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Kings day colors! #eyes #nails #lips #orange #oranje #her #diy #kingsday #koningsdag

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Koningsdag fun!!! #koningsdag #kingsday #orangelipstick #her

The Big Surprise (Pineapple Coconut Chicken Fried Rice with Her)

Two…now almost three weeks ago was Job’s birthday.  We celebrated it with his family at our house and it was lots of fun!  

I had given him his gift a few days before his birthday, so I really wanted to surprise him with something special.

I spoke with a few of his friends and I planned a little surprise birthday for him the week after his birthday.

The day before the surprise party, I told Job I really wanted to make a cake.  We worked together and make a very long list of all the ingredients we needed for the next week to come for all of our dinners (and the cake).  Eventually we made it home, made some dinner and sat down to relax after our long day of going about the city and gathering foods. (We went to a chinese store to get some ingredients like ginger and chili peppers as well as stock up on some soy sauce, as well as stop at the De Bijenkorf for a pastry spreader, and then stopped by C1000 and Albert Heijn for some “normal ingredients”.)

Around 9PM, Job asked me if we were still going to make the cake.  I responded that we should probably start.  We got up and made our way to the kitchen.  On the way, he told me to sit back down and that he would bake the cake, that I should relax.  He insisted even when I questioned him.  

Around midnight… or maybe it was 12:30AM, Job came over and woke me up on the couch, letting me know that he had just finished the cake.  

Fast forward to the next day.  Job had work so while he was at work, I decided to be a cleaning machine.  I dusted, vacuumed, and washed the floors, did a few loads of laundry and prepped some food for the little dinner party that evening.

One of our mutual friends came over early to help me set up.  We made a salad together and she helped me prep the main dish, Pineapple Coconut Chicken Fried Rice.  

I made this dish about a month ago and haven’t blogged about it, so I will use my photos from then to share the recipce with you!

Ingredients:

• Pineapple Chunks
• Coconut Milk
• Star Anise
• Cardamon Pods
• Rice
• Onion
• Chili Pepper
• Garlic Clove
• Spring Onions
• Sambal Badjak
• Sambal Oelek
• Soy Sauce
• Green/Yellow Peppers
• Chicken Breast
• Eggs
• Olive Oil
• Sesame Oil
• Fish Sauce
• Salt and Pepper for taste

The best thing to do is to prep all of the veggies first.  Slice up the peppers, garlic, onion, and chili pepper.  The garlic and chili peppers can be combined into one bowl.  The peppers and onions can go in another bowl.

(In the photos I have, all of my veggies were separate.)

Next you must prep the chicken.  The easiest thing to do is to butterfly the chicken and then cut it into thin slices.

Once everything is prepped, the rice should be put on to cook.  The rice should be cooked 1 part rice to 1.5 parts liquid.  For this party, I did 600g rice to 800g coconut milk.  I also added about 5 cardamon pods that had been slightly cut open to add flavor and four or five star anise as well.  This makes the rice super aromatic and flavorful.

The rice should be started on a high heat.  As soon as the liquid in the pan comes to a boil, quickly turn the mixture down to low and cook until the liquid is all gone.  It will take about the time it takes to cook all of the rest of the ingredients.

In a frying pan, it is now time to start the chicken.  Put the pan on a medium high heat with olive oil.  Let the oil heat up and spread it around the pan before adding in any chicken.

Once the pan is heated up, add the chicken with some salt and pepper and cook on both sides.  When the chicken is just turning white, add in the garlic and chili peppers.  Let this cook a little longer until the chicken is fully cooked.  Add in some soy sauce and cook for another minute or two so that the flavor seeps in.

From here, pour the chicken out of the pan and into a bowl (trying to make sure that all the juices stay with the chicken).  Add in some sesame oil into the pan and heat it up.  Once it’s heated, add in the onions, spring onions, and peppers.  The vegetables just need to be sautéed and only takes about three or four minutes to cook.  You don’t want the vegetables to lose their crunch.  Once these are cooked, transfer them out of the pan and into the bowl with the already cooked chicken, garlic and chili peppers.

From this point onwards, if you have a wok style pan, I recommend using it because you’re about to put a whole lot of ingredients into a pan.  If not, be careful as the next steps may get messy. Add a dollop of olive oil to the wok/pan and spread around.  Let the oil again heat up.  At this point, you will be adding eggs to the pan.  If you’re making a large amount of rice, you’ll want to use more than one egg.  For this recipe, I used two.  Whisk the eggs together before pouring them into the pan.

From here, you want to really spread the egg out around the edges of the pan.  You will need to now pour in the bowl of chicken and veggies.  Make sure to be quick about this step so that the eggs don’t over cook and so that they also meld with the veggies.  Make sure to continuously stir so the eggs coat the veggies/chicken.  At this point, your rice should be just about finished.  Make sure to remove the cardamon pods and star anise.  It’s not fun to accidentally bite into these spices.  You’ll also add in your rice now.  Keep stirring so that all of the ingredients blend together.  

