Groentesoep met balletjes

This is a Dutch soup I remember fondly from when I was growing up. It's a great way to stretch a tiny amount of mince, and get kids to eat their vegies. Master Six had three helpings, and Miss Four and I both had two. Plus, there are three individual serves in freezer bags for my lunches. All with mince that was less than half of what I normally use for one meal.

from The Art of Dutch Cooking - Countess van Limburg Stirum

I used 2 cups mixed frozen vegetables (carrots, corn, peas) along with one diced onion and a diced stick of celery. I also added two handfuls of chopped frozen celery leaves (which I save whenever I buy a bunch).

Vegetable soup boiling

You can see above that I used two packs of two minute noodles, along with the flavour satchels, instead of rice, because DP doesn't eat rice.

Tiny raw meatballs

Almost done

Too easy. Dinner took around half an hour, including meatball rolling time. I started the vegetables boiling, then mixed and rolled the meat, dropping each ball straight into the soup as it was rolled. Master Two had to have his strained, so he could eat the noodles and meat with a fork, and drink the soup from a mug, but he went back for seconds too, so it didn't put him off any!

This was an entry for
The Cookbook Challenge: Week 34 - Soups.

Kids Cooking Thursday: Speculaas Fruit Scrolls

This is a recipe I modified from a Hot Cross Bun recipe I tried a few years back. I wanted something spicy and fruity, but with a bit of a twist (har har) so we used dutch biscuit spices, and made a jam scroll-y type thing.

Speculaas Fruit Scrolls
4 cups good quality plain flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups lukewarm milk
15g dried yeast (I used 2x 8g sachets)
1/4 cup sugar
2 1/2 tsps speculaas spices (recipe follows, for those who aren't lucky enough to get it sent from Holland ready made)
60g soft butter
1 egg
1/2 cup sultanas
1/2 cup craisins
1/2 cup chopped dried apricots
approx 1/2 cup jam (we used the last of our Strawberry, Blueberry & cranberry conserve)

Put yeast in bowl with the milk and 1 teaspoon sugar. Leave for 10-15 mins until it starts to froth.
Sift flour, salt, spice into bowl and add sugar. Rub in butter and add egg, milk and yeast mixture and fruit. Knead for at least 10 minutes or until elastic.
If the dough is sticky you may have to add a little more flour.

Place into a greased bowl, cover with glad wrap and leave in a warm spot until double in size. (No point giving times, with it being Summer over here and all, my kitchen is way hot).
Punch down to original size and knead lightly until smooth. Roll out into a thinnish rectangle (but no holes) and spread with jam.

Roll into a log, working from the long end. With a sharp knife, cut into slices about an inch thick, and place on a baking paper lined tray about 1 cm apart.

Cover with a tea towel and stand in a warm spot for about 15 mins or until double in size.
Place in 200 c oven for about 20 mins or until cooked.

Speculaas Kruiden(Spices)
2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground aniseed
knifepoint of pepper


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Beef Croquettes

This is a recipe which everyone I've ever known has loved. It's a dutch recipe passed down from my mother. I've only made it myself about three times, since it is so very time consuming, and takes the best part of a day to make. But it makes heaps, and they are nice to have in the freezer, and DP loves them. Since I've been making a lot of his favourites this week, I thought it was about time I spent a day in the kitchen and make some again. After all, nothing says I love you like a hot, sweaty, tired partner covered in goop right? Um, perhaps don't answer that. But, everything has it's payoff, and you can't buy food like this from the freezer section. Damn, I just realised. If I'd only have made these earlier in the fortnight, I could have brought them to the Retro Blog Party!

Croquettes
1 1/2 litres of water
750g mince
4 beef cubes
1 onion (chopped and fried)
1 tsp curry
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp pepper
1 tbsp salt

Boil ingredients for 1/2 - 3/4 hr set aside to cool.

200g butter
400g plain flour

Melt butter, add flour slowly mixing together. When mixture is like crumbs, add the liquid from the meat mixture in, a ladle full at a time. When all flour, butter and water has been incorporated, add meat mixture. This is an insanely thick mixture. Blend together with a stick mixer until smooth.

It'll look kinda like this

Then cook for a few more minutes over low heat till it thickens a bit more. Don't let the bottom bits burn! Allow to cool.

Roll into log shapes. Unless you have a nifty croquette machine like I do, then it's just

Fill...


push...


and squoosh! Perfect logs, just cut to length.

Roll in breadcrumbs, roll through egg mix (1 cup milk , 2 eggs, 1 tablespoon oil), then through breadcrumbs again. Get yourself a little production line thing happening:

Working from right to left cos I'm weird.

Deep fry in hot oil for about five minutes or until golden brown and crunchy. Unfried croquettes can be frozen until needed. Since this usually an all day affair, lunch on these days was traditionally the meat mornay (mixture right before the 'roll into shape' step) on sandwiches. If Mum started too late in the day, then that was what we'd have for dinner, and she'd make the croquettes for the freezer afterwards. This makes plenty to freeze.

I think I had around 50 or so