The Belgian National Dish: WATERZOIE!

Image by roboppy via Flickr

There are 10 million people in Belgium and probably as many ways to make Waterzoie, the national dish! You can make it with chicken or fish or seafood, but in all cases it will have leeks as its characteristic feature. It really is a leek soup with either chicken or fish floating in it.

Sounds bad? Think again! It really is very, very tasty and remarkably easy to do if you follow my recipe - it can be quite a lot of work if you start from scratch and actually make a broth with bones and vegetables to cook your meat or fish in. We're in the 21st century and I'm not ashamed to confess that I use industrial bouillon cubes...

Another advantage of Waterzoie is that it can be prepared in advance: the perfect dish when you have guests!

So here's the recipe for 4 persons.

Ingredients

2 cups of leeks cut in julienne strips (at least 4 leeks and try to use the white part and not too much of the green)
1/2 cup white onion, likewise cut in strips
1/2 cup celery, also cut in strips
1 whole breast chicken, leave it whole or cut in two halves,   Alternative: fish or seafood 
1 or 2 bouillon cubes (chicken broth for chicken of course, and fish broth for fish, natch!
1 cup cream (since I live in Italy I use Mascarpone, but normal cream is fine and is what's used in Belgium)
1 egg yolk
Juice of 1/2 lemon (or more as needed - it has to have a sharp "tang")
Butter: one tablespoon
Flour to thicken the sauce (about one tablespoonful of flour plus one of cornflour - maizena - but you will need to adjust to the quantity of broth you have)

Boiled potatoes to accompany

Method

Boil the potatoes and while they're boiling prepare the waterzoie.

1. Cut all the vegetables, leeks, onion and celery,  in thin strips - julienne - about 1/2 inch long. Put in a wide pot, cover with water, add bouillon cube and a small amount (a tablespoonful) of butter.

2. Simmer, covered, for about 10 minutes taking care the vegetables don't burn - add water if need be.

3. After that time and as the vegetables start looking limp, add over them the chicken breasts and sprinkle a little salt over the meat. Cover and continue to simmer another 20 minutes until cooked. At that point the vegetables should be soft and the chicken cooked throughout and tender.

3a. If you use fish then you have to add it after the vegetables have cooked at least 20 minutes: the fish always cooks fast. How long that will take depends on the kind of fish you have chosen: for example, sea bass filets in my view don't need more than 5 minutes. Same with shrimps. More time is needed for lobster. Everytime, adjust the cooking of your vegetables that will always require 30 minutes to reach the right point of mellowness.

4. Now in a saucepan prepare the basis of your sauce: beat in a tablespoonful of flour and one of cornflour in 2 cups cold water and set on the fire to boil. This is how I make a "roux": I don't start by melting butter and working the flour in it. That's not needed! You can always add the butter - fresh, better for your health - at the end, when the sauce is done! Remember to beat it with a whisk so that the flour mixes well in the water and keep beating when it boils. It should boil at least 5 minutes to ensure the flour is cooked.

5. Pull out the chicken (or fish) from the pot where cooked and set aside on a warm serving dish (cover to keep the meat warm) You will serve the potatoes peeled in the same serving dish.

6. Do the sauce: pour the "roux" mixture from your saucepan (that you did in step 4) into the pot with the vegetables. Adjust the quantity of broth (I like it fairly liquid - but it's up to you, how thick a leek sauce you really want). Add chicken bouillon cube(s) or fish broth as needed so that it is rather strong tasting: it shouldn't be too bland because at this point you add the cream + egg yolk + lemon juice. Adjust with salt, pepper and lemon to taste. Once the yolk is in, be careful if you need to warm it up : you cannot boil the sauce anymore or it will turn stringy on you!

7. To serve: put the sauce (which will be very abundant!) in a soup toureen, and cut the chicken and potatoes for presentation on the serving dish.

This dish should be accompanied by full-bodied red wine if done with chicken - white wine if done with fish.

Enjoy!  You could be eating this in Brussels!

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A QUICK AND EASY DESSERT: Baked Strawberries and Bananas

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This is a no-brainer! Baked strawberries and bananas in a pretty pyrex dish: stick in the oven until the fruit is nice and soft and serve!

Ah, but there's a couple of tricks to make it really special. Here they are:

Ingredients
1 cup strawberries chopped in small pieces
2 to 3 bananas (one per person) peeled and sliced longitudinally
3 taplespoons of Mascarpone or very thick cream
1 tablespoon of White Martini wine (sweet)
juice from 1/2 lemon
Brown sugar to taste

Method

- Heat the oven to 200° or mark 6

- In a small saucepan melt the mascarpone, add the wine, strawberries, lemon juice and sugar.

- Set your banana slices in a pretty dish that goes in the oven and can be served as is at the table.

-Pour the mascarpone mix all over, making sure it also goes underneath the banana slice (if they break, don't worry, it doesn't matter)

- Put in overn about 15 minutes, until the fruit is done (the bananas must be soft)

Et voilà! Easy right? And you'll see how people LOVE it!

