oliebollen

delicious pile of oliebollen

Like Mary, who's recent entry in Mein a Musings highlighted ways to celebrate family and ethnic traditions, we have been inspired to savor some delights from our own family's melting pot. Both Calvin and Annika have created family trees for school in the past few weeks--their heritage is mainly Dutch, with a few Michener's, Benjamin's and Mahoney's mixed in to keep it interesting.  Last week, Annika gave a presention on The Netherlands to her social studies class. It was fun to help her gather information on the beautiful country most of my family came from long ago.

  

Annika wanted to bring a traditional Dutch treat to school to share with her classmates as part of her project. Just because she loves to bake anything and everything, she's been reading and studying A Little Dutch Cookbook for months, checked out from the school library and constantly renewed since she discovered it in September. Honestly, I should just buy little honey her own copy.

She decided to make Oliebollen. This is a wonderfully rich Dutch "doughnut", traditionally served on New Year's Eve. Annika made the batter and I handled the frying (or rather, the burning). It took the better part of a Sunday and the entire house smelled like a pot of oil for days, but the results were well worth the effort.

oliebollen frying

amazingly, this little pastry flips itself over when one side is done

totally lost control of this batch

Annika gives the final touch: powdered sugar