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53 recipes

Dolma batata

Dolma batata belongs to the Algiers home kitchen, where it is a Ramadan favourite and a Friday dish: hollowed potatoes filled with beef mince, onion, parsley and cinnamon, fried until golden, then simmered in a pale sauce (marqa beida) of onion, chickpeas, black pepper and cinnamon. The sauce stays white because no tomato goes in. The mistake is hollowing the potatoes too thinly, so they split in the pot; leave walls about 1 cm thick. Chef's tip: fry the scooped-out potato flesh and add it to the sauce to thicken it.

95 min

Algerian Meat

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Chipa

In Paraguay you hear 'chipa, chipa!' called by vendors with big baskets on buses and street corners, and every family bakes it for Holy Week, when chipa is the food of Good Friday. Cassava starch, a little cornmeal, butter, eggs and a lot of hard cheese are kneaded into a dough scented with aniseed, shaped into rings or small rolls and baked in a hot oven, traditionally a domed clay tatakua. It's chewy, crisp outside and best warm with cocido (toasted yerba tea). Chef's tip: the dough should feel soft and slightly greasy; add milk a spoon at a time, as too much makes the chipa spread flat.

50 min

Paraguayan Breads & Parathas

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Chtitha djej

Chtitha djej is the everyday chicken of Algerian homes from Algiers to Constantine: chicken pieces simmered in a red sauce of paprika, cayenne, garlic and caraway with chickpeas, reduced until thick and clinging. It is mopped up with khobz or matlouh flatbread. The mistake is burning the garlic and paprika when they go into the oil, which turns the sauce bitter; keep the heat moderate and add water as soon as they smell toasted. Chef's tip: add a squeeze of lemon right at the end to brighten the spices.

65 min

Algerian Chicken

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Mtewem

Mtewem, from the word for garlic (thoum), is an old dish of the Casbah of Algiers: chunks of lamb and garlicky beef meatballs simmered together in a peppery white sauce with chickpeas, and finished with whole cloves of garlic that turn soft and sweet. It is cooked for Ramadan and for guests, and eaten with bread. Some families add a little tomato; this is the white version. The mistake is letting the sauce boil hard after the meatballs go in, which makes them tough and break; keep it at a gentle simmer. Chef's tip: wet your hands when rolling the meatballs so they come out smooth and hold together.

105 min

Algerian Meat

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Vegetable chorba frik

Chorba frik is the soup that breaks the fast in Algerian homes every evening of Ramadan, from Algiers to Constantine, and it is just as common in Libya as shorba. Frik is young green wheat, roasted and cracked, which gives the tomato broth a smoky, nutty depth. It usually cooks with lamb; here chickpeas, celery and courgette carry it. Serve with lemon wedges and bread. Chef's tip: add the frik only once the broth is boiling and stir for the first minute, or it sinks and sticks.

65 min

Algerian Soups

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Sopa paraguaya

Paraguayans love telling visitors that their national 'soup' is eaten with a fork: sopa paraguaya is a dense, moist cornbread baked with sweated onions, fresh cheese, eggs and milk. It's on every table at asados, weddings and the Christmas meal, and sold in squares at bus stations from Asunción to Encarnación. The crust is golden and the inside soft and cheesy, more like a savoury pudding than bread. Chef's tip: soak the cornmeal in the milk for 15 minutes before mixing; hydrated cornmeal bakes up tender instead of gritty.

75 min

Paraguayan Breads & Parathas

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Rechta with vegetable sauce

Rechta is the dish of Algiers and Blida for Mouloud, Ashura and the first day of the new year: thin, square-cut fresh noodles steamed in a couscoussier like couscous, then drenched in a pale, cinnamon-scented white sauce of turnips, courgette and chickpeas. It is usually made with chicken; this vegetable version keeps the gentle, peppery broth. Dried rechta is sold in North African shops; very thin dried egg-free noodles work too. Chef's tip: steam the noodles twice and rub them with oil in between, so they stay separate and silky.

70 min

Algerian Pasta & Noodles

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Qalb el louz

Qalb el louz ('heart of almond') is the Ramadan sweet of Algiers: a dense, sandy semolina cake with a ribbon of almond filling, cut into diamonds with an almond on top and soaked in syrup while hot. Pastry shops in the Casbah sell it by the tray after iftar, to eat with mint tea or coffee late into the night. The semolina is soaked overnight in butter and water, which gives it its moist, grainy crumb. Chef's tip: pour cold syrup over the hot cake; hot syrup on a hot cake makes it soggy instead of moist.

90 min

Algerian Baking

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Couscous royal

Couscous royal is the big-occasion couscous that Algerian and Moroccan families brought to France and that is now served for weddings and Sunday gatherings from Oran to Marseille: a pot of lamb and chicken simmered with vegetables and chickpeas in a mildly spiced broth, grilled merguez on the side, and a mountain of steamed couscous. The mistake is putting all the vegetables in at once; the courgettes go mushy while the turnips are still hard, so add them in stages. Chef's tip: brown the lamb and chicken well before the water goes in; that colour flavours the whole broth.

