MING: This week on Simply Ming, we're on the road, this time in Amsterdam, known as the city of bikes.

Did you know there's over a million bicycles in this town, which is four times more than the number of cars?

I'm here today to cook with Chef Rudolph van Veen.

Together, we'll taste some fantastic Indonesian food, then we'll cook up some Indonesian desserts.

In the Netherlands, every household has, once a week, Indonesian foods.

And when it's a party, it's rice table.

MING: He'll be making a traditional Indonesian cake, and I'll be making a mango-pineapple croustade.

You want it GB and D, right?

You want to get that nice color on it.

GB and D?

MING: Golden brown and delicious.

(van Veen laughs) How do you say that in Dutch?

(speaking Dutch) MING: It's all coming up, right now, here on Simply Ming.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ MING: I'm here in downtown Amsterdam, on PC Hooftstraat, apparently the Rodeo Drive of Amsterdam, in front of Sama Sebo, which apparently is the best Indonesian restaurant.

And here I'm supposed to meet Chef Rudy, who's going to show me about Indonesian food.

Chef, Ming Tsai.

Chef Ming, welcome to the Netherlands!

So proud to have you here.

MING: Thank you.

I'm so excited.

I love your shows.

MING: Thank you very much.

Can I introduce you to my friend Daniel?

MING: Daniel, Ming Tsai, good to see you.

Nice to meet you, sir.

MING: Pleasure.

So, you're obviously the chef-owner?

Chef-owner, family owned, since 50 years, my father and mother started here.

MING: Congratulations.

We're still doing it, and... MING: Awesome.

Can I ask you to come in for a beer and maybe a rijsttafel?

MING: Rijsttafel, rice table, the best way to eat.

Let's do it.

Let's go!

Please.

MING: Thank you.

Dankjewel.

Oh, my God, chef, look at this.

This is "Welcome to the Netherlands," and you know what is funny?

MING: I love rice tables.

It might not be typical Dutch, but somehow it is.

Indonesia was a Dutch colony.

MING: Right.

For almost 150 years.

So we see this as our... well, one of our favorite cuisines.

In the Netherlands, every household has, once a week, Indonesian foods.

And when it's a party, it's rice table.

MING: Okay.

Yeah, it's a little rice, little bit rice, but many more... MING: Okay, I'll start, I'll put... And so, please, tell me, what do we have here?

Ah, sure, well, at the back, it's the satay.

MING: Okay.

And satay is with peanut sauce.

MING: Awesome.

And we even have, like.

lamb satay which is great, and omelet... MING: I'm going in.

Sambal buncis, everybody loves.

This is just green beans with sambal and shrimp paste.

Of course, tofu; this is frikadeller.

I know you want to try this.

MING: Yeah!

This table.

MING: So this is, uh...

So this is the real deal, with potato... MING: Minced meat and potato?

Minced meat, half pork, half beef, and then with potato.

MING: Oh, my God, oh, my God.

A rice table is something Dutch, because the Dutch people, when they were in Indonesia, they just want... they didn't know what to order.

They didn't know about the names of all the different dishes, of course.

MING: Right.

So, they'd say, "We want rice with a little bit of everything."

MING: Hmm, so what about dessert?

Mmm.

Actually, after this, you should try the spekkoek.

MING: Spekkoek?

We finish this, and then I bake you a spekkoek, right?

MING: Awesome.

That's a promise.

MING: All right, so we're going to eat, and then we're going to bake.

That's good.

MING: Proost to you.

Proost to you.

MING: Proost.

MING: All right, chef, so what's your dish?

Spekkoek.

MING: Spekkoek.

Which is a cake, and a cake that looks like spek, or bacon.

So... MING: Looks like bacon!

Light and dark layers, really.

MING: Oh, like spek, like in a charcuterie.

And you know what's great?

It's very popular in the Netherlands.

MING: Okay.

And spekkoek is sometimes sold by bakers, but also by butcher shops.

MING: But there's no meat in this cake?

No, not at all.

MING: No meat, okay.

We start with butter, 250 grams.

MING: Okay, all right.

250 grams of powdered sugar.

MING: Quarter kilo.

Times... yeah, got to do the math.

28 ounces in a... 28 grams in an ounce.

That's powdered sugar, okay?

