperonis, roasted garlic cloves, onions, and red peppers. 

          After all the toppings were on, I carefully rolled the stromboli up and then placed it in the oven to bake at 175°C/350°F for about 40 minutes. I then sprinkled the top with parmesan cheese and let it bake for another 10 minutes. 

          Viola! Lekker stromboli! A delicious twist on the classic pizza! 

          Now, for the last part of this very long post: tonight's dinner. This evening, I fried up some salmon fillets on the stove, seasoned with lemon, salt, pepper, and onion and garlic powder and cooked in olive oil. To go with it, I sauteed some asparagus, also in olive oil with salt, pepper, and onion and garlic powder, and cooked some brown rice, flavored with butter, salt, pepper, garlic, and basil. Simple, but delicious, filling, and even healthy! 

          That's finally it for this very long blog post. I'm now going to read my book while finishing some hot chocolate in the mug my lovely host mom bought me on her trip in New York and go to sleep! Until next time! 

I Hate that I Love Cooking with Onions: Lasagna Night!

          First of all, let me just explain the title of this post. I love onions and I love cooking with them, almost as much as I love cooking with garlic; however, they hate me, specifically, my eyes. I don't just tear up, my eyes BURN within minutes of beginning to chop that wonderfully strong, smelly vegetable. Of course they were going to go in the lasagna tonight, so the eyes were on fire. But, just as 'pain is beauty,' I guess 'pain is delicious cooking'? But, I digress.

          Since poor J will still be in his cast for a while longer (hopefully only the hip-cast till Thursday), he stayed home from school again today, so I spent the day with him and baby girl. After lunch, while J was watching TV and playing with the iPad for a bit, I started to prepare dinner for later so I wouldn't have to rush to get everything done this evening, since I had to pick M up from school in the bakfiets (another very Dutch thing: a bike with a front car compartment for carrying up to four children/groceries, etc.).

          I gathered all of my ingredients. I couldn't just do simple lasagna with sauce, meat, cheese, and noodles. I had to spice it up a bit with lots of spices and veggies. Though just plain ole lasagna, like the kind we make in a Dutch oven over the campfire every year at summer girl scout camp, is good too. 

          Then I chopped all my vegetables. If you're like me and onions set your eyes aflame, you'll need to chop your onions efficiently as to minimize exposure time. If you haven't figured out how to do this, my method is the quickest I've found yet. Note: I sometimes waste a bit of the outer layer of the onion because i simply pull it all off instead of taking forever to meticulously peel the onion. First, I chop the ends of the onion off and peel it. Then, I chop the onion in half so that each half can lie flat when I ben to chop it. Next, I slice the onion length wise, being careful to keep the slices together so as to easily slice in the opposite direction. Then, I hold the slices together and slice width wise. Since onions are already in layers, this is all you have to do to chop them as fine as you want. 

          Once all of my vegetables were chopped, I added them to a skillet with some olive oil and cooked them down, adding the parsley, green onions, and garlic after the onions, tomatoes, and zucchini had cooked down a bit. 

          If you don't own a garlic press, I suggest purchasing one. SO much easier than finely chopping the garlic. I never had one before this year because it's not something a cheap college student tends to buy (though I did buy springform and bundt pans... I'm pretty sure normal college students don't buy those either...) and I'm not really sure why my daddy never bought one. 

         

          On the topic of how to easily peel and chop things, it's a lot easier to peel garlic if you first chop the ends of the clove off, then place the clove under the flat of a knife and hit the flat of the knife with the heel of your hand one good time. The skin will then pretty much just fall off. 

          After all the vegetables were cooked down until soft, I added and browned the ground beef. I also added lots of salt, pepper, onion powder, basil, and garlic powder. Garlic powder is my FAVORITE thing to use in my cooking. I go through a ton of it. I love really strong flavors. If you don't, just don't use as much, obviously. 

                                    

          I then added the spaghetti sauce and a bit more salt and garlic powder.    

  

                                   

          Next, I layered the lasagna in the casserole dish. ALWAYS do sauce first on the bottom or the noodles/cheese will stick to the bottom of the pan: a mess you don't want to deal with scrubbing up. I did meat sauce, noodles (uncooked, instant noodles), shredded cheese (at home I would use mozerella, here the host family buys something called 30+ cheese, which tastes a little bit like a cross between parmesan and cheddar to me), then repeat. 

          When I got to the top, I ran out of meat sauce and I wanted another layer of sauce on the top, so I mixed a can of tomato paste we had in the cabinet with hot water from the instant boiling water tap (a very convenient appliance, I might add), salt, pepper, onion powder, basil, and, of course, garlic powder. I spread that over the top layer of pasta, then sprinkled the remaining 30+ cheese, along with some grated parmesan over the top. 

 

          I then covered it in tin foil. Later, once J, K, and I got back from picking up M from school, I gave them a snack and then preheated the oven and baked the lasagna, still covered with the tin foil, at 350° F/180° C (European ovens, as well as all other temperature gauges, are in Celsius) for about 35 minutes. Finally, I removed the tin foil and baked for an additional 10 minutes until the cheese on top browned slightly. 

          And viola! Lekker! The kids loved it and I'm sure I'll find out soon how the host parents liked it. I liked how it turned out. The real tomatoes and zucchini gave it a nice fresh taste and the garlic and cheese just made it delicious. 

           I originally wanted to add ricotta or another type of cheese as well, but since I'm home this week with J and his broken leg, I was unable to go to the Albert Heijn (Dutch big chain grocery store) this week, and I forgot to ask F to pick it up when she did the shopping. I think it turned out well enough without the additional cheese, though! 

          Poor J wanted to help clean up, but his leg is still keeping him from doing too much. He sat on the counter and helped me wipe them down though! Such a big helper! 

          That's about it for my second post! I won't post every day, but I will be trying to as often as possible. Hope you continue to read and enjoy my food/au pair blog! 

Recipe:

Fresh and Easy Lasagna

Ingredients: 

- 1 pkg. uncooked, instant lasagna noodles

- 1 lb. ground beef

- 1 large can/jar of spaghetti sauce

- 1 pkg. shredded cheese (mozerella or of your choosing)

- grated parmesan cheese (to taste)

- 2 medium yellow onions

- 1 zucchini 

- 8 (or so) cherry tomatoes 

- fresh basil

- 3 green onions

- 3 cloves of garlic (or to taste)

- olive oil

- tomato paste

- salt & pepper (to taste)

- garlic powder, onion powder, and basil (to taste) 

Directions:

1. Chop all vegetables finely.

2. Sauté onions, zucchini, and tomatoes in olive oil over medium heat until soft.

3. Add green onions, garlic, and parsley and sauté until the garlic is fragrant (about 30 seconds).

4. Add ground beef and brown.

5. Add seasonings to taste.

6. Combine beef and vegetables with pasta sauce. 

7. Layer casserole dish with meat sauce, pasta, and cheese, in that order, repeating until you have a final layer of pasta on top.

8. Combine tomato paste with hot water and season to taste.

9. Spread mixture over top layer of pasta.

10. Sprinkle with remaining mozzarella and parmesan. 

11. Cover with foil and bake at 350°F/180°C for 35 minutes.

12. Remove foil and bake for an additional 10 minutes or until parmesan begins to brown.