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Gratin Dauphinois (baked potatoes French-style) Made Easy

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There are lots of ways to make a gratin Dauphinois, that scrumptious French-style baked potatoes, all soft and mushy inside and with a nice golden crust on top...If you Google it, you'll find dozens of recipes. But after trying a few, here's the easiest way to do it, and also the best for your health: no cream, no full milk, just skim milk and next-to-no butter!

Here's how I do it.

Ingredients for 4


- 6 medium-sized potatoes, the baking kind (not the red-skinned variety that is good for frying; buy the brown/beige colored ones)
- skim milk to cover your sliced potatoes (about 1/2 litre)
- 5 to 6 tablespoons of grated Parmigiano cheese (you can use a mix of Parmigiano and Emmenthal)
- garlic
- a little butter (a teaspoon does it!)
- salt and pepper to taste

Method

1. Preheat oven at 200° or mark 6 (or whatever you use to properly roast a chicken)
2. Peel and slice the potatoes THINLY (use a mechanical cutter if you have one!). Do NOT wash but throw them directly into a bowl and cover with milk
3. Mix in the grated cheese, salt and pepper
4. Rub a pyrex dish (any baking dish that goes into the oven) with a peeled piece of garlic, then rub in butter
5. Pour your potatoes together with the milk into the baking dish
6. Sprinkle more grated cheese on top (at least 2 table spoons) and dot with (a little!) butter 
7. Put in your hot oven

Et voilà! That's all it takes, super easy! The dish is ready when the potatoes are soft through and through (check with a toothpick, it should sink in easily) and the top has turned into a golden crust!

This accompanies well any meat dish...

Of the Importance of Parsley in Sauces and Soups

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One person in my family, very dear to me, hates parsley - this post therefore is not for him!

Unless you're absolutely allergic to the idea of using parsley, here are some suggestions for parsley-based sauces and soups.


One of the most famous one is the Italian Salsa Verde or Green Sauce, a superb parsley-based sauce that accompanies perfectly boiled meat or fish - and there are of course French and German versions as well. Then in Lebanese cuisine, parsley is, as everybody knows, an essential ingredient in Tabbouleh or bulgur salad (along with mint, of course).

You can find these recipes all over the place on Internet or in a library.

But what I want to do here is to tell you about an interesting MEDIEVAL GREEN SAUCE of my own. Another example of serendipity in cooking!

I found my inspiration in French cookbooks on medieval cooking, and if you look at the originals you'd be amazed how our ancestors had neat ways of making sauces for their meat and fish. And naturally, parsley entered in nearly all of them. Unfortunately other ingredients did too and they're hard to find in modern markets. So I ended up with a parsley-based sauce that I use on all sorts of meat and fish. Most recently, I poured it over cold, thin slices of roast turkey (cooked the day before) and served it at room temperature, with extra sauce in a gravy boat. It was a real success with my friends! Of course, the same meat could have been served hot, with the sauce warmed just so, taking care NOT to boil it or it loses all its flavour!

Ingredients:
- 2 thick slices of bread, white or whole meal is fine but the bread should be tasty!
- 1 small glass of dry white wine (alternatively: a tablespoon of white vinegar but it's less refined); you can add a tablespoon of Porto or Madeira if
- 1/2 cup of consommé or meat broth (if you make the sauce to accompany meat; use fish broth to accompany fish). You can use Knorr-type cubes or powder, but make sure you put enough in: you shouldn't need to use salt in this recipe.
- A VERY large bunch of parsley: the more, the better
- one spoonful olive oil
- Pepper to taste (I always put it in abundantly - it exalts flavours)

Method:

It's really simple, no cooking required.

Soak the bread in water and squeeze it dry. Put all the ingredients in a blender and chop up fine and voilà, it's done!

Soups all gain by having a sprinkling of parsley on them, but then, for real parsley lovers, there's... the GREEN SOUP!
Yummy!!
It's just loaded with parsley - literally, two handfuls! Btw, it's not medieval, and it is inspired by the Belgian chervil soup. Since I live in Rome and there's no chervil (cerfeuil in French) here, I use Italian parsley. You know what I mean: the flat kind.

Ingredients for 4 persons
1 big potato
1 small carrot
2 celery branches (be careful to remove the strings!)
1 big white onion
1 leek (white part only)
Bouillon cube to taste
Fresh parsley: at least 2 handfuls (remove most of the thick stems, try only using the leaves)

Method
Peel and cube the vegetables. Throw them in pot, cover with water, add bouillon cube and bring to boil with the lid on - then simmer covered, until the vegetables are soft and ready to be puréed in your mixer, or whatever you use to purée your stuff.

As you finish puréing (and make sure it's turned creamy on you) add the parsley and give it another swirl until the parsley is finely chopped and your soup, originally white, has turned green.

