Keukenhof

If you ever have the opportunity to come visit me The Netherlands in the spring, I highly suggest you do so! Why spring, you ask? One word:

KEUKENHOF!

The Keukenhof is the world's largest bulb flower garden consisting of more than 7 million bulb flowers. More than half of those, 4.5 million, are tulips in over 100 different varieties.

These photos are from my visit a couple of years ago. I've never seen so many tulips in my life. I highly suggest stopping by. The park is open until May 18 this year.

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I'm participating in Mrs. Matlock's Alphabe-Thursday! Click the link below to see what other keen things people have posted about.

Technical Difficulties

The host I used for some of my banners on my new blog design has kindly decided to remove the images for no reason whatsoever so there are some large gaps. I'm working on it, but gimme a few days til things look nice and pretty again.

Avocado Chicken Salad

When you click on this weeks FNCCC chef and then select "low-calorie" or "low-fat" only 10 of over 1200 recipes pop up. Can you guess who it is? Paula Deen! I made her Banana Pudding last fall, so I decided to do a more savory dish this time. I made some alterations, so watch for my notes in italics.

Avocado Chicken Salad
Courtesy Paula Deen

Ingredients
Salad:
3 cups cooked, diced chicken
3 cups cooked white rice
2 avocados, peeled, diced, and tossed with 1 tablespoon lemon juice
3/4 cup chopped onion (I used one very small onion)
1 cup mayonnaise (Since the dressing below also includes 1 cup of mayo, I completely left this out)
1 to 2 teaspoons pepper (I went for a few grinds of freshly ground)
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley leaves
Thick, crusty bread, multi-grain or sourdough, for serving
Lemon wedges, for garnish (I'm just not that fancy so I didn't garnish mine with lemons!)

Avocado Dressing:

1 large avocado, peeled and mashed with 2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 cup mayonnaise (I used yogurt mayo and probably only did about 3/4 cup)
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1/3 cup chopped onion
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon salt
Dash cayenne pepper

Directions

Dressing:

Place all ingredients in a food processor and blend until smooth. Chill and serve alongside chicken salad. (I mixed this in with the salad itself instead of serving on the side)

Salad:
Mix all ingredients and chill. Pass with avocado dressing (again, I mixed the dressing into the salad because I ditched the mayo in the first group of ingredients). Serve on the crusty bread.

THE VERDICT: We both liked this. It's a bit different but not too bad! I think I'll use a bit of vinegar in the dressing next time because it was a little sweeter than I expected. I think that if I'd used regular mayo that wouldn't have been an issue though, so keep that in mind. It also could've been due to the fact that I forgot to salt the dressing and was just salting the salad afterwards.

Layered Jello Fruit Salad

If you ask me what my favorite food is, I will tell you JELLO! There is just something about it's jiggly goodness. I amass a stockpile every time I go home since I can't get a sugar free version here. If you feel like donating some to the cause, I'll give you my address! Just kidding... sortof.

Layered Jello Salad

1 pkg Orange Jello
1 pkg Mixed Fruit Jello
2 cups vanilla yogurt (approx 1/2 a liter)
1 packet unflavored gelatin
500 grams strawberries
2 bananas
1 small can pineapple tidbits

Prepare the orange Jello according to the package directions, but use 1 3/4 cup water instead of two cups. This will make for a slightly firmer set. Pour into the bottom of your nice clear bowl and refrigerate for an hour or so. Carefully mix in the pineapple tidbits and let set until completely firm (2-3 hours).

Mix the unflavored gelatin in with the yogurt (follow the packet instructions for dissolving it first). You can skip this step, but it just makes it firm up better and if you're traveling with it it won't completely fall apart! Next, pour about a cup of the vanilla yogurt on top of the Jello. Slice the banana into coins and layer on top of the yogurt. Then pour the rest of the yogurt on top of the bananas and put it back in the fridge until the yogurt is set.

For the final layer, prepare the Jello as you did in the first step, using 1 3/4 cup water. Set aside and let cool (not in the fridge) while you hull and slice your strawberries. You will want your Jello cool, but not so cool it starts to gel. Layer the strawberries on top of the yogurt. Then spoon the Jello over the top of your berries. This is a little tricky because if you pour in too much it will ruin your yogurt layer (if you use the gelatin in the yogurt this won't be such an issue), so go slowly. Cover and refrigerate overnight before serving.

You can use whatever fruits and Jello flavor combinations you want. I think it would be fun to do a blue layer for a red white and blue salad.

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I'm participating in Mrs. Matlock's Alphabe-Thursday! Click the link below to see what other jolly jubilant joyful things people have posted about.

BBQ Nachos

I made Neelys' Barbeque Nachos for the Food Network Chef's Cooking Challenge this week. This really sounded like a strange recipe, but I was really curious so I went for it!

Neelys' Barbeque Nachos
Recipe courtesy The Neelys

Ingredients

1 bag tortilla chips
1/2 cup Neelys Barbecue Seasoning, recipe follows (check the notes on the following recipe)
6 ounces chopped pork, beef or chicken (I used ground beef because it's what I had)
4 ounces Neelys Barbecue Sauce, recipe follows
4 ounces nacho cheese, melted (I made my own)
1 (4-ounce) can sliced jalapeños, drained (optional- if your cheese is hot enough you probably don't need these)

Directions

Mound tortilla chips in a pile on a platter. Sprinkle with Neelys Seasoning. Spread chopped pork, beef or chicken on top of chips. Sprinkle with seasoning again and pour the Neelys Barbeque Sauce onto meat. Top with the melted nacho cheese.

Lightly sprinkle more Neely's Barbeque Seasoning onto cheese. Top with jalapeños for additional spice.

