Cold pink soup

While Morel’s Restaurant and Café has a pretty standard menu over the years, cold pink soup and mooncakes were very recent surprises.

The cold soup is simply delicious, called Šaltibarščiai, or cold borscht with kefir. Lithuanian Cuisine. It is not yet on the normal menu.

Kefir or kephir, is a fermented milk drink similar to a thin yogurt that is made from kefir grains, a specific type of mesophilic symbiotic culture. The drink originated in the North Caucasus, Eastern Europe and Russia, where it is prepared by inoculating cow, goat, or sheep milk with kefir grains. It’s made by pouring milk over kefir grains, which are a cluster of bacteria and yeast. After about 24 hours, the microorganisms inside the kefir grains multiply and ferment the sugars in the milk.

Šaltibarščiai – cold pink soup
Kefir is not available everywhere, buttermilk with a little bit more lemon juice is a good alternative, or any mix of yogurt, buttermilk, and sour cream. This soup is best made ahead, as it needs a few hours to develop more flavor.
Ingredients

• 1 liter kefir
• 2 medium red beets, cooked
• 2-3 green onions, chopped
• salt and pepper
• fresh dill
• 1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and cut into ½-inch pieces
• 4 hard cooked eggs, peeled
• 4 medium potatoes, cooked and peeled

It is one of the many recipes on the Internet. More, see:
https://www.culturesforhealth.com/learn/recipe/milk-kefir-recipes/cold-borscht-kefir/
and
https://myfoododyssey.com/2013/09/21/lithuanian-saltibarsciai-cold-beet-soup-recipe/

Special mooncakes

I was a bit surprised to learn that Morel’s is making mooncakes. I checked the packing, pretty ingenious and efficient, two per box. I tasted one of the different varieties and it was a pleasant experience. The outside is not so dry and hard as the normal Chinese ones, it is a bit like croissant, the filling is soft and moist.
A new type of mooncake, approved! For sale, two pieces for RMB 28.

Netherlands Embassy

On Sunday 13 September 2020 we had the NVP Garden Buffet as a “welcome back” event, in the Dutch embassy. I am a member of the NVP, the “Nederlandse Vereniging Peking“, some other Flemish friends are also member.
The NVP has been very active and once again the buffet in the garden of the embassy was a success, with some 100 people participating, including many children who had a great time.

It was also the last event with our friend Willem as the president of the NVP. He has done a wonderful job and hopefully the new incoming team can continue the good work.
Catering was by Morel’s Restaurant, a guarantee for good and copious food to satisfy everybody. As our friend Renaat needed help, I happily volunteered to help Willem and Renaat.

It is always an interesting experience to see how much preparation and work is involved to set up a buffet and make the guests happy. Willem thought of everything for the setup, Renaat and his team was efficient as always. A great experience!

Belgian buffet

Thanks to the Dutch ambassador for letting the NVP organize the buffet in the embassy, that also has a nice big kitchen. In his speech, the ambassador thanked Willem for his work with the NVP.

We were lucky with the weather: not too hot, blue sky, a nice sun.
See the pictures of the preparation and of the buffet.