Amazon Flavors, A culinary weekend to savor! - Beverage

In such a culinary weekend, the beverage part can't be missed. At 2 pm was the rum and chocolate tasting. I looked forward to this every since I heard I got a day pass. The rum used is sponsored by Suriname Alcoholic Beverages N.V.

One thing I think was a great feature was that they also gave us spices to smell. Although it's the simple spices like sugar, anise, caramel, vanilla, butter and cinnamon that most people know, but I think most people don't really take the time to smell it thoroughly.This was very helpful when we finally tried to get a nose (smell) from the rum.

The first one was our awardwinning Black Cat. It's double distilled and won the 'Monde Selection Medaille d'Or' ( Gold medal Award) in Luxembourg. It smelled like black liquorice, which is the anise and vanilla. It tasted very sharp, sweet, but a short aftertaste.

The 2nd one was the Borgoe 82 rum. It smelled like caramel and tasted a bit heavier in cohesion to the Black Cat.

Borgoe Extra Rum is the 3rd rum we got to taste. Compared to the Borgoe 82, it smelled spicier and when drank, I fell it in my throat. 

Then the aged rums were introduced. We started with the Borgoe 5YO ( 5 year old) and it smelled stronger in aroma, but tasted milder than the rest.

We also paired it with chocolate from Tan Bun skrati. However it's green, in the way that they handcraft it from scratch using the pre-Columbian processing method without any chemicals, I think I really need to use to the texture. The higher the percentage of cacao used, the rougher the texture was. We got 3 types to taste: the 65%, 70% and 80% cacao. I like the 65% one best since it's not that sandy and it kinda melted on my finger when we finally got to taste it.

The last rum was the Borgoe 8YO. It smelled very much like brown sugar and if I may use wine standards to explain it: If all others are light to medium bodied, this one is the full body. All the flavors were well-balanced and it was heavenly (or I just had a bit too much). Unfortunately we couldn't taste the Borgoe 15YO, but who knows, maybe next year?

And if you want to read more about Borgoe, please check the latest edition of Victuals. It is a bilingual magazine, covering all kinds of culinary topics. And the pictures are always very appealing to the palate, so don't read it when  you're hungry.

After this I had to wait for my wine tasting with Riedel at 4pm. That was somewhat inconvenient though. Since I was there with the daypass, I expected to be kept busy from 9am to 8pm, like it was described in the program. It would've been very helpful if the program was more elaborate so that I would know in advance that between 12:00 -1:00pm and 2:00-3:00pm I would have a 1-hour break. I would've brought something to keep me busy.

The Riedel-seminar was also something I looked forward to. I've always heard that you have to drink the wine in the correct glass to enhance the enjoyment, but I never could've quessed that the difference could be so significant.

And if you may ever look into a Riedel brochure, you'll see that they take this fact very seriously. They have for every drink a different glass. And not only a glass for white, rose and red wine. For the reds for example, they have a special glass for every variety. A different glass for the Pinot noir, Cabernet Sauvignon and the Syrah. Same thing for the white wines. Their collection is so huge that their brochure counts 50 pages. This seminar was a real eye-opener. If you're interested or just curious, check their site: www (dot) riedel (dot) com.

We tried 5 different wines with these glasses and some tasted even bitter in the wrong glass. Raymond Kooii, the speaker of this seminar, explained a bit about how these glasses work. The human tongue differentiates 4 different flavors on different parts of our tongue: sweet, salty, sour and bitter. And every wine was determined which flavor should dominate and the glass will be made in such a way that it will hit those parts of the tongue to enhance that flavor.

While I was having the wine tasting with Riedel, the Suriname Chefs Congress was held, so unfortunately I can't tell you what happened there. But for all food lovers, my advice is to like the Suriname Chefs Association page on facebook to stay  informed of all upcoming events and see pictures of all events they'd organized till now.

Of course, the winner of the Amazon Iron Chef Competition was announced. The setting was very relaxed, which was also different than my expectations. For this, I blame the international chef competitions on tv, where the final results are always held in a more formal setting. So, I expected everyone in the congress room, with all the chefs in their chef uniform and the jury seated in front of them and building up the tension in the public.

