Kruidnootjes

Dutch Delight: Kruidnootjes

Periodically, EM reviews typical Dutch food products together with EUR international students. This edition, Doménica Salazar from Ecuador tastes and reviews kruidnootjes.

Doménica is a first year IBA student at Rotterdam School of Management.

The product

At the outset, kruidnootjes look like the perfect delicacy to be tasted by Doménica. “I am a person that likes sweet stuff”, she says. And she notes that apart from being rather small and having a ‘weird texture’, the cookies look like they will taste good.

“Hmm… they taste delicious!”, Doménica remarks right after eating the first one. In particular, she notes the dominant taste of cinnamon in the cookie, which she likes. The kruidnootjes remind Doménica of the cookies her grandmother used to bake, the difference being that kruidnootjes are much smaller and not flat. “So, these cookies are not completely new to me”, she adds with a blink.

Doménica considers kruidnootjes the perfect dish to eat as dessert after lunch or dinner. In terms of labeling the delicacy with a score she is either enormously gracious, or she is simply in love with kruidnootjes: she grants them 5 out of 5 stars. Although she hints a bit on the first option: “I am not sure whether I am completely objective now. Whenever a dish tastes sweet, I tend to like it.”

The product

Kruidnootjes are small, cookie-like delicacies, and are usually consumed in the period up to the Sinterklaas celebrations. Sinterklaas is a typical Dutch celebration for kids, where children recieve presents, and special delicacies are consumed, such as pepernoten and marsepein, next to kruidnoten. The cookies are made of a dough that is prepared from wheat flour and gingerbread spices. The latter being a mix of cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, ginger powder, cardamom, and white pepper. Previously, kruidnootjes were incorrectly called pepernoten, which is also a cookie-like confectionary, but has a tougher structure. However, the incorrect naming has become that common in The Netherlands, that the term pepernoten has become somewhat synonymous for kruidnoten. LJa