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Belgium

Belgium: Witte Kool in Roomsaus (Shredded Baby Cabbage in Cream Sauce)

Creamed cabbage. Oh dear.

It doesn't sound particularly exciting ... and especially not around here, as EuroCuisineGuy has been at war with the entire Brassica family from a very young age. And not just the cabbage side of the family, either. ECG isn't even wild about mustard, and when he was astonishingly spotted eating the (admittedly wonderful) sesame-oiled flash-grilled cauliflower at Deane's in Belfast, his profoundly skeptical mother suggested that the BBC (just around the corner) should have been asked to send in a camera crew for verification purposes.

In retrospect, this was understandable. Way too much overboiled big-head cabbage, way too many school lunches where the air was full of the persistent reek of broken cabbage-y sulfur bonds, have turned EuroCuisineGuy into one of the many who leave the room muttering when the word "cabbage" is mentioned.

But not today.

A sweetheart cabbage

During a shopping trip meant to prepare for a picture-taking session involving côtelettes de porc a la Flamande, EuroCuisineLady more or less accidentally acquired a small and handsome young cabbage labeled "Sweet Heart", grown in Spain. A little searching reveals that this is a newish cabbage variety; "sweethearts" are also called pointed cabbage, hearted cabbage, Duchy cabbage, and hispi. Anyway, the cabbage came home, and became part of this recipe adapted from one in van Waerebeek's Everybody Eats Well in Belgium.

The recipe involves shredding or finely chopping the cabbage, boiling it for exactly three minutes, draining it, spreading it into a buttered casserole, pouring cream over it, grinding over it fresh nutmeg and black pepper, and baking it for fifteen minutes. Any recipe that simple already has a lot going for it.

EuroCuisineLady proceeded stealthily, doing the slicing and brief cabbage-boiling without saying anything to EuroCuisineGuy about what she was doing until the dish was in the oven. "Smells good," she said. EuroCuisineGuy, amazingly, agreed.

This was encouraging. The casserole came out of the oven, and looked and smelled terrific. It was sampled, found super, then dished out and photographed. And then, "What do you think it is?" said EuroCuisineLady.

EuroCuisineGuy (who was upstairs at the time) said he didn't know. EuroCuisineLady told him. EuroCuisineGuy was very surprised. And then -- encouraged to eat it -- he did. And he liked it. Cries of "Hey Mikey!" filled the air, and these had to be explained to ECG, as he has never seen a Quaker Life commercial.

No matter. If you are acquainted with a cabbage hater, this is the recipe to try. Among cabbage recipes, it is a veritable Rolls-Royce.

Click "read more" for the recipe.

Belgium and the Netherlands: Online Sources for Mayonnaise and Friet Sauces

Various site visitors have contacted us to say that they've been trying to find genuine Belgian / Dutch mayonnaise, or various sauces for frites (frietsaus), without success.

We've therefore done a little research and have managed to locate some online sources where you can order these items. Please note that each supplier has its own limitations about where they'll ship to, and you may have to check several before you find one that will suit you.

Belgium: Geraardsbergen Mattentaart

People living in the rich pastureland areas around the East Flanders city of Geraardsbergen (or Gramont as French-speaking Belgians would call it) claim that this particular pastry can be made properly nowhere else. Opinions will vary as to why this should be. Probably basic to the whole business is the local milk, for this cake depends heavily on the Geraardsbergen area's dairy produce -- milk and buttermilk, used to prepare the unique, fine, dry curd for the cheesecake part (matten means "curds": the French-language name for the cake is tarte aux matons), and butter for the puff pastry.

At the European Union level, at least, it seems that someone agrees with the bakers of Geraardsbergen as regards the special qualities of their pet product. The mattentaart was the first Flemish food product to be granted (in 2006) the much-sought-after European Regional Product status, designating it as qualifying for a PDO or Protected Designation of Origin. This means that a pastry can only be called Mattentaart if it was actually produced in Geraardsbergen (or the city's neighbouring village of Lierde) and made using the traditional, ancient recipe -- which dates back to 1510 -- while also using milk from the region. With this in mind, it's probably no surprise that the mattentaart was chosen as one of the two Belgian "national birthday cakes" for the European Union's 50th birthday celebrations.

