Boiled mashed potatoes, carrots, and onions, with meaty grease and a porkchop. Not bad if dolled up with some nutmeg, a dash of soy sauce, and a sploodge of sambal. But I'm not that fond of it that I have carrots and potatoes on hand at all times, and sometimes a porkchop is hard to find in the fridge. Actually I dislike carrots, so there have not been any here in years. And no potatoes this week, I didn't buy any in Chinatown.
What I had available was stalky mustard greens and a juicy bratwurst. Plus wide rice stick noodles, of which I'm quite fond.
So I grilled the bratwurst, and cooked the mustard greens and rice sticks in the pan grease, stirring in two chilipastes, crab paste, and green curry paste, before adding stock and water. Plus some nutmeg, a dash of soy sauce, and another sploodge of sambal.
Yeah, okay, substitutions. But sensible ones.
It was delicious.
The Spanish siege of Leiden occured during the Eighty Years War (1566 – 1648) between the Dutch and the repulsive bandy legged barbarians (Spanish). At the beginning the Dutch were a motley collection of cities and provinces in a bunch of damp and muddy bogs and tidal flats, and the Spanish were the European superpower. When it was all over, the Dutch were a force to be reckoned with, awash with power and prosperity, and the most advanced nation on the continent. And the Spanish were kind of broken.
In all honesty, Spanish cuisine IS far more interesting than Dutch food.
Dutch food is by no means everything cooked by a Dutchman.
Nor is everything a Dutchman eats Dutch food.
It's been ages since I prepared a proper 'hutspot'.
Belgian hutspot is more exciting. A stew of meat and vegetables containing mutton gilded in bacon fat with parsnips, onions, and leek. Some versions have too many different things, which leads to a disappointing fustercludge. It benefits from the addition of good dark beer for part of the liquid. Also add cloves, pepper, and nutmeg or mace. The term hutspot basically means chopsuey.
As always, serve with sambal.
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2 comments:
Do you have any recommendations as to where to find Indonesian sambal in San Francisco? I’ve found the Oelek chili paste but the one you mentioned…the one with ginger, garlic, shrimp paste…any idea where to find that one? I suspect I may have to make it at home but thought I’d ask given your expertise regarding SF Chinatown markets.
Best make it at home. Sometimes you can find jars of sambal made in Holland (Koningsvogel Brand), but there's no telling how long they've been sitting on the shelf.
Sambal Oelek/Ulek, in various brands, is quite available, and I tend to use that as a building block for all sambals I make at home.
Dai Lee Food Inc. (876 Washington St, San Francisco, CA 94108, btwn Stockton Street and Ross Alley) is a grocery store which has a wide variety of sambals, pastes, sauces, noodles, dried goods, etcetera.
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