Winter is a time for home-cooked comfort foods and that's when Dutch food really comes into its own. With humble seasonal produce such as potatoes, curly kale, apples and pears and luxurious seafoods such as mussels, cockles and oysters, there's plenty to choose from this month.
This overview focuses on Dutch-grown fruits and vegetables, venison and sustainable seafood varieties. And, because it's always nice to turn theory into practice, we've provided a list of recipes featuring seasonal ingredients for each section.
Locally Harvested Winter Vegetables
Beet (biet)
Belgian endive
(witlof)
Black radish (rammenas)
Black salsify (schorseneren)
Brussels sprouts (spruiten)
Carrots (bospeen, waspeen, winterpeen)
Celeriac (also known as knolselderij or turnip-rooted celery)
Celery cabbage (also known as Chinese kool, Napa cabbage or Chinese cabbage)
Curly Kale (boerenkool)
Daikon (rettich)
Jerusalem artichoke (also known as aardpeer, sunroot, sunchoke, earth apple or topinambur)
Lamb's lettuce (also known as veldsla, corn salad or mâche)
Leek (prei)
Onion (ui)
Parsnip (pastinaak)
Pointed cabbage (spitskool)
Potato (aardappel)
Purslane (winter) (postelein)
Pumpkin (pompoen)
Red cabbage (rode kool)
Radish (radijs)
Rutabaga (also known as koolraap, swede or turnip)
Savoy cabbage (savooiekool)
White cabbage (witte kool)
Recipes featuring February's seasonal vegetables:
Potato & Celeriac Soup with Gouda Cheese Recipe
White Winter Vegetable Mash
Cinnamon Glazed Carrots RecipeRoast Beet Salad with Chèvre Recipe
Witlof, Goat's Cheese & Bacon Bites
Celeriac & Potato Stamppot Recipe
Sauteed Curly Kale Recipe
Jerusalem Artichoke Soup with Chanterelles
Tart with Belgian Endive & Chevre
Roasted Root Vegetables Recipe
Puff Pastry Tarts with Leeks & Mushrooms
Roasted Hutspot Recipe
Pickled Beet Salad with Ash-Coated Goat's Cheese Recipe
Pumpkin, Butternut, Carrot & Saffron Soup Recipe
Creamy Belgian Endive Soup with White Beer
Foamy Cream of Parsnip Soup with Prawns & Herb Oil
Old Amsterdam Parsnip Bake
Pink Beet & Orange Soup Recipe
Pan-Fried Pointed Cabbage with Leeks & Bacon
Chicken with Purslane & Crispy Bread Salsa
Crunchy Coleslaw Recipe
Zuurkoolstamppot Recipe
Dutch-Grown Fruits
Apples (appel)
Pears; regular pears (handperen) and stewing pears (stoofperen)
February's best fruit recipes:
Jachtschotel Recipe
Kapucijnerschotel Recipe
Traditional Dutch Apple Pie Recipe
Poached Pears in Red Wine Recipe
Tarte Tatin with Stoofpeertjes Recipe
Pear & Ginger Crumble Recipe
Beet & Pear Smoothie Recipe
Red Cabbage & Apples Recipe
20 Dutch Apple Recipes
Apple Pie Muffins Recipe
Kohlrabi, Celeriac, Carrot, Crunchy Apple & Currant Slaw RecipeDutch Apple Sauce Recipe
Port Poached Pears Recipe
Apple Beignet Recipe
Apple & Pear Chutney with Speculaas Spices Recipe
Advocaat & Pear Muffins Recipe
Pickled Herring Salad with Sour Apples & Potatoes
Apple Syrup Recipe
Apple & Bacon Pancakes Recipe
Seasonal Venison from the Netherlands
Red deer (edelhert)
Roe deer (female); (reegeit)
Wild pigeon (wilde duif)
Wild rabbit (wilde konijn)
February's venison recipes
Roast Pigeon with Grapes & Celeriac Puree
Jenever Poached Deer Steaks
Roast Pigeon with Limburgian Apple Syrup Gravy
Reehachee Recipe (Venison Stew)
Sustainable seafood from the Dutch coast and rivers
Brown shrimp (Hollandse garnalen)
Cockles (kokkels)
Common Bream (brasem)
Common Periwinkle (alikreuken)
European smelt (spiering)
Flounder (bot)
Mussels (mosselen)
Oysters (Creuse oyster; European flat oyster or platte oesters)
Squid (pijlinktvis)
Zander (pike-perch or snoekbaars)
February's seasonal seafood recipes:
Dutch Shrimp Croquettes
Mussel Pot with Trappist Beer Recipe
Mussel & Dill Tompoes Recipe
Scrambled Eggs with Shrimp Recipe
Mussels with White Wine & Samphire
Shrimp & Cucumber Sandwiches
Mussel Soup with Sherry & Saffron Recipe
Mussels with Saffron & Ginger Recipe
Source: Het Nederlands Viskookboek; Milieucentraal Groente- en Fruitkalender; Wildplaza.com