And the winner of the competition is................................Chef Dino Jagtiani from St. Maarten. He won the moneyprize of $1500,- and some other gifts from the sponsors. One prize that made me jealous was the Riedel's Burgundy Grand Cru glass. Can you imagine drinking wine out of this glass?


However I can't compare it with last year's Amazon Flavors, because I didn't attend that one, but I believe this one must be better. And I base my opinion on these factors:

* Not only did the organizers invited foreign chefs to participate, even interested a Michelin chef to become part of the jury panel
* and not to forget our own Suriname's Yellow Gold, Borgoe, enjoyed in a different setting with Tan Bun skrati chocolates.
* Last but not least, the magical glasses of Riedel. It really opened my eyes to a whole new dimension to wine drinking.

Since this year's event has these highlights, it's only natural to think that the organizers will top this next year. I can't wait ....

Amazon Flavors, A culinary weekend to savor! - Food

For weeks, I'd been looking forward to what's going to happen during the Amazon Flavors and thinking that I'll have to read about the reactions in newspapers, newssites and on facebook. And thanks to my friend Jill-Joy Landburg, I got the opportunity to take part in the activities of the final day.

The day started at 6:00 am. Seriously, it's after a very long time that I woke up this early on a sunday. I felt like a junior on the morning of the schooltrip. So I arrived at 7:00 am sharp at Krasnapolsky. Only a handful of guests that were also waiting for the bus that'll bring us to Berg en Dal. And as promised we got our breakfast package in the bus. Probably because I really hoped to see a cup of coffee in my breakfast package, but I was pretty disappointed when I saw a white box handed to me.
The breakfast package was a pretty healthy one: 2 slices of  bread with cheese, a cupcake, a cooked egg, an apple and a juice.

We finally arrived in  1,5 hours at Berg en Dal. This is the schedule for the day:

In the Seafood Master Class, we had a guest speaker Mr. Waldring, the owner of Walvis. Although I'm not a fish lover, I had to admit that it was very interesting. Not only did he give us some advice on buying fish and the differences between a Bang Bang (Yellow Snapper) and the King fish, it was amazing how his assistant filet a fish of about 1 meter in less than 2 minutes. We even saw a shark jaw and a shark fin. Some of the pointers he gave were:

* the drier a fish, the more neutral a fish taste ( for people like me who doesn't like the fishy smell)
* if the fish is frozen, press with your finger in the fish and if it jumps back up, it's fresh.
* the King fish doesn't get skinned.
As an extra, every visitor got a bruschetta with bangbang filet. It was a nice gesture, but after the snack, my mouth felt so sour and the onion in it was a bit too much.

And since it's all about culinary, a chef's demonstration can't be missed. Mr. Jeroen Robberegt  was part of the jury in the Amazon Iron Chef Challenge. If you'd like to read more about him and his masterpieces, please check this site: http://receptenvantopchefs.nl/introductie.php?chef=Jeroen Robberegt.
It's always something seeing professionals in their act. The way he prepared everything seemed as if it is so simple and easy to make.

 
 He made tuna sashimi, rolled in black curry and brocolli couscous with caviar. Just to have an idea how fresh he cooks. Even the kroepoek (cracker) was freshly made and the tuna was freshly rolled in the black curry. Wonder what black curry is? The chef made it mixing curcuma with coal. The flavor is very mild, not the aggressive curry we're used to in Suriname, with a smoky twist.

For me the curry, however mild, was still a bit too much. I hardly tasted any tuna flavor if I took a bite with the black curry. The brocolli couscous was supposed to be sweet and sour, which I couldn't taste in it.  The krupuk was very crispy, but mine was still a bit oily and a strong fish taste to it.

Next to that, there was a potato/cassave puree and crab.
The puree was very good. Super moist, so soft that it seemed to melt in my mouth. Not much was done to the crab though.