I take half of the powdered sugar, because it's going to be very fine, and we just cream it.

MING: Cream it?

Just stir it slowly, because it's going to of course... MING: Yeah, you don't want it to go everywhere.

You get a lot of fuss, so... easy.

Yeah, but that's just in the beginning.

It doesn't matter.

MING: Right.

Just slowly.

The rest of the powdered sugar is for the egg yolks.

MING: Okay.

Because next to the butter and the sugar, we... MING: And this is a classic Indonesian... Indonesian homestyle cake.

Indonesian people always make this cake, and it became so popular in the Netherlands too.

MING: All right, that looks nice and creamed, right?

Okay, now we're going to add egg yolks.

MING: Okay.

We need ten egg yolks.

MING: Okay.

And eight egg whites.

MING: Want me to separate this for you?

Sure, please.

MING: Ten egg yolks, and... Yeah.

MING: All right, so you have... that's why you have, you have two egg yolks there already.

And then I'm going to add some vanilla.

When I use vanilla pods, they are so expensive.

MING: Right.

When I empty them, I, I add some vodka... MING: Vodka!

And then I let it rest for at least six months, in the dark.

And then you have a natural vanilla extract, which is homemade.

MING: Interesting.

That's from, from vanilla pods that are already being used.

MING: From real vanilla pods.

Yeah.

MING: All right, so you add that to the cream.

A little more, because it's Chef Ming.

(Ming laughs) In Amsterdam.

MING: Appreciate that, all right.

So when I worked at Fauchon in Paris, we would have to do, like, 100 egg yolks.

But if the chef saw us do it, Pierre Hermé saw us do this, he would be so mad.

All right, so this looks good.

Yeah.

MING: What else goes in here?

Does anything else go in here, or you're done here?

The egg yolks.

MING: All of them?

One at a time.

MING: One at a time, I'll start with these two.

A little faster?

Yeah, you can do it.

MING: Okay.

So ten yolks and then egg whites, right?

Yeah.

MING: One at a time.

Bloop.

Okay.

Keep going, chef, this is good?

Fantastic.

Now we wait a little.

MING: Yep, that's seven.

Wait until it's, it's, it's... MING: Well incorporated?

Yeah.

MING: Yep.

And then some more.

MING: Last egg?

Do we not need to wait so long?

MING: Yeah, all right.

Okay, I took a 20-centimeter spring mold... MING: More, chef, you want to get it whipped or not?

Uh, should be light and fluffy.

MING: Yeah, okay, I'll let it go.

So spring mold has what, butter, flour?

Uh, no, this is your powdered sugar.

MING: Oh, that's the extra powdered sugar, okay.

So, it's a baking paper underneath... MING: Okay.

That's just for safety.

MING: Got it.

We have our egg whites.

MING: Okay.

With the rest of the powdered sugar.

MING: Okay.

All at once, interesting, all right.

Yeah.

MING: This looks awesome, chef.

Just before we're going to use the machine... we can do that by hand, if you'd like.

MING: Right, just to start it?

(laughs): If you do.

MING: Yeah, yeah, it only takes 20 minutes by hand.

Sure.

MING: How's this looking, chef?

Ah, that's fantastic.

MING: That looks great, right?

It's actually done, yeah, let's swap them.

MING: Look at this, amazing.

It's nice.

MING: That is some good-looking buttercream.

You just, you just... MING: Show me.

Ah, the whole thing.

Okay.

Okay.

MING: This is a great little mixer.

And then... it is.

Very fast.

MING: Snaps in, there we go.

Okay, this piece.

MING: Okay, now let's stir it in.

You can do it high speed.

MING: High speed, straight off?

Yeah.

MING: Okay.

Just easy, and even if you don't have an electric mixer, you might have an, a handheld mixer.

MING: Right.

That will be fine too.

MING: So this is going to take four minutes, probably, right?

Yeah, yeah.

MING: All right, so we... Just like shaving foam.

MING: Yeah.

More or less.

MING: So come back in four minutes when this egg white's... you going to soft-peak stage, I assume?

Yeah, yeah, yes.

MING: All right, we're going to combine this, we're going to make some spekkoek?

Spekkoek.

MING: Spekkoek.

Four minutes, stick around.

