The original recipe is called: "Om Frickedillen in Krop-salaet te maken"
(to make frickedillen in lettuce). Frickedillen are meatballs
made with minced veal. You can buy the modern
frikadel
or frikandel in any Dutch snack-bar. Nowadays it is a
straight, long, thin, sausage wich is being deepfried and served with
mayonnaise, tomato-ketchup and chopped raw onions. The meat used
for the Dutch frikadel seems to be a bit of a mystery. Some maintain it
was originally cow's udder and pig snout. Udder and snout
are dissapearing foodstuff. They used to be delicacies, but nowadays in
the Netherlands you
find them only unrecognisably in (maybe) the Dutch frikadel and tins of cat- or
dogfood. This is a pity. I once prepared a demi-salé pigsnout a friend
had brought for me out of France: delicious!
A short history of the frikadel: As you
have read above, the modern frikadel is a long, thin, deepfried sausage.
There are no recipes in modern Dutch cookbooks for this frikadel. You
couldn't make it at home, even if you wanted to, because there are no
butchers that sell udder and pigsnout.
In older cookbooks, from the 19th
and 20th century, you can find recipes for frikadellen, but these are for
Indonesian meatloaf or meatballs, or even little pancakes with whole
corn/maize kernels,
called pergedel djagoeng (very tasty). In the cookbook of "De
Amsterdamse huishoudschool" (The Amsterdam school of housecraft) by C.J. Wannée there is a
recipe for Indonesian frikadel with crabmeat and lobster. Not
quite snack-barfood. (I have a copy of the 18th impression of Wannée's
book, 1977).
The recipes for frikadellen in the 17th and 18th century, they were called
frickedillen in those days, are like the recipe you can find
below, for meatballs with minced veal.
Going back further still, to the first Dutch collections of culinary
recipes in the fifteenth and sixteenth century, there is but one recipe for
frikadel, which is called a fricotel. This fricotel is very
different from its successors. It is made with veal, but not with
minced meat. Calf's liver is cut into thin strips. After being
spiced with herbs and spices, these strips are wound around a skewer and roasted before
an open fire (the source is a manuscript in the Royal Academy in Gent, ms
KANTL Gent 15, vol.3, recipe 233, edited by W.L. Braekman in 1986, see also my online
edition of this manuscript).
In The Netherlands as well as for example France the first really
innovating cookbooks since medieval times appear after 1660.
The recipe for frickedillen is taken from the only new Dutch cookbook that
appeared in the seventeenth century, "De
verstandige kock"(The sensible cook), by an anonymous author. This
small cookbook is an addition to the third imprint of
"De verstandige Hovenier" (The sensible gardener) from1667, wich
was called "Den verstandigen Kock". There was another addition,
titled "De
verstandige Confituurmaker" (The sensible confectioner). In 1668
these additions appear again, this time with a third, titled "De Hollandtse Slacht-tydt"
(The Dutch butchering time). Again these booklets did not appear as
independent editions, but as additions, this being the third part of "Het Vermakelyck
Landt-Leven" (The delicious country life). This beautiful book
gave patricians an idea what their country seat could and should look
like, and what to do with the produce of the gardens. Later on "The
sensible cook" appeared several times independently, together with
it's collegues, "The sensible confectioner", and "The Dutch
butchering-time".
You can read the
entire cookbook (in Dutch) on the website
of Marleen Vander Molen-Willebrands.
If you are interested in books on the history of food look at foodbooks.com.
The original text:
"De verstandige kock, of sorghvuldige huys
houdster"(anonymous) from 1668. Facsimile-edition with an introduction by
Joop
Witteveen. De KAN, Amsterdam, 1993. Interpunction is mine.
For the translation I have emprunted from the translation by Peter G. Rose:
"The sensible cook. Dutch foodways in the old and the new world." (a
translation from a 1683 edition) Syracuse University Press, 1998. However, I
have not copied her translation literally, but made some changes in
interpunction and grammar to create shorter sentences, wich will facilitate
reading.
Om
Frickedillen in Krop-Salaet te maken.
Neemt gehakt kalfs-vlees, met Kalfsvet
wat vetter als ordinaris. Ende dat wel
ghekruydt met Noten en een weynich Foelie, Peper en Sout na behooren. Kneet
wel ondereen. Neemt dan soo veel van de
malste Kroppen Salaet als't u belieft,
en suyvert die van de buytenste bladeren. Ende dan schoon uytgewassen en de
Krop van binnen de bladers wat open gedaen. Neemt dan soo veel Eyeren als ghy
Kroppen hebt. Maeckt oock soo veel frickedillekens, en doet in't midden van
yder den door van een Ey. Leght dan in
de Krop en bindt hem met een draedt toe.
En als't water koockt, doetét in de
pot. Als het gaer is kondt dan in't sop
een weynigh fijn gestooten Beschuyt
doen, en wat Boter, wat Kruys-besien of
onrijpe Druyven, Verjuys, naer elck sijn believen.
To make meatballs
in head-lettuce.