After this we took a break since the 12 o'clock wine tasting was only for chefs. I sat at the dining area and had a nice view on the river. It's so calming and looking at it, I can only sigh and admire its natural beauty.

Because I was part of a media group, I had to pay nearly SRD 100,- (nearly US$30,-) for lunch. I don't hope people get me wrong here. I do pay these amounts for food, but if I pay this much, I do expect food that's a bit special. And it doesn't need to be lamb chop or angus beef,  but I at least expected something more special than fried rice and fried noodle. Probably because for most guests the lunch is included, but for such a culinary weekend, my expectations were pretty high.

 

 

Moksi Alesi Strey

Last week was the first break-through in my food critic path. I got invited to the 'Moksi Alesi Strey' organized by the Suriname Chefs Association.  It was a real honour to have an inside peek into the judges' job. From here out I'd like to thank Michael Hermelijn and Marieke Visser for this awesome invitation. Before I start with anything, let me introduce to you what "Moksi Alesi" really is about.

Literally moksi alesi means mixed rice. Its existence dates back to the slavery time when all the slaves got was some rice, a handful of veggies and hardly any meat. Everything got mixed together, so that every one could at least get something out of the ingredients with their rice. But nowadays, it's a favorite among many locals and tourists. The best combination is enjoying such a dish with a glass of ice-cold ginger beer and listening to some great songs of our late King of Kaseko, Lieve Hugo.


It is even said that this dish is quite national, because every ethnic group has its own moksi alesi. And indeed, I remember whenever my mom  had some meat and veggie leftovers, she would mix it with old rice to make it some kind of a fried rice. But even that can be considered moksi alesi.

Back to the Moksi Alesi Strey = Mixed Rice Competition.
The cooking would start at 11 am, so I was there already at 10:50. Probably too excited to see what's all going to happen, but of course, way too early. Some participants were already busy with preparing their mise en place (is a word commonly used in commercial kitchens for washing, cutting and preparing the raw ingredients ).

Like I said before, it's my first time and I really didn't know where to go or what to do until the participants were done cooking. Luckily my invitor walked  towards me and introduced me to some of the key persons of the association as well as the organizers. Where initially I was wondering how I was gonna fill up my 2 hours, walking with the judges makes these hours hardly noticeable.

There were 7 participants: Krasnapolsky, Thuksa, Waaldijkschool, 2 x family Lont,  Heave, Berg en Dal.
The first thing that I noticed was how big the difference was in heads per team. It was funny how one team had only 2-3 members and one with more than 10 members trying to make it work in a 3x3 space.

From all the participants, there were some who really stood out.  These are my opinions:

- Krasnapolsky had the best decoration compared to the other participants. The orange cloth really pop out and they decorated with lots of fruit and decor items. It showed that they really put effort in making a professional but yet stylish appearance.

- the group Thuksa had some memorable accents. They had an old coal pot, a natural fruit bowl and the old Surinamese flag. These features would really pop out if they'd put them on a wooden stool or art piece together. And not to be forgotten, the lady cooking in the creole traditional dress, koto.

- the Lont family cooked as if it's one of their weekend family cook-outs. The atmosphere was relaxed and what was really a nice feature was that they had a print-out of their dish with a little history of moksi alesi, a small description of their dish and the uniqueness of it.

After some observation, there were some things that the organizers might take into consideration for their next event.

• For such a street event, the numbers of visitors might be huge, so it would have been helpful if portable toilets were arranged.
• I saw first aid medical assistance, but haven't noticed other emergency units like the fire department and police. It's always better to be safe than sorry.
• Extra garbage bins would have been helpful or assigning persons to empty the street garbage bins.

There were 2 groups of judges: the floor jury and the tasting jury. The floor jury had the job to observe, oversee and evaluate the participants on:

• hygiene
• organization of the activities
• originality and decoration of the stand

That means that the jury had to really use all their senses (except their taste) to evaluate how everything is going. And I do mean it. They have to oversee what everyone is doing, smell if anything had an irrelevant smell, hear how the team members are communicating with each other and feeling the hot sun on their skin since it's held in the middle of the Domineestraat.