Now it’s time for the flavors.  Add in your pineapple chunks and little bit of the pineapple juice.  Add in some more soy sauce and fish sauce.  I like to add some spice to the rice so I add in about a half tablespoon of both varieties of Sambal.  Just keep stirring and tasting until the flavor is right for you.

Now everything sounds pretty easy to do… and granted if you’re paying attention, it really is easy to do, however, at the point in time that I was cooking everything, the guests for the surprise party were arriving every five minutes or so.  As I was setting on the rice and waiting for the liquid to come to a boil, someone rang the doorbell.  I ran to the door, quickly welcomed them and got them a drink and went back to the kitchen, but had forgotten the rice had still been on a high heat,  I realized it quickly that I had forgotten when I smelled something burning… Well so much for a perfect dinner.  I quickly turned the rice onto a low heat and removed it from the hot burner and scraped the rice off the bottom of the pot.

I was lucky enough to salvage most of the rice.  The guests all arrived and we waited quietly (well they did as I continued to cook) until Job arrived.  All of the doors and windows were open as the weather was so beautiful out so that when Job opened one of the doors, the hallway created a huge wind tunnel and caused another door to slam.  I wasn’t at the time completely sure if it was just the breeze that caused the door to slam or not, so I went over to the door and opened it and then Job was there… Whoops, well I just said hello to him and welcomed him home from work and then everyone jumped out and yelled SURPRISE!  Everyone congratulated him and wished him a happy birthday (gefeliciteerd! gelukkige verjaardag! ). I invited everyone to sit around the table and start eating as I had just finished the fried rice.  Some friends brought some wine and drinks so we got out glasses and “Proost”ed (Cheers).  

We passed around the foods, talked, ate and enjoyed everyone’s company.  After the food was gone, it was time for the cake that Job had cooked (Unknowingly for his own party) the night before.  We sliced it up and passed it around, had some coffees and talked a little more before the guests had to make their journeys back home.

The evening was so pleasant and gezellig and I don’t think that either one of us could have asked for anything better.  The whole thing was a total surprise to Job and he was so excited and happy that night!

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Breaking Tradition: April Holidays

There is nothing more peaceful and relaxing than biking home from a long day of work and reflect on my day and think about the next coming days.  I’ve been talking a lot lately with my mom, my sister, and my best friend, Ayla.  Ayla has just gotten a new apartment, my sister is going on a quick holiday to Prague, and my mom is excited but tired from all of the construction work going on at the house in the states (which is finally almost finished!).

Talking with Ayla, we really realized that this is the first year that we will not be completing our normal April Holiday traditions…

Ayla and I…since we were about 8 or 9 years old have been best friends.  Each year we have a holiday exchange.  Once in the winter for Christmas and Hanukkah, and once in the spring for Passover and Easter.  We are honorary family members in each others families.  This will be the first year ever that we are unable to attend the spring celebrations with each other.

Next Monday marks the first evening of Passover.  Ayla would always come over to my house and help us prepare our meal and then she, my parents, my sister (sometimes via Skype) and my mother’s parents would sit down to a glorious meal with multiple courses.

The Seder Plate in all of it’s glory

Salad

Matzoh Ball Batter

Matzoh Ball Soup (I don’t know what April is going to be like without my mom’s amazing soup and my matzoh balls)

Veggies

Kuggel (one of my other favorite passover treats, and in the background, my mom’s amazing chocolate/caramel covered Matzoh…TO DIE FOR!)

Chicken (or salmon for my grandma)

Matzoh (Specifically making Hillel Sandwiches with charoset and maror)

the crazy story my sister and I tell of Passover (We like to modernize things and have fun basically outlining the story of the DreamWorks movie Prince of Egypt… otherwise it’s a pretty long seder)

and last but not least, finding the Afikomen and my grandfather paying us for it.

Passover, although you can’t eat real bread or anything leavened is probably one of the most fun holidays to celebrate with my family.  (And if you’re lucky, someone will get in a fight…me and my sister, my sister and my grandma… it’s always entertaining!!)

Celebrating Easter with Ayla is just as fun.  We go over to her Aunt Sara’s house in East Providence.  Sara lives at the end of a cul de sac.  We usually arrive to Sara’s, help a little with setting the table/ prepping a few things, talking in the living room, and then it’s time to eat.

We get to eat an amazing ham with pineapples and cherries, lots of mashed potatoes, carrots, asparagus, cream of corn soup, green bean casserole, and for dessert, usually some fruit salad and an amazing Trifle that Sara makes! Before we start the meal, there is always a game also.  Sara fills a random jar full of jelly beans.  Everyone must make a private guess as to how many jelly beans are in the jar and submit it.  At the end of the meal, Sara announces the winner and they get all of the jelly beans.  I’ve won before and it’s amazing. I love jelly beans.

After the meal, we have an easter egg hunt in Sara’s yard and the eggs are filled with amazing little easter candies.  

After the easter egg hunt, we open all of our eggs to find our candies and then play a big game of catch at the end of the cul de sac.

Writing about these two days we spend together really is making me miss home a little.  I can’t wait to be reunited with my friends and family over a big meal.

