A frikandel is one of the most popular Dutch fast food items. They are usually produced from “mechanically separated meat”, which means any meat that can be obtained through mechanical means from a carcass after ‘regular’ butchering has finished. To make up for the lack of proper meat, a lot of spices are used as well … Continue reading
Stefano of Italian Home Cooking has done it again: he posted a delicious traditional Italian recipe that I had not heard of before. I love Ragù alla Napoletano, which is a large piece of beef braised in tomato sauce. The tomato sauce obtains a wonderful beefy flavor, and is served over pasta as primo piatto. Then … Continue reading
Boeuf Bourguignon is a famous beef stew from the French region of Burgundy. The beef is stewed with red wine and served with mushrooms and pearl onions in a rich beefy sauce. I’ve posted before how to make it on the stovetop or using a pressure cooker. It is delicious, if you succeed in stewing the beef … Continue reading
When cooking sous-vide, you have perfect control over how done the meat is going to be. But it does require you to know what temperature corresponds with how you like your steak done. And so I prepared the above chart for you. You can look at what the meat will look like in the photo, … Continue reading
After having cooked sous-vide for six years, I still discover some improvements now and then. Until recently, when cooking beef sous-vide I would usually choose as low a temperature as possible, and then cook long enough for the meat to become tender. This has as an advantage that the beef retains as much juices as possible, because … Continue reading
For Christmas I wanted to make a traditional Italian dish that I had not prepared before, preferably something that involved stuffed pasta. As I’ve already made so many stuffed pasta dishes over the years, I wasn’t sure if I would succeed. But then I saw ravioli alla genovese on Enassar’s blog Oven-Dried Tomatoes, and I … Continue reading
Some Dutch words are difficult to translate. Two important ones are gezellig and borrel. “Gezellig” means having a good time together with other people. It can be used as an adjective, as in “gezellige avond” (avond = evening), or as an adverb: “het is erg gezellig” (it is very gezellig). A “borrel” is getting together to have … Continue reading
This recipe is pretty crazy. It’s something I thought of and wanted to try: deep fried ravioli made with cornflour (masa) that I wanted to taste like hard taco shells, filled with chili con carne and smoked mozzarella. Although I didn’t manage to make the deep fried ravioli as crispy as hard taco shells, it … Continue reading
My old-fashioned butcher (which is not a bad quality at all in a butcher) is slowly catching up to new trends, and is now dry aging beef. I picked up a dry aged strip steak (called entrecote in the Netherlands) and decided to use what I had that needed to be used up to create a … Continue reading
Blade steak or flat iron steak is a relatively inexpensive cut of beef that when you cook it sous-vide becomes more flavorful than many more expensive cuts of steak, and just as tender. Look for steaks with a lot of marbling in them, because that is what gives them the flavor. In the Netherlands this … Continue reading
Picanha is a cut of beef that is very popular in Brazil and Argentina, that is known as “rump cap” in the United States or as staartstuk in the Netherlands. It is a tender and flavorful piece of beef from the rear of the animal with a fat cap on top. In South America it … Continue reading
Enchiladas is Spanish for something like ‘covered in chilli’, and refers to tortillas dipped in chilli sauce. In this version corn tortillas are dipped in chilli con carne, stuffed with cheese, and baked with more chilli con carne and cheese. I saw it on Meals With Mel, and decided right away I wanted to try this Tex-Mex … Continue reading
As promised in my review of sous-vide equipment, I’m going to write more about sous-vide techniques. This is the first post in a series, that will be in the new categorie “Sous-Vide tips & tricks“. In cooking we often strive to combine a tender and juicy interior with a crispy and flavorful crust, which is an … Continue reading
Happy St. Patrick’s day! It’s an Irish-American tradition to eat corned beef with cabbage on St. Patrick’s day. I usually don’t celebrate St. Patrick’s day (most people in the Netherlands haven’t even heard of it), but when I came across a recipe for corned beef with cabbage I thought the cooking technique was very interesting. You … Continue reading
To celebrate a friend’s 20th birthday, I got him a vintage port from his birth year and an accompanying dinner. Since I know he loves blue cheese, it wasn’t difficult to decide what to prepare to go with the vintage port: steak with a blue cheese sauce. The tannins in the port go well with … Continue reading
