Hotdog!

My Dear Former Fellow Americans--

Forget McDonald's. Yes, I said it. In addition to the stroopwafels that I have teased so many of you with before, the Dutch have discovered the perfect food: HEMA Hotdogs.

I guess I need to sidetrack to talk about HEMA first. I think the authorative post on HEMA is here. Kind of like Target. They're all over. It's not a "big box" store, though. A Target-like economy of [that] scale does not exist when the entire country boasts a population of fewer than 17 million. It does end up playing a similar role in some cases, as shopping is, for the most part, very localized in NL, and HEMA competes with smaller local shops.

Back to the hotdog. Begin with the dog. A Dutch specialty is smoked sausage, or rookworst. There are several kinds of rookworst. Ambachtelijke rookworst is recognizable by the strings on the end. This is smoked sausage that is actually smoked. Most rookworst now sold just has smoke flavor added. Gelderse sausage originated in Gelderland (a region) where the pigs were raised on rye, buttermilk, potatoes, and acorns. This gave Gelderse pork exceptionally good flavor and led to the fame of Gelderse smoked sausage. (Smoked sausage was the most efficient way to store meat for later use.) Today it's a spice recipe and a particular thickness of sausage that's typical to Gelderse rookworst. Kleintje rookworst is a half-size version. Rookworst are available in lower-fat versions as well, magere, but this isn't generally a concern. Magnetron rookworst comes in a skin that won't explode in the microwave.

All of those kinds of rookworst are typically eaten alongside stamppot. Potatoes are as much a part of Dutch cuisine as they are in Irish. A very typical Dutch meal includes 4-6oz of meat (lots of pork, some chicken and some beef), boiled potatoes, pan gravy, and a vegetable. Smashing the potatoes on the plate with the vegetables and sometimes the meat mixed in with some pan gravy poured over the whole thing is normal. [One custom I'm not so much all about adopting, thank you.] Stamppot is when the potatoes are served already mashed with a vegetable. Boerenkool stamppot is with chopped kale. Boerenkool stamppot normally appears in November along with rookworst, which was traditionally made in November. The rookworst is boiled in the same pot with the stamppot, then removed and served alongside.

And then there's the HEMA hotdog. This contains a spice mix and flavor very similar to the region's beloved Gelderse rookworst, but it's long and thin and straight. As such, it slides nicely onto a rotisserie, where it is roasted to yummy perfection. It also slides perfectly into HEMA's own version of a hotdog bun. That is, take a baguette, slice it in half, and hollow out the middle--forming a tube that's closed at one end. Then slowly heat the resulting bun in an oven until it's toasty and crusty and hot. To marry these two, squirt saus into the middle of the tube before inserting the hotdog. Saus in this case in a mayo-mustard mix.

Voila. HEMA hotdog. €2. To die for.