Yeah.

MING: All right, chef, it's been four minutes, how's that look?

Yeah, that's good, fantastic.

MING: Yeah?

Okay.

Like shaving foam.

MING: Yes, it looks like it.

All right, here we go, and then...

Thank you.

MING: Just pull this out, right?

Yeah, sure.

MING: Okay, there we go.

Thank you.

And now we have two mixtures.

MING: Okay, here you go.

Lighten this mixture up.

First try to make it like family, you know, not, not putting all egg whites in at once, MING: Right.

Because then it's more difficult to, to mix.

MING: So lighten up the buttercream first.

Even when it's too sticky, you know?

MING: Right.

You have pieces of butter.

use a whisk... MING: Right, yeah.

and then just quickly stir to make it smooth, okay?

MING: Okay.

Love the tips, oh, yeah, look at that.

That's very nice.

Smoother.

MING: Yep.

And now the rest of the egg white.

MING: Okay.

And then some flour, 100, about 25 grams-- MING: All the rest?

All the rest.

MING: Okay.

And just mix it through, with flour, and that's the basic cake batter.

Vanilla.

MING: Yeah, love it.

And then, the spices come in.

MING: There you go, chef.

Thank you.

MING: It's so important not to... at this point, you're trying to keep it lighter, so you don't want to whisk it again, right?

Yeah, no.

MING: And then the flour at the very end, and that's just all-purpose?

All-purpose flour will be fine, yeah, sure.

It's already sifted.

MING: Right.

So first, half.

MING: Which is key, sift your flour.

You can't have those little pieces.

Yeah.

And then the rest.

MING: Okay.

Yeah, and then the spices.

and with spices, you can go wild if you like.

MING: Right.

You can... you can use as many spices as you like.

In the Netherlands we have a mixed spice called speculaas.

MING: Speculaas.

We also cookies called speculaas, or spekulatius.

MING: Wow.

Which is a mixture of cinnamon, nutmeg... MING: Clove?

Clove is in, ginger... MING: Ginger, right?

It's very similar to five-spice.

Yes, it is, yes.

MING: Which is, actually, my tart is going to have five-spice, so.

It's speculaa?

Speculaas, Speculaas.

MING: Speculaas.

So it's, it's a mixed spice.

Now I'm going to divide this batter in half.

MING: Okay.

Because one half, we're going to leave plain.

MING: Right.

And the other half will be mixed with spices.

MING: Love it.

The main ingredient, actually... MING: So two, two-layer cake.

Yes.

Well, it's not only two layers, it's a minimum of eight.

MING: Eight-layered cake!

Like I said, two-times-four layer cake.

Oh, you, you bake, bake, bake?

Okay.

So would you like to add spices?

MING: Sure.

In my recipe, normally, I would say one tablespoon-- please-- of speculaas.

So the mixed spice.

MING: That's a heaping teaspoon.

All this?

Yeah, all.

MING: Okay.

Yeah, sure, yes.

More?

I think so, yes, yes.

MING: Yeah, okay.

Which is a lot.

MING: It seems like a lot.

Your house will smell fantastic if you make this.

MING: I wish this was my house.

One small teaspoon of extra cinnamon.

MING: Okay.

Wow, that's really getting dark.

Yeah.

It's getting darker because a good teaspoon of clove powder.

MING: Clove too, wow.

Very strong.

Some cardamom.

MING: It's a very savory layer, right?

Yeah, yeah.

MING: So it's like the meal we just had.

And cardamom, okay.

Here's half a teaspoon of cardamom.

And then finally some nutmeg.

So you can use powdered nutmeg or, just, grate it fresh.

MING: Which, such a difference, right?

It is.

MING: When you grate nutmeg, I mean, yeah, that smells like Christmas now.

Ciao.

MING: Okay.

It's very inviting if you have friends coming over in your house, and you make a spekkoek.

MING: All right, now what?

Okay, now we have two mixtures.

And the oven is set to 170 Celsius.

MING: So, 350.

Yeah.

MING: Right around 350.

Yeah.

Then the first layer, you use a spoon, you use, like, more or less, the same spoon, the same size.

You can use a ladle or whatever.

MING: Okay.

Okay.

Just to make it more easy.

MING: Got it.