Each region of Italy has its own pasta shapes and pasta recipes. Valeggio sul Mincio, a town near Lago di Garda and the city of Verona, is famous for its Tortellini di Valeggio, tortellini made of pasta as thin as a veil with a filling of beef, chicken, and pork. To make them extra delicate, … Continue reading
Tenderloin, prized for its tenderness, is an expensive cut of beef. A tenderloin tapers towards one end, and the ‘tip’ of the tenderloin is not suitable for tournedos or châteaubriand. Tenderloin tips are therefore available at about half the regular price of beef tenderloin. Other than their shape and size, their taste is exactly the … Continue reading
After four years of cooking sous-vide, the longest cook I had done was still 72 hours. So far I had not encountered a cut of meat that required more. Then I read about oxtail sous-vide, cooked 100 hours at 60ºC/140ºF, and I was curious to try it. As this was a trial run, I kept the … Continue reading
Beef shoulder, also known as the top blade roast, has great marbling (intramuscular fat) and therefore great flavor. It has a drawback, which is a thick central muscle sheath that is very tough. If that sheath is removed then the resulting cut is called flat iron steak (in the US; butlers’ steak in the UK, … Continue reading
Have you been wondering what I made with the Chinese chicken stock? Well, here it is: Chinese hot pot (also known as Mongolian hot pot), a festive dish that is delicious, healthy, and surprisingly easy to prepare for such a feast. As always, it is worth making your own stock. Raw meat, seafood and vegetables … Continue reading
When I prepared a Bistecca alla Fiorentina in January to celebrate Conor’s board, there were two things I put on my to do list: (1) to try this with real Chianina beef from Tuscany, and (2) to try to ‘warm age’ the t-bone steak first to make it more tender and to make it easier to … Continue reading
We love fajitas, Tex-Mex flour tortillas stuffed with chicken or steak, bell peppers, onions, salsa, and cheese. At least that’s how I like to prepare them. We usually have them with chicken, but I was curious to try them with steak. Skirt steak is sometimes also known as ‘fajita meat’, and so that was the cut … Continue reading
This pasta dish is inspired by Sapori Pugliesi, a humble trattoria in downtown Amsterdam. This place is in walking distance from where I work, and perfect for a quick, delicious and cheap meal after work if I’m going to stay downtown for whatever reason. They have great antipasti and fresh tagliatelle served with a variety … Continue reading
Have you ever heard of cutlets “Palermo style” (alla Palermitana)? I hadn’t. But thanks to the blog Culinaria Italia (the blog of a Brit who lives in Puglia) I have now tried them and loved them! The Cotoletta alla Palermitana is much lighter than its cousin from Milano/Vienna (i.e. Wiener Schnitzel). Instead of breading the slice … Continue reading
After seeing a nice recipe for caramelized red onions on Viaggiano con Bea I wanted to try, all that was left to do was pick what I would serve it with. I had some lovely wagyu blade steaks in the freezer, and decided to try whether I could cook them sous-vide using a trick I developed … Continue reading
Tapas are in Spain simply bar food, but outside of Spain have become very famous. In Spain every bar (with the word “bar” meaning a neighborhood hangout that is open all day and night and where you can also buy newspapers or lottery tickets) has a display on the counter that proudly displays the, often … Continue reading
Conor has invited me to join his board. He had commissioned four handmade chopping boards to be cut from the same block of walnut by his friend Terry from 2 Wooden Horses and has sent them as Christmas gifts to Richard, Nick and myself. As chairman of the board, Conor challenged us to use the board. And so … Continue reading
Braised beef is known as “draadjesvlees” in the Netherlands. This literally means “thread meat”, referring to the flaky structure of the meat. Good draadjesvlees should be juicy and tender, not tough and dry. This means braising it over low heat for a long time. One of the most common cuts that is used for this … Continue reading
This history of this dish and the origins of its name are uncertain according to Wikipedia, but it definitely plays an important role in my personal food history as Beef Wellington was one of the first gourmet dishes I learned to prepare. It was at the christmas party at my first job back in 1997. We … Continue reading
When I wanted to try and make chili con carne from scratch for the first time, the natural place to go for a reliable recipe was REMCooks.com. Richard’s recipe for what he calls Super Bowl Chili, Texas-Style has been the basis. According to Richard (and I consider him a reliable source), true Texas-style chili includes only … Continue reading