Lucky for me, I get to experience a new fun holiday in just a few weeks…King’s Day!

Do you celebrate Easter or Passover? What are your favorite foods from these spring holidays? What are your favorite traditions?

21 Things You Need To Know About Providence Before You Move There

Welcome to the smallest state’s capital—while it’s small in stature, this city is huge on culture, art, food and… puppets?

I’m from Providence, and this city is so full of fun, culture and good food! I honestly can’t recommend it enough to people visiting the United State… especially the East Coast.  It’s a 1 hour train ride from Boston and a 3 hour train ride from NYC!

If you see my previous post I talk about a lot of my favorite restaurants which are some amazing 5 Star places in Providence!

So proud to be from this little state with a big personality!

21 Things You Need To Know About Providence Before You Move There

Foods…

The night before last, as I sat on our balcony staring at the sunset while swirling my wine, the first thing…well the first person… that popped into my mind was my sister; mainly because I was swirling my wine, and well, my sister is living in Italy… and she likes wine, so I texted her just to check up on things.

We got to talking and we landed where we land a lot.. talking about food.  This time, it was food we missed.  We talked about what Job and I made for dinner and how she was jealous…and then a small story about peanut butter… but really her list of things she missed was just glorious.

So really, here is just my list from notes of foods that I miss… to be clear, originally I was going to make a post of just foods I missed and then restaurants that I missed, but at this point, I’ll just let you see the list I have.

Most missed American foods

• Maple syrup (Vermont)
• Cabot’s Seriously sharp cheddar cheese
• Chobani/oikos
• Annies Mac & cheese
• Kraft Mac & cheese
• Mint chocolate chip ice cream
• Skittles (All of the fun flavors!)
• Sour patch watermelons
• Sabra roasted pine nut hummus
• Dunkin donuts caramel swirl iced latte
• Dunkin donuts turkey cheddar bacon on a French roll
• Maple & brown sugar Quaker oat instant oatmeal
• Moms cooking!!!
• Chipotle, Specifically a burrito bowl with chips and guac
• Julian’s..their Brunch.
• Nick’s on Broadway…their french toast OMG.
• Broadway Bistro …their menu changes weekly I believe…
• Tokyo
• Nice slice their BBQ chicken, Greek, and La Strada pizza are amazing.
• And…I can’t say that I miss this place, but man oh man I cannot wait to try Hudson Street Deli, one of my old co-worker’s new places!

Anyways, this is a running list… so I’m sure I will think of more things I’m missing… now I’m really hungry.

And for those of you who are interested in trying some amazing local cuisine in Providence, RI, try some of those above listed spots!!!!

As an expat, or just when you travel, what foods do you miss the most from home?

A Busy Saturday

As many of you know, Job and I have been looking at apartments.  In the last two weeks we’ve viewed about five places and have a few more viewings set up.  Our lease ends at the end of May so we’re hoping to see as many apartments as possible and find the best fit.

Yesterday, 5 April 2014 was Open House Day in Amsterdam.  Originally we planned just to go look at a whole bunch of apartments, (many out of our price range just to see how beautiful they were, because in all honesty, there weren’t many being rented that were in our price range) however, the Expat from Australia that I met for coffee a few weeks back told us about a expo that we were both interested in and we decided instead to go to that.

Before the expo however, we did have a quick stop to make: viewing one apartment that was in our price range.  The apartment was small, but the kitchen and bathroom alone made up for the size of the place.  The kitchen was fully furnished with a new modern (pretty high end) gas stove as well as a nice refrigerator, and a quaint slab of chalkboard paint on the wall to announce fun things like what was for dinner or welcoming guests.  The bathroom had a full tub and a decent sized shower and overall looked like the whole apartment had been recently renovated and updated.  It was definitely an apartment we could see ourselves in.

Next it was on to the expo.

It was a day full of some useful information and we got to see my expat friend and her boyfriend which was also nice.  We learned some cool tips at the expo and it was just a fully packed day.

We had started our day around 11AM and we didn’t get back home until almost 7PM.

On our way home, we stopped at a little…the best way I can think to describe it is a Bodega, however I’m not sure that’s what you’d call it here. Basically a very small independent market that sells all kind of of food and produce… Bodega really seems fitting.  Anyways, as we stepped off the tram for our walk home, the bright fruits and veggies stood out to me and I asked Job if he wanted to take a look at the fruits there.  As we walked over, we could smell the beautifully ripe fresh strawberries.  They also had some amazing artichokes which we purchased.  We got a few spices for cooking and some dried/candied fruits and finally walked back to our own apartment.  

The day was so nice out and as we walked back we saw numerous families with their kids sitting outside, eating and playing.  We walked past a couple enjoying a glass of wine at a small table.  As we walked back inside I just felt like everything was fitting into place and it was just such a great day.  We went upstairs to prepare dinner and eat dinner and afterwards we ourselves enjoyed a nice glass of wine on our balcony, enjoying the sunset.

We sat outside until the sun was past the horizon.  The sky was so beautiful yesterday.