Dutch Night

Yesterday I woke up early and put on a batch of Sunday soup. Four hours later Natasha came over and we were in heaven. This soup comes straight out of our childhood. Every Sunday for 13 years I had this meal with my uncles, my dad, sisters and grandparents after church. Before I made it however, I never really thought about how to make it. Two years ago I attempted it and failed miserably. I didn't know the secrets, the time honed ways. Always yellow potatoes, and always cooked the night before. A marrow bone and stew beef simmered together in a pot of water for three hours. Meatballs with gehakt spice, milk, no eggs and breadcrumbs. After my first attempt I asked my Oma (the master of this craft, she's been doing this for over forty years) what went wrong. She was happy to tell me. I wrote it down and used her guide. This time was perfect.

To have the traditional Wilbrink (and maybe other people?) Sunday Soup you must have:

Sunday soup

Fried potatoes with dutch mayonnaise

Vanilla ice cream with homemade blackberry sauce.

We forgoed the ice cream (even though we had the sauce) for a lack luster butterscotch pudding. Very disappointing. Other than dessert this dinner brought us right back to our childhood. Full of flavour, salty and loaded with delicious fat.

We hope we can find a soup just like this when we are visiting relatives in Holland in 146 days!

Sunday Soup:

I forgot about the gehakt seasoning, so I didn't have any on hand. I did mix together coriander, pepper, ginger, nutmeg, cardamon, chili and oregano, in roughly equal parts and it tasted just like it should.

1 marrow bone, veal or beef

1 lb stewing beef, seared

1 package Groentesoep season mix (Honig brand)

1 recipe meatballs (follows)

spagettini noodles crushed with your hands into 1 inch pieces

maggi, saltine crackers (optional, but not in our house)

Meatballs:

1 lb ground beef

1/4 c fresh breadcrumbs

1/4 c milk

1 T gehakt seasoning

Place marrow bone and seared stewing beef in a large pot and bring to a boil with 8 or so cups of water. Simmer for three hours. Mix meatballs and roll into 1 1/2 inch sized balls. Add in meatballs and one package of seasoning mix and simmer for 50 minutes. In last ten minutes of cooking add noodles. Serve piping hot with crackers crushed in and maggi sprinkled on top.