Take chopped veal with veal-fat a little fatter than usual. Spice it with
nutmeg and a little mace, pepper and salt as appropiate. Knead it
together. Then take as many of the tender heads as you please, and clean
off the outer leaves. [And] then wash it clean, and open up the inner
leaves of the head. Take then as many eggs as you have heads. Make also as
many little meatballs, and place in the middle of each [meatball]
the yolk of an egg. Put [the meatball] inside the head,and tie with a
string. And when the water boils put them in the pot. When it is done you
could add to the broth a little finely crushed rusk and some butter, some
gooseberries or unripe grapes or verjuice, according to everyone's liking.
400 gram
(1 pound) minced veal
50 gram (1/4 cup) kidneyfat of veal, finely chopped
4 heads lettuce
4 hardboiled eggs
nutmeg, mace, pepper, salt to taste
1 raw egg
crumbled rusk or toasted
breadcrumbs for the meatballs
2 (or more) crumbled rusks for the sauce
50 gram (1/4 cup) butter
1 deciliter (1/2 cup) juice of gooseberries or unripe grapes, or verjuice
or apple vinegar
Preparation in advance:
Wash the
heads of lettuce, drain well. Remove the outer leaves. You can use these the
next day for a salad. Prepare the minced veal: knead the meat with chopped fat,
the spices, and the crumbs of rusk. Take the yolks out of the hardboiled eggs.
If you want to, you can use the chopped egg whites as garnish later on. Make four
meatballs, and carefully put in the middle of each ball a hardboiled yolk.
Remove if necessary some of the inner leaves of the heads of lettuce. Place in
the middle of each head a meatball. Bind with kitchen twine.
Preparation:
Lay the heads side by side in a pan where they snugly fit. Pour in
some water. It should reach halfway the lettuces. Bring to the boil, and let the
heads simmer, covered, for seven minutes. Carefully turn the heads over, let
them simmer for seven more minutes. Drain the heads but keep them warm. Reduce
the simmering-liquid by one-third. Bind the sauce with the crumbled rusk (or use
toasted bread-crumbs). Bring to the boil once more. Season to taste with
some sour liquid like apple-vinegar, gooseberry- or grapejuice. The sauce should
taste slightly sour.
To serve:
Remove the kitchen twine from the heads of lettuce. Put the heads on a
decorative dish. If you wish, you can cut the heads in half, to show the yellow
surprise in the middle.
Pour some of the sauce around the heads, serve the remainder in a sauce-cup.
Verjuice:
The juice of sour, unripe grapes that was used in the Middle Ages and up to the
eighteenth century. You can still buy it, but you may have to look
for it. In the Netherlands verjuice was also made from unripe apples and sorrel.
You can use applecider vinegar as a substitute. More
about verjuice and a recipe to make your own verjuice
W.L. Braekman, Een
nieuw zuidnederlands kookboek uit de vijftiende eeuw
(A new southern Dutch cookbook from the fifteenth century).
Scripta 17, Brussel, 1986. (ms KANTL Gent 15 vols. 2 and 3).
This
manuscript is in the course of being published by me on this site. The first
volume is now completed, the second
(of four) is in progress. The Middle Dutch text is accompanied by translations
in modern Dutch and English.
Peter
G. Rose, The Sensible Cook. Dutch foodways in the old and the new world (a
translation from a 1683 edition) Syracuse University Press, 1998.
This is the only English edition available, and therefor a valuable book. But as
to the adapted recipes I sometimes disagree with her. For example, she never
mentions the direct source of each adapted recipe, nor quotes the original text
(not even in translation) if the source is other than the Sensible Cook.
This makes it difficult to judge the adaptations. Just take her version of Meatballs
in head lettuce: Was another version of this recipe used, or else what were
her reasons to leave out mace in the meatballs and a sour liquid like
grapejuice, gooseberries or verjuice to finish off the sauce and the rusk to
thicken it? Moreover, she suggests serving boiled potatoes with the meatballs.
In the seventeenth century bread would have accompanied the meatballs, potatoes
only became staple food at the end of the eighteenth century. Her suggestion to
insert raw egg yolks in the meatballs instead of cooked ones is interesting.
Indeed the recipe doesn't mention whether the yolks are raw or cooked. I have
chosen cooked egg yolks because that's what I know from other recipes, I've
never encountered a recipe in which whole raw egg yolks were inserted into meat
balls.
De verstandige kock, of sorghvuldige huys
houdster (anonymous) from 1668. Facsimile-edition with an introduction by
Joop
Witteveen. De KAN, Amsterdam, 1993
Syracuse University Press, 1998.
This is the only English edition available, and therefor a valuable book. But as
to the adapted recipes I sometimes disagree with her. For example, she never
mentions the direct source of each adapted recipe, nor quotes the original text
(not even in translation) if the source is other than the Sensible Cook.
This makes it difficult to judge the adaptations. Just take her version of Meatballs
in head lettuce: Was another version of this recipe used, or else what were
her reasons to leave out mace in the meatballs and a sour liquid like
grapejuice, gooseberries or verjuice to finish off the sauce and the rusk to
thicken it? Moreover, she suggests serving boiled potatoes with the meatballs.
In the seventeenth century bread would have accompanied the meatballs, potatoes
only became staple food at the end of the eighteenth century. Her suggestion to
insert raw egg yolks in the meatballs instead of cooked ones is interesting.
Indeed the recipe doesn't mention whether the yolks are raw or cooked. I have
chosen cooked egg yolks because that's what I know from other recipes, I've
never encountered a recipe in which whole raw egg yolks were inserted into meat
balls.