If you're lucky enough to come across a genuine mattentaart, you're in for a treat. The addition of eggs and a touch of ground almond or almond essence to the cheesecake mixture produces a flavor that's surprisingly complex for something so simple... and the puff pastry adds a delightful, tender crunch, far better in its way than the usual cheesecake crust.

Click on "read more" for the recipe.

Belgium -- Belgian Waffles

In this world of foods that people label as coming from one place when they actually come from somewhere else (like French fries) and dishes that people think everyone in a country eats when that's not the case at all (like corned beef and cabbage), it's a relief to find one food that actually comes from the country it's named after, and is really popular there as well. Into this class falls that shining example of sugary goodness, the Belgian waffle -- known to French-speakers on its home turf as the gaufre or gauffre, and to Flemish- / Vlaamse-speakers as the wafel, waffel or suikerwaffel.

This is where things get complicated, though, as it turns out there isn't just one kind of Belgian waffle. There are at least two main varieties -- possibly more, depending on who you talk to -- and a lot of minor regional variations.

But before getting into details about the recipes, it has to be said that in their native Belgium, waffles aren't eaten all that much as a breakfast dish -- though naturally tourists ask for them at breakfast, and get them. And though they appear as a dessert dish, again, there are lots of other desserts that are as popular among Belgians.

Where the waffle really shines in Belgium is as a casual snack food -- something you buy from a bakery or street stand, and eat hot and out of hand. (There is so much of this that there are lots of places, especially in the big cities, where you'll see signs like the one on the left, begging people not to bring waffles into shops or stand around eating them out in front and blocking the view in or out of the windows.)

The waffle that most North Americans would think of as a Belgian waffle is known in Belgium as gaufre de Bruxelles, "the Brussels waffle". General Belgian affection for it is sufficiently great that this waffle was chosen as one of the national "birthday cakes" for the European Union's fiftieth birthday celebrations.

The Brussels waffle is based on a batter raised with yeast -- as opposed to most North American waffle or pancake batters, which are raised with baking powder.


Gaufre de Bruxelles: Brussels-style waffle

This is where many North American attempts at the Brussels/Belgian waffle fall down: the yeast raising changes the chemistry of the batter, producing a tenderer crumb in the finished waffle than a baking-powder raising can. The yeast and the beaten egg whites which are folded into the batter work together to produce a light crisp waffle. The Brussels waffle is rectangular and usually about an inch thick, with fairly deep "dimples". When you buy it on the street or in a shop in Belgium, it usually comes dusted with a little confectioners' sugar / icing sugar, and maybe spread with chocolate or thick whipped cream. But you can also get it piled high with fruit and other goodies.

The other main kind of waffle is the Liège waffle, named after that city. It's oblong, more or less oval-shaped, a thinner and smaller waffle than the Brussels waffle. But it's also more substantial, and has a significant crunch due to the small nuggets of parelsuiker or "pearl sugar" that are added to the batter just before baking. These bits of sugar melt when being baked on the waffle iron and caramelize, producing a sugary crust like what's found on top of a creme brulée.


Gauffres de Liège | Liège-style waffles

(Pearl sugar is somewhat specialized. Some stores that specialize in cakemaking and other confectionery carry it, and there are some online sources, this one for example, and this one. If you can't get your hands on it, you can fake the pearl-sugar effect passably well by procuring "coffee sugar" -- the brown kind that comes in large granules -- pounding it well in a cloth with a wooden meat-tenderizing mallet, and sprinkling the crystals into the batter when directed in the recipe below.)

Click on "Read more" to see the recipes. (Francophones: see also this excellent page of minor regional waffle varieties such as the gaufre de Flamande, gaufre de Herve, gaufre de Verviers, gaufre de Perron, etc.)

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