Thank you for the compliments. I am blushing…
It is not entirely true that we don’t appreciate the Dutch kitchen. The main staple in most households still is meat, potatoes, veggies and gravy. Dinner also has a social function as the entire family is gathered at the dining table, no TV dinners. The only difference is that when I was young you were not allowed to speak during dinner time and you always had to clean your plate. Also your mother filled the plate with an amount that she thought was right for you. That didn’t always match with your appetite especially for some vegetables.
Famous is our Erwtensoep, a green pea soup with smoked sausage. It is heavy stuff so normally this is only eaten during winter time. However, on board we got it in the tropics but that didn’t matter because we loved it. The Dutch are called the Chinese of Europe because you can find then anywhere over the world, small or big towns. Sometimes those expats came looking at the ship. It often happened that they asked us whether we had erwtensoep. When the captain was in a good mood he invited them for the next day for an erwtensoep party. The leftovers went ashore afterwards…
Another speciality is Captain’s dinner a festive dish based on capuchins served hundreds of years ago on the sailing ships of the VOC. Here is a link with a recipe but beware it is a poor imitation!
And not to forget our potatoes stew. We mash boiled potatoes with all kind of mostly raw vegetables, endives, spinach, rucola, kale (precooked), carrots and onions and sauerkraut, naming a few.
And then of course our love for our raw herring, especially when they are ‘new’ in May, June and July.
Our ‘broodjes’ are pretty good. But have you tried our 'saucijzenbroodles, 'worstenbroodjes, ‘broodjes frikandel’ and others? Famous are also our ‘kroketten’ and ‘bitterballen’. I have to stop now I am getting very hungry suddenly.