Oke I'll admit it. I really love food and everything that is involved with it. I like to make stuff, experiment with stuff, and like it when others experiment with food and flavours as well. In other words, I'm open to taste and try. Also with learning so many new skills in cooking for myself over the last years, it feels it gets harder to be impressed here by food by others.
But what I am noticing over the last years here in the Netherlands, is that heading out for food externally has turned into out of proportion expensive. Well, when you look at how the price of groceries has gone up, and also with inflation in other forms...This is not something strange
But I can tell you that my salary hasn't doubled in the last years, but the price of everything else has
Dorade fish ceviche with a jell-o impression of bloody mary tomato (England)
So in the combination of these two things, I feel less of an urge to head out for dinner. But you can always wake me up for some form of a tasting menu together with some friends. Yummie!!
Let us be surprised!
El puente
Heading out to one of the favorite hotspots in the city of Eindhoven called El Puente, you just know you never get disappointed. They use an around the globe theme for their cooking in tasting menus.
As in...every dish has a concept coming from a country but they had made it into their own transforming it into something new.
Duck with pink pepper and a hint of cranberry (China)
What I always find so cool in these sorts of menus is that all of these flavours are so well balanced. There is just a little bit of everything in there that with every bite you find something new to explore.
I need to integrate that in my cooking as well, but hey....that is challenging and you need a crapload of solo elements in there then
Oladipancake with beetrootsauce dill and vegan caviar (Russia)
See this was an interesting one there. Pimping the rather bland pancake with some Russian salade, beetrootsauce and then faking a caviar by taking little seaweed balls in there, which actually fit the setting perfectly.
Who comes up with this stuff, I love it!
Since it was winter....there were winterdishes
What I do like, is that all of these places are cooking quite seasonal. As in...no salad in winter time, but using more and more what is suitable for that time of the year.
It felt we full blown went into the winter dishes here
Brisket stewed meat with mokka and passion fruit (Turkey)
Say whut what a combination. Already I knew that stew meat together with coffee or dark chocolate is a winner (also in terms of wine) but mixing it up with a sauce of passionfruit and mint which has the freshness and the sourness to give some contra flavour, is just awesome.
Or what about this dish of local deer with some mashed potato. Yeah, it has some hints of the previous dishes and is not something entirely different.
Deer with cherry sauce and red cabbage (Netherlands)
But is that even bad??
After all...it is winter and these kinds of dishes feel like winter.
Desserts are my favorite
Since I have zero skills in making deserts myself, I always love having deserts made by people who actually know what they are doing. And you can be so creative in deserts as that ou add in so many textures and complimentary hints of stuff.
And..it always just looks stunning!!
Maplesyrup icecream and gingerbread cream with wallnut and bloodorange (Canada)
If there is a choice between cheese and something sweet, I would totally go for the sweet one as that is always such a treat!
That is just what I love these tasting menus. They give you all kinds of good ideas on what kind of ingredients are friends and benefit each other.
Even though I don't head out for food that much anymore, these kinds of setting are so cool as they bring so much inspiration and new kinds of ideas to make stuff with. And especially if there is stuff to celebrate, why not get some people together and celebrate over some nice food!