And then you start with the first layer of the white mixture.

MING: Okay.

And just spread it out.

The first layer is, might not be the easiest one, because the next layer, when I take this out of the oven... MING: Right.

This will be hot.

So if you ladle the next layer on... MING: And... psh, it spreads out for you.

It will spread more easy.

MING: Interesting.

So this is just like, two tablespoons, could be three tablespoons.

MING: So like a centimeter.

Of the white layer, yes.

MING: Right.

And now it just bakes.

MING: Why this is... And what happens, if you go to the oven.

MING: Yeah.

I first bake this in the center of the oven.

MING: Okay.

Because we need heat from underneath, from the bottom, and from the top.

MING: Up top, and sides, right.

When this layer is done... MING: Right.

I'm only going to use the top heat of the oven.

Because... MING: You don't want the bottom to burn.

The bottom layer will stay in the oven, if we have eight layers, of eight times ten minutes.

so that's a long time.

MING: Wow, that's 80 minutes.

So you don't burn it, okay.

Yeah.

MING: So this is ten minutes?

Yes, ten minutes.

MING: All right.

Just in the center of the oven.

MING: Okay, Ten minutes.

Stick around.

All right.

MING: Ooh, GB and D, baby, look at that!

The first, starting to smell, but not so good yet, because this is only the plain.

MING: Okay.

This will give you more smell, more aroma.

MING: I mean, literally...

Same amount.

MING: You have five spices plus four others.

This is like nine spices.

Yeah, yeah.

And now you just spread this out.

MING: While it's hot, it helps it spread easily.

Yeah, yeah, more easy.

MING: And then, same thing.

Same oven temp.

Same over temp.

MING: I love the tip, but the top shelf now.

Yeah.

MING: Because you don't want the bottom to cook.

All right.

MING: Beautiful.

And another ten minutes.

MING: But now, top shelf, so no heat... Yeah, only top heat.

MING: So only top heat, so it cooks, because we don't want the bottom to burn.

Yes, because the oven will still be warm.

MING: Right.

And the bottom layer will still have some more temperature.

MING: So that's key.

To protect it.

MING: Otherwise your bottom layer's going to be burned.

Yeah, or too dry, at least.

MING: Too dry, no good.

Ten more minutes.

MING: All right, chef, let's see what this is.

Oh, yeah, look at that.

You know, each layer, just should be look, like, baked and dry.

If you just touch it... MING: Oh, yeah.

It's like baby skin, isn't it?

MING: It is, it's so soft.

Yeah.

MING: So now, another layer.

Here, I'll do this.

Yes, please.

MING: And because... Don't bake it too dry.

You see how it melts?

MING: Yeah, now it melts and spreads out so easily.

All right, so then we're going to do this totally, until the batter runs out, right?

Yeah.

MING: So it could be eight, ten layers?

At least eight, or... but you don't throw any batter away.

You just continue doing it until the mold is totally full.

Best... although it smells fantastic, but best is to serve this when it's chilled.

MING: Chilled, okay.

Overnight, or at the end of the day.

MING: Is that, that's okay?

Because it will spread out, right?

Yeah, thanks.

MING: Okay.

Put it in the oven.

MING: Awesome.

And then, chef, I know, because you're a pro, you have one that you've already done that's now chilled, right?

Yeah, otherwise you would wait too long.

MING: Okay, so how long has this chilled out?

Overnight.

MING: Overnight.

At least half a day.

MING: Because it just settles and solidifies.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

MING: Okay.

Although it smells fantastically when it's warm, but... MING: Right.

Oh, you can smell it everywhere in the kitchen.

And now let's pull it off.

MING: Awesome.

And it's served, just, plain.

but it only will be... you know, it reveals itself when you, when you cut it... MING: When you slice into it.

And then you see all the layers, so.

MING: I can't wait.

Ah, wait a little minute.

MING: 80-minute cake, an 80-minute cake.

All right, chef, before we get to eat this, I'm going to make a quick little tart with some exotic fruit.

Oh, lovely.

MING: You'll help me out?

The pineapple?

MING: The pineapple, and the mango.

Tart, stick around.

♪ ♪ MING: Rudolph, can't wait to try that cake, it looks so good!

Well, what about this?

MING: So, we're doing...

