AiMS: Americans in Maastricht Society Inaugual Meeting (and cookies)

I baked my first batch of chocolate chip cookies since moving to Maastricht this week, but it wasn’t just for Dan’s sake. We attended the first ever meeting for a new expat group in Maastricht on Tuesday (which also happened to be Liberation Day here in the Netherlands). It was a lot of fun to socialize with a small group of people. Plus its a great opportunity for expats to share information about resources and generally just help each other out. AiMS is on Facebook if you are an American expat and interested in checking us out.

The cookies themselves turned out very good despite a lack of vanilla extract, baking soda, and chocolate chips. It turns out I can buy those thing at the Asian grocery stores (except the chips; I have to make them myself), so I expect the next batch to be even better.

3 Responses to “AiMS: Americans in Maastricht Society Inaugual Meeting (and cookies)”

1. Miss Footloose says:

   May 13, 2009 at 4:08 pm

   Hello Locusta,

   About your cookies Baking soda is zuiveringszout in Dutch. And for vanilla the Dutch use little packets of
   vanillesuiker (vanilla sugar) which is sugar flavored with I think vanillin, immitation vanilla — yuk.

   Having said that — I hail from Holland (pc the Netherlands) and am married to an American. On all my expat travels, I bring with me American liquid vanilla and double acting baking powder because I use a lot of American recipes now. American double acting baking powder is different than European baking powder and I have never figured out how to convert one to the other.

   Chocolate chips are available in some stores. Try Albert Heijn if you have one in your neighborhood — you must have!

   Reply
2. katy says:

   May 15, 2009 at 12:45 pm

   I remember making my first batch of Chocolate Chip Cookies over seas (we’re in Lux) I wasn’t particularly craving them, but I just wanted to do it to see that I could. Hardest to find item: brown sugar.

   Reply
3. locusta says:

   May 15, 2009 at 12:49 pm

   Thank you both for the advise. I agree the brown sugar here seems to be a bit different, but not impossibly so. The grains seem to be larger.

   I think in the future I’m just going to make my own vanilla extract and skip the middle man as it were.

   Reply