by Ellen Bannink -

Pepernoten – tiny Dutch spiced cookies

Pepernoten-1-inmyredkitchen

Yummy, pepernoten!
While we in the US are busy preparing for Thanksgiving my fellow Dutchies in the Netherlands are also preparing for a national holiday: Sinterklaas’ Birthday. Sinterklaas is a very old man, a very very old man. I mean like, hundreds of years old! Sinterklaas has a long white beard, wears a red robe and has a large golden walking stick. He also rides a white horse called ‘Amerigo’ and Amerigo likes to eat carrots. Every year at the end of November Sinterklaas arrives by boat in the Netherlands from Spain, where he lives. On board are also his hundreds of helpers, they are called Piet. Each Piet has his own task, like navigation, baking pepernoten, carrying around the Big Book of Sinterklaas or wrapping the gifts for all the children in the Netherlands.

Yay! Gifts and presents for all children in the Netherlands!

by Ellen Bannink -

Chicken Madras curry

– Click here for this recipe in Dutch -> Kip Madras zonder pakjes –

I’m always a big fan of homemade food so when my brother sent me a picture of the dinner he was cooking at that moment I made a promise.
A promise to do a post on Chicken Madras curry. So here it is.

Kip Madras p

This curry is a populair dish in the Netherlands and it all comes from a package. These kinds of packages all go under the name ‘Wereldgerechten’ which means World Dishes. There is Italian lasagna, Mexican burrito’s, Indian chicken tandoori, Greek kofta, Morrocan chicken tajine, Spanish paella, Japanese teriyaki and so on.

This is the picture my brother sent me, Chicken Madras that comes from a box.
This is the picture my brother sent me, Chicken Madras that comes from a box.

And I have to admit, I also used to prepare those Wereldgerechten quite often.