I love mango and pineapple, right?

They're great fruits, and when I think of Indonesia, I think of those islands and...

Ripe fruits, yes.

MING: Yeah.

so if you could just mince me about a tablespoon, heaping, of ginger, and we're going to do slices of mango and slices of pineapple.

I'm doing an exotic fruit croustade, right?

Wow.

MING: So we're first going to take flour and butter and all of these spices.

So we have... you have your great, kind of, this demerara brown, or light brown sugar.

This is five-spice, right, this is a Chinese five-spice, a little... it's regular table sugar, and some salt, all right?

So we're going to butter this first.

I mean, not cream the butter, but in little pieces, right, so classic pastry.

We'll put in some of the sugar.

Put in...

I'm going to put in two pinches of five-spice, maybe three, that should be plenty.

Regular sugar, pinch of salt.

And then the hard.

So this will be a pie dough.

MING: This is a pie dough, right.

Then hard butter.

Yeah.

MING: Out of the, out off the freezer or fridge, nice and hard.

And we just want to, again, very slowly, because you know flours, flour comes up.

We want to get the butter into little, little pieces, right?

And that... we'll go a little faster.

So, as you know, when you make pâte sucrée or pâte brisée, any type of pie dough, you never want to cream the butter.

You want little pieces, because then the butter will melt away, that's what makes a tender crust, right?

That, actually, the butter melts away, the butter flavor stays, but the water evaporates, and that's what puffs up the crust.

Right.

MING: Right, so we're just looking for little pieces here.

And while that's going, I'm going to just take one egg yolk and a little bit of milk, and this is going to be our liquid, that we'll add.

We'll add to this once we have the butter nice and small.

You can go a little bit faster.

How fine do you want your ginger?

MING: Yeah, that's perfect right there, chef.

You can dump that whole thing in the bowl.

So I'm just making a gingered fruit, right?

Right.

MING: Just a little bit smaller.

Mango.

MING: And you can't really, you know, like your tart, you can't really... your cake, you can't rush, that takes 80 minutes, right?

No.

MING: Here you just, you just can't... you don't want to get your hands in there, because your hands are warm, right?

You want this machine, which doesn't have warm hands... Yeah.

MING: To break the butter down.

You can see they're like, they're big pieces, right?

They're still the size of a dime of a quarter.

I'm really going for like a pea.

Pea-size.

All right, so that's looking good.

Oh, this mango is so ripe.

MING: Beautiful mango.

All right, so there.

So now I can add a... just slowly add a little bit of this, this is the milk-egg mixture.

Add that on the side.

All right.

That's looking good.

So I just have some plastic sheets here, right?

Because I want this, this has to rest a little bit.

All right, so that's perfect.

So now we can take this out.

I have your oven at 180 Celsius, okay?

MING: Perfect, yeah, perfect.

All right, so take this dough out, like this.

And here you want to-- you know this, chef-- you want to just let it rest about 20 minutes or so.

Just make it into a disc, a flat disc like this.

And then... Long slices like this?

MING: Perfect.

Yeah?

MING: yeah.

It's very ripe, so really soft.

MING: All right, so we're going to throw this now in the fridge, let this rest 20 minutes.

Finish with cutting the fruit, and then we'll pop this croustade in the oven.

Stick around.

All right, chef, so, gets a little bit firmer, right?

Yeah, great.

MING: So what we're going to do, a little bench flour.

Nice job with the fruit dish, chef.

Pretty good.

And what we're going to do is just roll it out.

This is, you know, this is an oblong shape, doesn't matter if... it's not going to be perfectly round, right?

I'm looking for...

It's the perfect home recipe, right?

Because everybody can make this.

You don't need any mold or... MING: No, and you can use any fruit: apples, peaches, plums.

Yeah.

MING: Right.

And like yours, it gets, it gets a nice little color, right?

Yeah.

MING: Right?

So... and it's a pretty delicate dough, so you really don't want, um, you don't want to spread it too thin, because it'll break on you, right?

So then, what you try to do then, is lightly take this off... Want a spatula?

MING: I think, yeah, maybe a spatula.

Yeah, maybe a spat.

Yeah, a little stuck, thank you.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's what people in their homes sometimes do, is they push too firmly with the rolling pin, and then... MING: So here's a trick, right.