Don't cook anymore: just warm up and serve, so that the fresh taste of parsley is preserved!

Post-scriptum: The illustration I used is chervil...not parsley! Sorry if I played a trick on you, but it's such a pretty illustration, don't you think?



 

Pear and Figs Compote: an unusual mix of fresh and dried fruit!

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How about an unusual combination of cooked fruits? Pears (fresh, peeled and quartered) complement wonderfully figs (the simple, sun-dried variety), with an appetizing bittersweet result. Cooked in wine, the figs become big and soft, and are beautifully set off by the pears.

 How to do it? Super simple:

Ingredients for 4 people:
3 to 4 pears, peeled and quartered
A dozen sun-dried figs or more - snip off the tail, it's too hard to cook, but leave them whole
One small glass of Sweet Martini White Wine (or any sweet wine will do)
1 to 2 tablespoons of Brown Sugar (the quantity depends on how sweet your pears are)

Method
Put everything in a pot and cover. Cook on a low fire until the pears are soft but haven't come undone (about 10 minutes)

Enjoy! It's best lukewarm...

Btw, pears are a wonderful addition in the kitchen, often making for unusual tastes. Check out the recipe below and you'll see what I mean:

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• Recipes: Pear, Persimmon and Hazelnut Salad (nytimes.com)

Penne Treviso-style plus a Belgian Variation

This is a typical (and very easy) recipe from Treviso sent to me by a Facebook friend who lives in that town, in the north of Italy. Treviso is the cradle of "radicchio", a slightly bitter vegetable  that, in spite of its red colour, is very close in taste to the Belgian endive. Which is why I'm going to give you both versions: the original Treviso one and my (Belgian) variation on it. But there are lots of other ways to use radicchio, and here is a useful link to give you some ideas:
radicchio.net/ricette

Ingredients 
- Pasta, any "hard" kind (meaning done without eggs), like spaghetti or  penne, about 80g/person  (if the commercial dried variety) or 100g if you use home-made fresh pasta; the rest of the ingredients are given for 4 persons:
- 50 g bacon (not the smoked variety - really lard) cut in very thin slices;
- 100 g of radicchio di Treviso, also cut in thin slices;
- garlic (optional)
- olive oil, a small table spoon
- ground pepper as desired

Method
In a pan, fry the garlic (a small piece if you use it) in a little olive oil and once it has browned, throw it away. Continue with the same pan using this oil  to fry the bacon for about 2 minutes.  Then add the radicchio and cover with a lid, lowering the flame and cooking for about 10 minutes or so, until the vegetable has become tender.
It's done! Now you cook the pasta as usual, remembering to set aside a cup of the cooking water once you've strained the pasta - because you'll use some of that water, as needed, when you turn the pasta in your pan-fried vegetables and warm them up quickly before serving. At the last minute, add a little fresh olive oil in it and a sprinkle of grated Parmisan cheese. Serve with more grated cheese on the side.

Now for my Belgian variation:
- replace the radicchio with a couple of Belgian endives sliced thin

- the bacon can be replaced with smoked ham also cut in thin slices and dried in the pan without oil, so the slices become slightly crisp. Then proceed with cooking the endives, as before, on a slow fire with a lid. If it looks dry to you, add a little water so it won't burn.
- at the end, when you turn the pasta in the pan, add the cooking water as needed and a pat of fresh butter.

Serve with cheese as before.

Pork with Peaches, Honey and Red Wine

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Once again, this recipe has resulted from a peculiar form of serendipity: I open my fridge an hour before dinner and discover I'm missing a whole lot of things and have to make do with what happens to be in there (ok, I'll confess to a small sin: I'm often too lazy to go shopping!). On that particular day: pork, peaches and potatoes...

The peaches threatened to mature to the point of being quite inedible! So I had no choice but cook them and I used what I had - a few slices of pork cut in the fillet part, but pork scallops would be equally good for this recipe.

It's really very easy to do and the fruit goes superbly well with the pork! 

Ingredients for 4 persons
-  one pound/500 g of pork in slices (or more if you're very carnivorous), trimmed of fat and floured
-  3 or 4 peaches, peeled and in pieces
-  2 tablespoons honey
-  small glass of red wine
-  one teaspoon of Knorr or Maggi's powdered meat broth or one cube of same, or better still "fond de veau" (but as fas as I know that can only be found in France)
-  salt and pepper to taste


Method 
Start with the peach sauce. Peel the fruit and cut it in rough pieces. Put everything - the fruit, the meat cube or powder, honey and wine - in a lidded pot (better if teflon-lined) and cook on a slow fire  until soft. It takes about ten minutes. Be sure to cover your pot so it doesn't dry and add freshly ground pepper at the last minute.

Put a little salt over the pork slices then flour them, shaking off the excess. Pan-fry them (I use a teflon pan with a little olive oil) until golden. Set on a serving dish with boiled potatoes (you can also pan-fry them in oil to make them tastier and prettier) and pour the peach sauce over the meat.