10 JAAR IN NEDERLAND

Who would have imagined that on 12 May 2015, when I arrived in Tulip Land (and made myself that veggie cous cous), I’d be still here 10 years later?
An adventure that was supposed to last the length of a 3-year PhD trajectory and instead turned out to be a long part of my life, almost a third of it.

I know I know, I spreek nog niet goed Nederlands (= I don’t speak good Dutch yet) – blame the job, blame myself? Yet, I do feel this is my home. I’m grateful for the life I’ve had here — especially to all the people, Dutch and beyond, who made it so.

No big celebrations planned for today, but I thought to bake something Dutch. Found myself with no time to bake a proper appletart nor to learn how to make a tompouce from scratch. I don’t have the wafel iron so no stroopwafels either. But I do have apples and could find bladerdeeg (puff pastry – sorry I am cheating) at the supermarket. So let’s make these appelflappen (apple flipovers), my favorite (post-teaching) Dutch sweet treat, with a little spice twist.

APPELFLAPPEN

Ingredients

1 rectangular sheet of puff pastry
1 apple
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp speculaas spice mix (or simply use cinnamon)
1 egg (for brushing)
Extra sugar for decoration

Prepare the apple mix

Peel and dice the apple into small cubes. In a bowl, mix the apple with 2 tablespoons of sugar and the spice.

Fill in the appelflappen

Cut the puff pastry into 4 equal squares, about 14 cm each. Place 2–3 teaspoons of the apple mixture in the center of each pastry square. Fold each square into a triangle, sealing the edges by pressing them with a fork. Brush the tops with beaten egg and sprinkle generously with sugar.