And if you think the tasting jury had a nice job, think again. I had the chance to also take part in tasting the submitted dishes. And seriously, I never thought I would find a disadvantage for becoming a food critic and I actually found one. Being part of the tasting jury also means that you really need to taste all the dishes and give it a score. Doesn't sound that bad, right?? Believe me, it does if you have to judge 8 different kinds of dishes and some even looking totally different than what you ever imagined of moksi alesi.

The criteria for the tasting committee were: appearance, creativity, taste and originality.
For the tasting part, I'm gonna give my opinion about some groups but in numbers like it was in the blind tasting. It'll be the only way I can give my honest opinion and not let some groups feel offended. In Suriname, we're a very small community, so I'd like to prevent putting some people in an awkward spot.

#1- they gave 2 dishes. One with bokking (red herring) and one with pork ribs. From one of these, the rice was obviously burned. The stench of burned rice was so overpowering that I only took a bite because it was part of the experience of being a jury. The other one was better; really had the nice aroma of bokking, but still didn't impress me.

#2- the presentation was good, but it smelled sour to me and the texture of the rice was mushy

#5- this group presented a well-balanced dish. The rice was not too dry, it tasted good and had BBQ chicken and liver sambal on it. However, the sambal did make me think of a Javanese dish with BBQ on it.

#7- I don't hope the ones who can find themselves back in this dish will feel offended, but this one was really the worst. The whole dish was mushy. The texture was somewhere between porridge and soft rice. It was a mixture with black-eyed peas and some kind of fish. It didn't look appealing let alone smelling and tasting it.

So for those of you who thought a tasting judge's job is fun and easy, you really should reconsider.

However originality is one of the criteria, but secretly I had hoped that one group would still stick with the authentic Creole Moksi Alesi.

Which Moksi Alesi would really make your day?

Time to Wine

Red wine comes in many varieties and have a great range in body. From the light bodied Gamay Noir (also known as the Beaujolais) to the full bodied Cabernet Sauvignon, they all have their own sophisticated flavors and elements.


Red wine is said to be complex and that's the reason why most people prefer White wines or Rose, because it's simpler to taste. For me, they all have their own thing, but I gotta admit that my palate is prefering the red more and more.

Last night, it's Time to Wine again! And to give you an idea of how much fun such a night can become, I started the night feeling a bit under the weather. Probably some stress from work or maybe the November rain, but I really felt as if I wasn't even looking forward to the wine class. Even having a thought like 'just get it over with', but at the end of the class, I forgot all about feeling ill or whatsoever. It's always a nice time discussing with my winemates. Even if it's about politics, the subject I hate most!

Anyway, don't want to keep you guys waiting any longer. We had a sort of blind tasting again. The instructor put two bottles of red in a paperbag and we were poured both in two different wineglasses.


The first wine we had was very strong in flavor and tannic. I was really trying hard to taste what's inside, but still can't get any aromas out of it yet.

The second one compared to the first, was like day and night. Just to give you an idea, the first one felt like heavy metal head banging and the second one was like 'the swan lake'. Totally different in feel, in taste,,,,in everything except that they're both red.

And I gotta say, it didn't feel that uneasy this time to do a blind tasting. And the wines were:

1. Trivento Malbec 2010

2. Beacon Hill Shiraz 2008



And in addition, we also had another red wine, which is known as a Meritage. A Meritage is a blend wine produced of 2-3 Bordeaux grapes. For many wine lovers, Bordeaux is known as the largest wine grape growing region in France. It is known for their fullbody reds like the Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Carmenere, Malbec and Cabernet Francs.


So, this one is called 'Arte Valduga'.
This one is a meritage of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Cabernet Francs. It was soft, easy on the palate and above all, we were all surprised that this great wine actually came from Brasil!
Most of all, I was so happy that I finally had a good read!! I tasted instantly the Cabernet Sauvignon in this! Yay,,,that's one step closer to becoming a wine expert! :D