160 min

Algerian Meat

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Oliebollen

On the last day of December the queues outside the oliebollenkraam, the caravan-like stalls that pop up in every Dutch town, stretch round the block. Oliebollen ('oil balls') are the food of Oudejaarsavond, New Year's Eve: round, yeasted fritters full of raisins, currants and apple, deep-fried and buried in icing sugar. Families fry big batches at home in the afternoon and eat them with champagne at midnight. They are best within a few hours. Chef's tip: dip your two scooping spoons in the hot oil before each ball; the sticky dough slides off cleanly and the balls come out round instead of ragged.

60 min

Dutch Desserts

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Bitterballen

Order a round of drinks in an Amsterdam brown café and a plate of bitterballen will follow: small crumbed balls with a crackling shell and a molten centre of beef ragout, eaten with a dab of sharp mustard. They are the classic borrel snack across the Netherlands, served at parties and receptions as well as in bars. The filling is a thick roux sauce with slow-cooked shredded beef that has to set firm in the fridge before it can be rolled. The usual failure is a filling that is too soft, so the balls split open in the oil; cook the ragout until it is very thick and chill it for at least four hours. Chef's tip: crumb them twice (egg, crumbs, egg, crumbs) and freeze them for 20 minutes before frying for a shell that never bursts.

180 min

Dutch Snacks & Starters

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Poffertjes

The smell of poffertjes drifts across every Dutch kermis (funfair), Christmas market and summer street festival, where they are flipped by the hundred on a cast-iron plate full of shallow hollows. They are tiny, puffy, yeasted pancakes made partly with buckwheat, served a dozen at a time on a cardboard dish with a slab of melting butter and a snowfall of icing sugar. At home you need a poffertjespan, a pan with small round dips; a Danish æbleskiver pan is too deep. Chef's tip: put the batter in a squeeze bottle or a piping bag; filling 30 hollows quickly by spoon is almost impossible, and the first ones burn while you fill the last.

45 min

Dutch Desserts

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Kaassoufflé

Despite the French-sounding name, a Dutch kaassoufflé has nothing to do with a baked soufflé. It is a snack-bar classic, fried in the frituur of every cafetaria from Groningen to Maastricht: a rectangle of thin pastry wrapped around a slab of young Gouda, coated in breadcrumbs and deep-fried until the cheese inside goes molten. It is the vegetarian's answer to the kroket, eaten at lunch or on the way home from football, with a squeeze of mayonnaise or sweet chilli sauce. Chef's tip: chill the filled, breaded pockets for at least 30 minutes before frying; cold pastry and cheese stay sealed in the hot oil, while warm ones burst and leak.

40 min

Dutch Snacks & Starters

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Mhadjeb

Mhadjeb (also mahjouba) are the folded flatbreads of Constantine and the east of Algeria, sold on street corners at teatime and made in every home during Ramadan. A stretchy semolina dough is pulled paper-thin with oiled hands, filled with a jammy stew of onion, tomato and pepper, folded into a square and cooked on a dry griddle until spotted brown. Chef's tip: knead the dough for the full 15 minutes; it must stretch almost transparent without tearing.

110 min

Algerian Breads & Parathas

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Appeltaart

Dutch appeltaart is a tall, generous pie baked in a springform tin, piled so high with apple chunks that a slice stands almost as tall as it is wide. A buttery, cake-like crust holds apples with cinnamon, lemon and raisins, and the top is woven into a lattice. It is what Dutch cafés serve with coffee, and what people bake for a birthday, always with a spoon of slagroom (lightly whipped cream). Amsterdam's Winkel 43 made it famous with tourists. Chef's tip: use firm, tart apples such as Goudreinet, Elstar or Bramley mixed with Jonagold; soft dessert apples collapse into purée and leave a gap under the lattice.

115 min

Dutch Baking

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Hagelslag toast

Ask anyone who grew up in the Netherlands what they ate before school and the answer is usually a boterham met hagelslag: a slice of soft bread, well buttered, and covered edge to edge in chocolate sprinkles. It is not a treat for special days but an ordinary Dutch breakfast and lunchbox filler, and the country gets through millions of kilos of hagelslag every year. There are milk and dark chocolate versions, plus vruchtenhagel (fruity pastel sprinkles) and anijshagel (aniseed sprinkles). Chef's tip: the butter is the glue, so spread it right to the crusts and press the sprinkles down gently with the flat of a knife before you lift the slice.

5 min

Dutch Breakfast & Brunch

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Stroopwafels

Stroopwafels come from Gouda, the cheese town in South Holland, where bakers once made them from leftover crumbs and syrup. Today they are made fresh at Dutch markets, split while still hot and glued back together with warm caramel syrup. The Dutch way to eat one is to rest it on top of a cup of hot coffee or tea for a minute, so the steam softens the caramel. You need a thin waffle iron (a pizzelle or stroopwafel iron) to make them at home. Chef's tip: cut each waffle open the moment it comes off the iron; after 20 seconds it stiffens and shatters instead of splitting.

