Preuvenemint 2009: Eatting Our Way Through Maastricht

Right up there with Maastricht’s Carnival, Queens Day in Amsterdam, and a pottery-oogling trip to Delft, Preuvenemint in Maastricht is a “Must Do (at least) Once” event in the Netherlands. This year was our first time to visit so we brought Dan’s parents along to share the experience.

Getting In
Preuvenemint in Maastricht is a yearly culinary event that runs during the last full weekend of August, creating a cap to the end of the vacation and summer season here in the Netherlands. This year that weekend was from August 27th to the 30th. On the weekdays, the Preuvenemint opened at 6 pm for dinner and ran late until about 2 am. On the weekends, the event opened earlier for lunch as well.

Like many large outdoor events, this culinary extravaganza is located on the Vrijhof. They actually began setting up the tents and fences a few days earlier, effectively hiding the square behind metal and plasticized canvas. My in-laws found this to be a little confusing; they didn’t realize that the Vrijhof is usually a wide open square. Still, it is the sort of event you can’t miss. A large crowd of visitors and locals attend the event every year too.

Getting Food

The Preuvenemint using special tickets instead of cash to pay for your food. Special booths are available at each of the entrances where you can purchase them for 1,80 euros a piece or in a booklet of 10. The cost is somewhat expensive depending on what food you order, but worth it for the experience. We found that drinks (beer & soda) were usually 1 ticket a piece and plates generally ran from 4-10 tickets. Snack food such as waffles and sate was usually 2-3 tickets. Many places allowed you to sit down, so the best course of action is to order your food and then pay with the tickets when the food arrives.
 
Who’s There
The vendors serving food are mostly local resturants, cafes and hotels; with several Brand beer tents (the same ones that I’ve seen at nearly every event I’ve attended in the Netherlands). Everything from street vendors to CoffeeLovers (a chain cafe) to 5-star hotels were hawking their wares so there seemed to be a little some for everyone. The food varied, but we mostly saw Dutch, French, and Indonesian fare with a couple of Japanese restaurants as well. Of course the other side of this event is advertising for the restaurants. They will serve you the best food than can muster under the circumstances (outdoors & no on-site kitchen) because they want you to come back.
 
There was constant music from the stage set up in front of the gazebo as well. We didn’t specifically check out the music schedule, but during our visits there was a great variety: big band music, Spanish, and 80s tunes, and no doubt some Dutch music as well (but not while we were there).
 
Our Experience
As a group, we mostly went for seafood, starting with oysters and our first taste of Dutch style herring. Yes, tasty on all accounts. We also tried some pork sate (kinda eh) and two forms of mussels. I still prefer steamed to Maastricht-style mussels (in sort of a cream sauce). If you purchased a beer at one of the beer tents, you could carry it around with you, but beverages purchased at a sit down spot need to be consumed while sitting. While we were concerned about the cost of beverages, it wasn’t really an issue.
 
If you attend in a group for the first time, I recommend you do what we did, and share dishes as multiple stops. This way everyone can try something new without duplicating plates. Your tickets will go farther and you’ll get more variety. There were many very nice sitting areas as well, so if you’ve been to Preuvenemint a couple of times, it is probably very nice to relax at one or two locations with a beer or some wine and just take in the experience.
 
Bottom Line
The bottom line is that the Preuvenemint is a tasty, if pricey event. I won’t take every dinner there because of the cost, but it was a fun change to our usual experience and the chance to try some new foods. Go with an open mind and a taste for something different, and you won’t leave disappointed.

Gouda: Saving the Rind

In the long series, of “why didn’t I think of that”, I presents Dan’s idea for saving that last bit of Gouda.

The Netherlands is, of course, know for their Gouda cheese and it is available as widely here as American and Cheddar cheeses are available in the states. The older Gouda is, the harder and sharper the flavor gets. People even eat a type literally called “Oude Kaas” or Old Cheese, which can rival extra sharp Cheddar in strength (I like it, Dan doesn’t). I find it to be vastly preferable to American cheese, but still mild enough to make a good sandwich.

I like to buy my Gouda as a wedge with waxy skin attached (2,50 or so at Aldi), but once you get down to the rind the cheese gets harder and more difficult to slice. Instead of tossing out this last bit of cheese, try grating it for use on pasta and in chicken quesadillas (a Potter favorite).

Just 3 easy step…
1) Tug off the waxy cover. This is generally pretty thin and can be a little tricky to remove, but you probably don’t want to eat it.
2) Grate the remaining cheese. Once the cover is off, everything else is edible.
3) Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator. I don’t know how long it’ll last, so I’d recommend eating it fairly quickly. If you let it mold, but use your green compost bin to toss it out.

Enjoy your Gouda!

Cooking with Speklap

One of the great things about living abroad is checking out the new foods. Many things are familiar, but every once in a while you encounter something new that tastes great, even if it isn’t good for you. Since I’ve been doing all the cooking lately, I get to pick out the new foods to try.

Speklap (or Bacon Flaps or Streaky Bacon) is one of those foods. Basically strips of long and thick bacon, Speklap is available marinated or plain at nearly any grocery store (and probably the butchers’ as well). It is a fairly inexpensive cut of meat and, since it a fatty cut, four slices can be made to stretch over a couple of meals when combined with a starch and veggie. It is also sold chopped up for those sorts of dishes.

Cooking Suggestions
When it comes to dinner, I like to keep it simple. I recommend buying the Speklap pre-marinated (the orange marinate is good and a bit spicy) and pan frying it on medium heat until the pink is gone. Then I serve it with rice and a vegetable. The “a la minute” Speklap cooks very fast, but even packages that don’t indicate that cook pretty quickly.

Leftovers can be chopped up for breakfast the next day or for American omelets. Its also good with potatoes, but really nearly everything is.

We haven’t tried it yet, but speklappen appears to be popular for BBQ. Since it cooks up quickly and takes marinades well, I can see why.

Real Recipes
Of course others have much more experience with speklappen then me. Here are a few recipes that I hope to try in the future.

Beans with Apples and Pork: A traditional Dutch dish according to GoDutch.com.
Speklappen with a Crispy Herb Crust (Dutch only)
Grill Speklappen Sate: (Dutch only) Dan & I are suckers for the peanuty flavor of sate sauce.

Do you have a favorite recipe or ideas for a good one? Share it in the comments.

Handy Cooking Conversion Websites

I love baking and brought American measuring cups & spoons along with a couple of cookbooks when we moved to Maastricht. Even so, I frequently need to make conversions from Fahrenheit to Celsius and from cups to grams. The follow sites are indispensable to me when baking.

Albireo.ch Temperature Converter: This simple site converts both ways between Fahrenheit and Celsius and allows you to chose whether to round the number or not.

Gourmet Sleuth Gram Converter: Grams are trickier. Most Dutch recipes and packaging use grams to indicate the amounts you need, but the number of grams is determined by weight rather than volume (like cups). This Gourmet Sleuth tool is useful because it provides the estimated grams per cup of several common foods. I rarely use the actual tool, but I’m always referencing the chart below and using my kitchen scale.

The kitchen scale is a new tool in my kitchen, but it is great to have. If you are looking for one in Maastricht, Media Markt has a nice selection of scales at a variety of price points.

Next Entries »