The Inventory Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH) in the Netherlands contains ICH of which the communities, groups or individuals involved have written a safeguarding plan. Those plans are reviewed by an independent review committee. Every three years an evaluation of the safeguarding takes place.

Description

The word ‘Mop’ is regional language for cookie.

The Genuine Dalfsener Mop is baked with fine ground flour, butter from the Vecht valley and various herbs. After the dough has been kneaded, the cookies are placed on a baking tray by a special machine. An ingenious baking process guarantees the specific taste and odour that characterises the Genuine Dalfsener Mop.

The recipe of the Genuine Dalfsener Mop is a secret. The present baker, Van der Most Bakery, has signed a confidentiality obligation paper during the transmission by Frijling Bakery.

Centuries ago the Genuine Dalfsener Mop used to be sold mainly at fairs and markets; they are presently sold at the shops of Van der Most Bakery and various supermarkets in Dalfsen and surroundings. The tradition of buying and eating the Dalfsener Mop for diverse occasions is still followed. In earlier days the cookie was often merely bought to be given away as a present. Today people also buy the cookies for their own consumption.

 

Community

The birth of the Genuine Dalfsener Mop took place within the Frijling family. They have developed the recipe and the working procedure which came into the hands of the Van der Most Bakery at the transmission of the bakery in 2011.

For the inhabitants of Dalfsen the tradition of the Genuine Dalfsener Mop is a culinary speciality that is inextricably linked to their residence.

The Historical Circle Dalfsen keeps the archive holding the history and the visual material of the Genuine Dalsener Mop tradition.

 

History

The Dalfsener Mops probably date back to 1784. According to a family story, baker Gerrit Frijling made a mistake while baking cookies. In 1784 he shoved a tray into the oven on which balls of dough were lying. To all probability they were meant to become a small kind of gingerbread cookies, but it turned out differently. When Frijling opened the oven, he scented the odour of a product unknown to him. The cookies were smaller and much harder, but they smelled nice and tasted deliciously. He took them with him to the annual fair and called the new cookies ‘Dalfsener mops’.

The cookies were well-received by the public and the mops were quickly sold out. Following this success the competition tried to imitate the Dalfsener mops. However, the taste of the Dalfsener mop proved to be unmatchable. The competition did result in the renaming of the Dalfsener mop into ‘Genuine Dalfsener Mop’. At some point the Genuine Dalfsener Mops were sold throughout the Netherlands, except in the southern provinces. ‘Common’ people treated themselves and their families to this cookie. Nowadays the cookie is a luxury article and is more nationally available, but only with the baker who bakes the mops and several points of sale in the province of Overijssel.

Contact

Bakkerij van der Most
Schoolstraat 55
8152 AR
Lemelerveld
Overijssel
Website