80 min

Dutch Baking

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Makrout el louz

Makrout el louz are the elegant almond sweets of Algiers and Constantine, piled on silver trays for weddings, Eid and engagement visits. Unlike fried, date-filled makroudh, they are baked: a paste of ground almonds, sugar, egg and lemon zest is cut into diamonds, baked pale, then dipped in a light syrup and rolled in icing sugar so they look frosted. Chef's tip: bake them only until firm and barely coloured underneath; brown edges harden and stop the syrup soaking in.

45 min

Algerian Baking

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Pannenkoeken

Dutch pannenkoeken are a meal, not a dessert: plate-sized, thicker than a French crêpe, and eaten for dinner with whatever has been baked straight into the batter. A pannenkoekenhuis in Amsterdam or by the dunes in Zeeland will offer dozens of fillings, but at home the favourites are apple (appel), young Gouda (kaas), or the two together, all finished with a thread of dark syrup (stroop). Kids eat them rolled up by hand. Chef's tip: lay the apple slices or cheese in the pan first and pour the batter over them, not the other way round; the fruit caramelises against the hot pan and the cheese becomes a crisp golden lace.

50 min

Dutch Breakfast & Brunch

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Speculaas

In the weeks before 5 December, Sinterklaas evening (pakjesavond), Dutch kitchens and bakeries fill with the smell of speculaas: thin, crisp, dark-brown biscuits heavy with cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, ginger, cardamom and a little white pepper. Traditionally they are pressed into carved wooden moulds shaped like windmills or Saint Nicholas himself; at home most people roll and cut them, scatter almonds on top and bake them crisp. Make your own spice mix (speculaaskruiden) once and you'll never buy it again. Chef's tip: let the dough rest overnight in the fridge; the spices bloom into the butter and the flavour is twice as deep the next day.

35 min

Dutch Baking

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Boerenkoolstamppot

When the first frost hits the Dutch polders, farmers say the kale (boerenkool) finally turns sweet, and that is the signal for boerenkoolstamppot: floury potatoes mashed with finely shredded raw kale until the green is just wilted by the heat of the mash. Across the Netherlands it is the dinner of dark December evenings and the meal people want after skating on a frozen canal. Every plate gets a kuiltje, a little well pressed into the mash and filled with gravy. The classic partner is a smoked rookworst sausage; this vegetarian version keeps the smoky note with pan-fried smoked tofu and a slow-cooked onion gravy, and a spoon of mustard on the side. Chef's tip: shred the kale as fine as you can and stir it in raw at the very end, so it stays bright green with a little bite instead of turning grey and soggy.

55 min

Dutch Vegetarian

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Hutspot

Every year on 3 October the city of Leiden celebrates Leidens Ontzet, the end of the Spanish siege of 1574, and the whole town eats hutspot. The story goes that a hungry boy found a pot of stewed root vegetables left behind in the abandoned Spanish camp. Today it is a rough, orange mash of winter carrots, onions and potatoes boiled together in one pot, then stamped coarsely with butter. In the rest of the Netherlands it turns up all autumn and winter as a weekday supper. It is traditionally served with slow-braised beef (klapstuk); here it goes with a fried egg or a spoon of piccalilli, which suits it just as well. Chef's tip: layer the vegetables with the potatoes on top and the carrots at the bottom, in just enough water to reach the potatoes; the potatoes steam, the carrots soak up the flavour of the onions, and nothing turns watery.

45 min

Dutch Vegetarian

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Vegetarian erwtensoep

Erwtensoep, or snert, is the soup that Dutch skaters drink from paper cups at the koek-en-zopie stalls on frozen lakes, and that families leave to simmer on a Saturday in January. A proper snert is so thick that a spoon should stand upright in the pan, and it tastes better on the second day. The traditional pot is full of pork and smoked sausage; this version gets its depth from celeriac, leek, a little smoked paprika and a long, slow simmer. Serve it with dark rye bread (roggebrood), butter and mustard. Chef's tip: stir the bottom of the pan every 10 minutes in the last half hour; split peas settle as they thicken and catch easily, and a scorched taste spreads through the whole pot.

140 min

Dutch Soups

by KrazyBadal 0 views

Mbejú

Mbejú (say 'mbeh-JOO') is a Guaraní breakfast and merienda: cassava starch rubbed with butter, cheese and a little milk into damp crumbs, then pressed into a hot pan where it fuses into a thick, chewy, crisp-edged cake. It's eaten in the countryside with cocido (sweet toasted yerba tea with milk) on cool mornings, cut into wedges. It's naturally gluten free and very quick. Chef's tip: the mix should look like damp sand, not a dough; if you can squeeze a handful and it just holds, it's right.

25 min

Paraguayan Breakfast & Brunch

by KrazyBadal 0 views

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