Shredded Chicken Quesadillas

Quesadillas are just another of the seemingly endless variations of dishes that can be made using tortillas (either flour or corn varieties). Although authentic Mexican quesadillas are usually made from corn tortillas, in the Tex-Mex variation and also in Northern Mexico, flour tortillas are much more common.

The concept is very simple - place the ingredients of your choice in one half of a tortilla and heat in a frying pan or on a comal - a Mexican cast-iron griddle pan. Then fold over and cut into wedges and eat! In Tex-Mex cuisine, 2 tortillas are often used instead of 1. In Mexico this would be called a sincronizada (synchronised) rather than a quesadilla. Confused?!?!

Macaroni Schotel - Macaroni Dutch style

This is a typically Dutch hybrid dish; and as with many Dutch classics, it combines the basic structure of international dishes with traditional Dutch ingredients. The Dutch are very adept at taking international favourites and giving them a quintessential Hollands twist. Often the flavours are mellowed for the blander Dutch palate, and it can sometimes be the case that little of the taste of the original dish is noticeable in the finished result. But sometimes, as with this macaroni dish, the combination of ingredients work so well together and bring something totally different. And this particular dish is a veritable meat feast, or more specifically a pork feast! It should come as no surprise that the Netherlands is one of the top pork exporters in Europe, (rivalled only by Germany), and that over half of all meat consumed in the Netherlands is pork. Its safe to say that Dutch people love eating pork!

Ingredients

500g half and half mince (50% pork, 50% beef)

200g smoked speck or lardons

1 red onion

2 cloves of garlic

1 packet of soup vegetables (finely sliced leek, carrot, shredded cabbage and celery leaves)

1 Tb tomato puree
1 tsp paprika powder
1 tsp thyme
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp black pepper
1 tsp turmeric
1 400g tin chopped tomatoes
500g macaroni
1 pork smoked sausage*
1 tin of pork hotdogs
a sprig of fresh parsley for garnish

* smoked sausage or rookworst is a favourite of many Dutch dishes, from stamppot and hutspot to brown bean soup and erwtensoep. It comes pre-cooked and vacuum packed.

Roti Kip - Surinamese Chicken Curry

Suriname is said to be a melting pot of races, cultures, languages and cuisines.

You have the original indigenous people - the Amerindian tribes of Arawaks, Caribs, Tiryos amongst others; then you have the descendants of African slaves, the town blacks or "foto nengre" and those of mixed race - the Creoles; then you have the descendants of the runaway African slaves who escaped the plantations into the vast dense jungle - the Marrons; then you have the indentured workers from other former colonies brought in to work on the plantations when slavery was abolished in 1863 - the Javans and other Indonesians; then you have the Jewish-Portuguese, who were some of the first plantation owners in Suriname; the Chinese immigrants, and then you have the whites, the Dutch, "bakras" or "boeroes".

Cheese and Onion Pasties

Just a quick one from me today, as I am busy. (Pictures will follow shortly)

These pasties are made with puff pastry and are really simple to make.
The origins of cheese and onion pasties are not really clear. Perhaps they are a veggy alternative to the traditional Cornish Pasties. Who know?

Ingredients

300g onions (2-3 onions)

450g grated cheese of your choice (I used a mix of mature cheddar and gouda)

salt and pepper to taste

1 tsp mild mustard

1 tsp paprika powder
2 packets of frozen puffy pastry squares (20 squares in total)
A little sunflower oil to fry
1 egg to glaze the pasties

Makes between 15-20 pasties

Method

Place the pastry squares individually onto a clean surface to defrost.

Peel and finely chop the onions. Fry these gently in a medium pan with a little sunflower oil, until they are soft and translucent, about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and leave to cool.

Add the grated cheese and mustard together with the spices and mix through the onions well.

Preheat the oven to 180 C.

Depending on what shap you want your pasties to be, you can either leave them as squares (will give you triangle pasties) or cut the squares into circles (will give you D-shaped pasties). 

Spoon a little of the cheese and onion mixture onto one half of the pastry, leaving a thin space round the edges with no mixture. Fold the other half of the pastry over and crimp down with your thumb or a fork, making sure there are no holes for mixture to escape. Cut a small slit in the top of the pasty to allow steam to escape.

Place the pasties onto a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper, and glaze the tops with a little beaten egg.

Bake in the oven for about 20-25 minutes or until risen and golden brown.

Allow to cool slightly before eating, or you will get some molten cheese burning your mouth!

Enjoy!