Sinterklaas is the Dutch equivalent of Santa Claus, with a slight difference: his birthday (that is the day Dutch children receive their presents) is on the 5th December, or in some parts of the country on the morning of the 6th. He is known by the name of Sinterklaas but also as Sint-Nicolaas or De Goedheiligman. The traditions for celebration differ from region to region even in a small country as ours.
Sinterklaas leaves his palace in Spain and arrives in the Netherlands on his boat a few weeks before the 5th December. In Maastricht, this year he arrived on the 14th November. Perhaps you saw him and his Zwarte Pieten (helping hands) as well as his white horse (also on the boat!) arriving on the river Maas near the Servaasbrug (the old bridge in the centre of town) .
Once Sinterklaas has arrived in our country, children place their shoes in front of the fireplace before they go to bed. They sing a song and leave some bread, water and a carrot for the horse. Next morning – surprise!!– they find some candy and/or a little present in their shoes.
Of course children and adults alike eat lots of sweets and goodies these weeks. You can find them in almost all stores and supermarkets; they are overloaded with chocolate letters (you always receive the first letter of your name) pepernoten, speculaas, taai-taai, all based on the same gingerbread kind of dough.
Traditionally, the Zwarte Pieten (Sinterklaas’ helping hands) throw all kinds of candy, and one type is the pepernoten. Today we give you the very easy recipe for these little balls made out of a kind of gingerbread dough (which it is not, but that comes closest). The spices needed for this recipe are called speculaaskruiden (it cannot be translated since there is no English word for speculaas) and you can buy these in any supermarket, just mention it and the staff will be happy to help you.
Pepernoten
125 grams plain flour
125 grams butter
125 grams self-raising flour
80 grams brown sugar (basterdsuiker)
2 tbl sp water
Bit of salt
1 egg yolk (we don’t use the egg white)
1 tbsp of speculaaskruiden
½ tsp of ground cinnamon
Mix all ingredients well together and form a round shape. Leave it to rest for at least one hour in the refrigerator. Grease a baking tin with butter. Take a bit of the dough of about the size of a teaspoon and shape these bits into marbles. Put all your marbles on your baking tin and make sure you leave enough space between them. Bake the in a preheated oven on 160 degrees Celsius for about 20 minutes or until golden brown.