Christmas 2012

After a few days of gluttony, we're embracing a pared down diet over here. Christmas was, as always, a family affair that rotated around the dinner table. Christmas seemed to sneak up on us this year, and I felt woefully unprepared. Most of the presents were bought a few days before they had to be given out, and we didn't do our meal planning until just before my parents arrived. I choose to blame this on a combination of celebrating Sinterklaas and being busy with things that interest me more than decorating a tree: finishing a free-lance project, reading Slate, getting outside for the few minutes a day that it isn't raining, keeping a toddler from careening to certain injury from the top of the sofa.  I'm not a Christmas fanatic, and I am often very glad to live far away from months-long Christmas displays in Target and the custom of putting up the tree on Thanksgiving evening.

What I totally got behind this year was our Second Christmas (December 26) dinner. We usually celebrate with my parents, who are staying with us, and a few close friends. In the past I've viewed it as a chore, since one of our friends doesn't like seafood and the other doesn't like cheese.  Because I tend to shy away from preparing meat, mostly because I am lazy, I've had a difficult time coming up with menus that suit everyone.  This generally leaves me a nervous wreck.  I also prefer to make fun desserts, although the crowd of meat eaters at our table gets less excited about my efforts than I generally do.

This year, we did it differently.  I nixed the dessert and bought some nice bonbons (insert frowny face for no Holiday baking), and Niek declared we would be roasting pork belly.  Pork belly?  Where are we going to get a 6 lb. pork belly? It turns out that there is an amazing butcher about five minutes from our house.  I must have walked past that place hundreds of times thinking it was nothing special.  His display case holds mostly potato salads and a few chickens.  Given the modern Dutch penchant for heat-and-serve meals, I wrongly assumed he would not have pork belly.  When we walked over there on the Saturday before Christmas, the place was packed.  Niek asked the lady behind the counter about our cut of meat, and I heard her shout into the back, "Do we still have pork belly today?"  The butcher came out and asked how much we needed.  Next thing I knew, he was hoisting almost half a hog onto a back counter and grabbing a sharp knife. Honestly, it's been years since I've been to a real butcher  shop, and I've never ordered such a large cut of meat.  Even though it was a really simple cut, it was pretty awesome watching him work.  We were so excited about our purchase, and we couldn't stop talking about having an actual butcher in our neighborhood. I'm kicking myself for not going in before now.  I think that experience is what got me excited for making the meal and entertaining friends.

Niek did most of the cooking, although I stepped in as sous-chef/baby wrangler throughout the afternoon. Here's Niek getting ready to prep the huge chunk of meat we bought:

The roasting pan we borrowed from my in-laws barely fit in our oven.  Seriously, we had about 1/8" on either side.  We were so terrified it wouldn't fit.  The recipe we used called for cooking the meat at a high temperature (250 degrees Celsius=482 degrees Fahrenheit) for the first hour in order to create a crispy skin.  It certainly worked, but it also created a smokehouse in our living room. Our oven is so small that the meat came closer to the oven's heating elements than we would have preferred. We had expected a bit of smoking but not to the degree we had. All our windows stayed open for about an hour.  It was either get a little cold or feel like we were living in a campfire.  

I'm so proud of Niek's cooking abilities.  The meat was delicious, says the woman who has no great love for pork.  It was, however, a really fatty cut and not one that I would want to eat weekly.  For Christmas, though, it hit the spot.  I was sad to see the evening end.  This is really the first time I felt like I truly embraced the fun of a second Christmas.  The 25th was all about my father-in-law's amazing meal--and it certainly was amazing--but the 26th was our chance to relax and have fun in our kitchen. I suppose we'll have to get more adventurous next year, since we now know where to buy our meat.

Even the toddler had a good time.  Did you know giant spoons are more interesting than food?

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Winter Blahs...

Last night I read a post on a blog about a woman who sits under a light therapy lamp at least once a day all winter long, and I got a little jealous of her miracle lamp.  This morning it wasn't truly light outside until almost 9:00 a.m., and as I ran through the streets of Amsterdam in darkness watching kids and their parents heading to school with their bike lamps on, all I could think about was this feeling of winter blah.  It hit me early this year.  Usually I don't get this way until mid-January, and by that time there are only a few weeks left of nasty darkness before the days become exceptionally longer.  Not sure what it is about this year, but we haven't even reached the shortest day yet.  I'm almost there, almost there.

The terrible news about the school shooting has not helped much and has left me quite weepy in the evenings as I listen to NPR's Morning Edition while cooking dinner.  Technology has made it so that I can feel connected to American current events and culture even when I would rather bury my head in the sand. 

I've been surprisingly good at keeping the winter food blahs at bay.  It's mostly due to my love of Ottolenghi's vegetarian cookbook.  I would shower the world (or at least all of my friends and acquaintances) with his books if I could.  I know that I need to broaden my horizons and add a few more cookbooks into the rotation--forlorn Tessa Kiros books on my shelf, I'm thinking of you you--but I can't get enough of his warm and hearty meals.  Maybe it's because he lives in London and knows a thing or two about the cold days when the damp seeps in.

I need to go make some soup and stare at my Christmas tree for a few minutes before I head outside and soak up the few hours of overcast sun that we still have today.  Only a few more days until the sun starts staying up longer.  

Ottolenghi Crazy

We are experiencing a bit of an Ottolenghi obsession in this house at the moment.  I don't consider this to be a bad thing.  If you aren't familiar with Yottam Ottolenghi's cookbooks, his column in the Guardian (on which Plenty is based), or his London restaurants, I highly suggest poking around various websites and getting to know his food.  It's with a tinge of regret that I didn't call enough in advance for reservations at his restaurant the last time we were in London.

The recipes seem to be filling a need for our general food cravings: lots of pulses (chickpeas, lentils, and beans), aromatic spices, and complementary layers of simple ingredients.  Listen to me, sounding as if I ever in my life used the word pulses to refer to beans--must be the Ottolenghi wearing off on me.  Maybe it's because we've been in that no man's land of fresh ingredients, otherwise known as early spring.  The beginning of asparagus season this month has signalled a turning point, but the month preceding it was hard for us.  We've drawn a lot of inspiration from the cookbooks.

Our favorite recipe so far has got to be the Quinoa Salad with Dried Iranian Lime.  Alas, no dried limes to find here in Amsterdam--we're substituting lime juice and lime zest.  If you're in L.A. and you want to know where to get them, I've got a few addresses for you.  I lived in The Valley (the San Fernando Valley to you non-Southland people) for a few years, and the gigantic Persian market in Van Nuys was probably one of the greatest redeeming values of living "so far" from all of my friends.  This recipe has appeared twice on our menu in the last week-and-a-half, despite the extra effort of going to the super-chic supermarket for the orange sweet potatoes, honestly really worth the extra step. Besides, the youngest member of our family has really gotten into sweet potatoes.  As you can see, the eggplant from the soba noodle salad has also been a hit with the younger crowd.

 Lots of changes going on in the house at the moment.  A growing baby, making some travel plans, making some choices about a career move.  It's all been a little overwhelming, but when doesn't life seem to be really full.  I will say that it feels like with the arrival of spring, life (and cooking) has become more manageable.  Maybe I just needed some more sunlight.  Well, I've got my wish; the sun rises here a little after 6:00 a.m. and sets well after 8:00 p.m.  This is good for me but not so great for a baby, who hates to go to sleep.  We finally broke down and ordered a massive black-out shade for our bedroom window.  Whatever keeps us rested and sane, right?

Now go make some Ottolenghi recipes.  You can thank me later.