Use your rolling pin, go around it, and then I lay it back on.

Fantastic.

MING: Okay, bring this over here.

What do you want with the filling, chef?

MING: So, we'll add... here, we'll just add a little... Flour?

MING: Flour, just like, because there's so much liquid in these fruit, right?

No extra sugar, right?

MING: No extra sugar.

No, I don't think we need more sugar.

The mango is really sweet.

You know, it falls, it almost falls apart.

MING: So here we can make it just a little bit thinner.

So good, ginger.

MING: Awesome, I love the ginger.

Mango, pineapple, that's it.

MING: So I'm not going to put it all in for now, I don't want to overstuff it, but let's see how this, see about two-thirds of it.

Mm-hmm.

MING: Because you can't... oh, we can go a little bit more.

Yeah?

Yeah, the rest of the mango.

All right, that's perfect.

All right, okay.

So here, very simple, just fold.

Yeah.

MING: Very rustic, right?

Fold like this, fold, pleat it, fold, pleat it.

Ideal recipe for first-time bakers, I would say, this.

MING: Right?

It's not that hard.

Yeah, yeah.

MING: Whisk that for me here, chef, will you, please?

Sure.

MING: I'm going to grab a... you have a pastry brush here, chef?

I'm sure you do.

I have, of course.

MING: You have everything here.

It's a great kitchen.

Here.

MING: Thank you.

So then what we're doing is just egg-washing the edge, because you want it, you want it GB and D, right?

You want to get that nice color on it.

GB and D?

MING: Golden brown and delicious.

Come on, how do you say that in Dutch?

(speaking Dutch) MING: (speaking Dutch) That's GB and D?

Yeah.

If you say it fast, you almost sound Dutch.

(laughing) MING: All right, and then we have... you have this other sugar, this is... Yeah, the brown sugar, yeah.

MING: Fantastic.

Just to have a little sugar crust.

Nice, caramelization.

MING: Yeah, and it looks nice, and it, of course, this is that little bit of sugar that you were... We're marking.

All right, I think this looks great, chef.

So this is 3... 350, and about, at least 20 minutes.

Okay.

MING: Okay, could go up to half an hour.

Looking forward to it.

MING: Here we go, croustade.

Bye-bye.

Thank you.

Wow.

MING: 20 minutes.

MING: All right, chef, let's eat, shall we?

Yes, we do.

MING: All right, I'm going to cut you a little slice of this tart.

Oh, yeah.

Fantastic, for you.

Wow.

MING: Cut me a slice as well.

Oh, these look good.

This is a cake you could easily eat, just by hand, of course, but.

MING: Okay, yeah, I'm going to do that.

Fantastic.

MING: Look at that, that's perfect.

Cheers.

Cheers to you.

And thanks for visiting the Netherlands.

MING: Oh, wow.

Moist, delicious-- savory, sweet, savory, sweet, awesome.

Yeah.

And it's borrowed from Indonesia, so it's... is it Dutch?

Well, it's a little bit cheating, of course.

It's the Indonesian influence.

MING: Well, there's so many Indonesians here, right?

I mean... so, by the way, pretty good, chef.

This is out of his book, Rudolph's Bakery.

It's exactly, exactly, actually... Oh.

MING: You're literally, you literally made the same thing.

That's awesome.

How's the tart?

Oh, fantastic.

This should be in, in the next book.

Oh, it's such a great idea, this is one of the simplest cakes you can make.

MING: Yeah, yeah.

It's awesome to have after a dinner party.

MING: And the similarities between your spice for the cookies, spekukl?

Hmm?

MING: What's it called?

Speculaas.

MING: Speculaas and five spice is almost identical.

Five-spice has what, fennel and citron and peppercorn, but this smell of Christmas... Yeah.

MING (sniffs): It's fantastic.

Yes, sir.

MING: Cheers to you.

Come over for Christmas again.

MING: Yes, I would love to.

Thank you so much.

Thank you, Chef Ming.

Dankjewel, really delicious stuff.

Say hi to Boston.

MING: Yeah, I will.

And to all you out there, dankjewel... dankjewel?

Dankjewel.

MING: Dankjewel.

Thank you very much, and as always, peace and good eating.

Mmm, so juicy.