Culture

This year we are celebrating New Year’s Eve at Roger’s. One of the most important parts of that (besides hanging out with friends, of course!) is “gourmetten”. Below is a picture of all of the gourmetten foods Roger purchased for the evening, although we already know we won’t be able to eat everything.

“Gourmetten” is a Dutch tradition of frying meats and (to a lesser extent) vegetables on a small grill on the dinner table. You can see pictures of the gourmet grill in the 2015 New Year’s Eve blog post I made. Roger purchased a new grill for 2016, so I will try and take some photos of that in action. I can’t wait!

A lot of Dutch have a New Year’s Eve tradition of dusting off their gourmetten sets to grill up mini meats, fish and vegetables, similar to the New Year’s tradition of consuming oliebollen.  I’ve written about it a few times, but here’s a look at how it went this year.

First we start with a clean set. This set in particular is good for 3-4 people and has 8 pans underneath for extra grilling potential:

Here is a look at the underside so you can see the pans:

And a look at the meat we grilled up:

Dutch supermarkets sell a lot of gourmet mini sets with items that are pre-cut and otherwise packaged in small containers (meats, sauces, peppers, onions and similar). They are frequently sold as “buy 2, get 1 free”.

The gourmet set in action:

And the most awesome thing ever? Grilled pineapple at the bottom (which I have never had until Marco and I went to Rodizio).

And also underneath – shoarma and mushrooms. Yum. Not shown – bread with a choice of garlic butter, aioli and sweet paprika sauce.

Until next year!