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Neelys Barbeque Seasoning:

3/4 cup white sugar
1 1/2 cups paprika
3 3/4 tablespoons onion powder

Mix all ingredients together and store in a tightly sealed container.

I divided this entire recipe by a factor of 6 and that really was enough to sprinkle and have a bit leftover at the end.

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Neelys Barbeque Sauce:
2 cups ketchup
1 cup water
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
5 tablespoons light brown sugar
5 tablespoons sugar
1/2 tablespoon fresh ground black pepper
1/2 tablespoon onion powder
1/2 tablespoon ground mustard
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

In a large saucepan, combine all ingredients and mix well. Bring mixture to a boil, reduce heat to simmer. Cooked uncovered, stirring frequently every 15 minutes, for 1 hour and 15 minutes.

Yield: 3 1/2 cups

I halved the sauce recipe and it was enough for about 3 servings. I also substituted appropriate amounts of Splenda in place of the sugars. This is a very sweet BBQ sauce.

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The Verdict: These were surprisingly good! The sweetness of the BBQ sauce with the spice of the cheese actually worked out very well. I imagine you could cut back a tad on the sweetness of the BBQ sauce, but not too much! We both said this would be a good "treat" food because if you ate it too often you'd get awfully sick of it fast, but every now and then it will be great.

Hop on over to I Blame Thank My Mother for more FNCCC!

Menu Plan Monday- March 22, 2010

Last week was rather successful and reminded me that I feel way less stressed out when I have some idea of what dinner will entail.

I skipped on the Sauerkraut Tarts because we didn't have leftovers of what I expected we would. I've saved it to try again down the line.

I made some slight changes to the Bierock Casserole. I made them in individual triangle casserole dishes, precooked the bottom "crust," and seasoned the hamburger with some garlic and onion powder. I thought they were fab and Martijn loved them too. We're considering doing some sort of study to see if things just taste better in triangles, but I do think the recipe had something to do with it too.

The ham was nice but it didn't really caramelize like the recipe indicated. I'll probably try it again with less orange juice.

This week:

BBQ Nachos- This is my FNCCC recipe for this week. Watch for the recipe on Wednesday!

Cauliflower Cheese Pot Pies- I got two giant heads of cauliflower for cheap this weekend and this looked tasty.

Spicy Veg Fajitas- Again I can use my cauliflower, plus some of my giant stash of chickpeas.

Beefy Noodles- Maggi Mix thingie

Shoarma in Pitas- Back-up pantry/freezer meal incase something goes awry!

Inburgering

Inburgering translates to integration in English.

When you move to The Netherlands (unless you are EU) you are required to integrate yourself into the country by learning the language and how things work. I don't think it is an entirely unreasonable requirement, but it has it's own set of problems (which I won't go into here).

When you move to The Netherlands, you are required to go through some sort of inburgering. Some municipalities will pay for it and help you arrange your courses, while others will just pat you on the head and say "good luck." Unfortunately I fell into the second group of lucky immigrants. If we'd had a little more guidance I probably would've chosen to do things a little bit differently, but as the Dutch say- helaas (alas in English). You can also opt to self study, but I'm not convinced learning a language via self study is always productive.

Luckily (or unluckily depending on how you look at it), you can apply for a student loan to help with the costs. If you are self paying (or using the loan) then you are entitled to a 70% reimbursment of your course fees (up to a certain amount) as long as you go to an "approved" school. I had the choice of two different language schools to choose from. We ended up going with the more expensive one because they actually returned our phonecalls and requests for information. The only information we could pull out of the other school was the fact that I would "need to have some classes and need to do some tests." Well, okay... WHAT classes? WHAT tests? You would've thought we were asking them for state secrets or the location of buried treasure the way they held onto information!

Anyhow...

The school I went to split things into two. First you would do an intensive Dutch course two times a week for about 16 weeks. After that you would be thrown into the pits of hell start the actual "Knowledge of Dutch Society" part. The language course was absolutely wonderful and I actually feel like I learned a lot. The second part I still see as seven months of my life that I will never get back. My tormentor instructor had a grating personality that I (and apparently everyone else in my class) didn't get along with. That paired with a textbook that I thought came across as somewhat condescending in places made it really difficult for me to get through. I'll admit that part of it was attitude, but I did go into it kindof excited. As the weeks wore on my attitude got worse, but I did make an effort to begin with! If I'd known how awful it was going to be I would've opted to a different route. But again, helaas!

The "do some tests" part of the inburgering is pretty straight forward. There are four different tests you need to do. A test you do over the telephone so they can hear you speak, two tests on the computer, and a real life practical exam.

The practical exam (which I feel like I have been working on for the last 90 years) has you out and about in the world doing "Dutch" things and living to tell the tale. You must put together a portfolio of your bewijzen (proofs). I'm actually doing my volunteer work for my portfolio, though I think it's a nice thing to do anyways. Some other things include knowing how to read your electric meter, paying a bill (banking system here is totally different, but AWESOME), going to the city and registering yourself as a resident and so on and so forth. A MIRACLE fell into my lap a few weeks ago because they changed it from needing 30 proofs to just 20.

It is with great delight and joy that I announce that I'm 97%* DONE with my Inburgering! I've passed the telephone test and the two computer tests and I will be submitting my portfolio for the practical exam this weekend. Once it's accepted as being good and complete, they call me in for a test where I talk to them about some of the things I did and what I felt about doing it. I have a few interesting things to say about that, but right now I'm just going to bask in the happiness that I'm so so so close to being done!

Next step- citizenship!

*Approximately... I don't actually have an exact percentage, but I thought 97% sounds pretty close to done. I feel pretty close to done, thus the 97%. I know, I'm weird.

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I'm participating in Mrs. Matlock's Alphabe-Thursday! Click the link below to see what other iteresting things people have posted about.