Amsterdam is a city rich in food traditions, with historic flavors from its former colonial empire joined to strong local traditions of seafood and stews and soups, and mixed with cosmopolitan additions of the recent decades.
Our guide, waiting for the group to arrive.
So, any attempt at getting more than a small taste of the city will go well beyond a few hours of a food tour, but even though the tour we took last summer, in the Jordaan neighborhood, covered almost none of our Dutch favorites of previous years, it covered quite a bit of tasty territory.
Our first stop was at Cafe ‘t Papeneiland, said to be the oldest cafe in the Jordaan; it’s well over 100 years old, but it’s recipe for apple pie, which we tried, is twice the age. Warm and rich flavor, flaky crust. It’s the only dish made on premises.
The building it’s in has a story, too. The name means Papists’ Island, and it was in an area that remained strongly Catholic during the 17th-century Reformation. Public worship in Catholic churches was forbidden, and ‘secret’ churches developed behind closed doors. A tunnel beneath the present cafe building leads to a hidden church on the opposite side of the canal.
You can’t really think of the Netherlands (the tourism folks are trying to kill Holland, which actually is the name of only part of the country) without thinking of cheese. Gouda (which, it turns out, is pronounced how-da) and Edam come first to mind but there are many others including the notoriously rich and smelly Limburger. We didn’t get to Limburger, but were able to sample Gouda at several different ages, some not pasteurized. Amazing variety of flavor!
The name wasn’t lying on this place: Lekkernijen means ‘yummyness’ or to be more formal, treats.
Our next stop was definitely a treat for the carnivores among us; at Frans Louman, the only plant-based thing I saw was the wooden board our tastes were served on.
Unlike many of the trendy cafes and shops that have developed in the Jordaan in the past two or three decades, Louman has been there since 1890, when it was one of the city’s poorest and grittiest areas.
The area also has several street markets, held on different days; this Saturday one on the Lindengracht is one of the larger ones.
No, that’s not an ice-cream cone; it’s a trade sign set into the wall of a house once owned by a family in the laundry and bleaching trade. That’s a coil of linen in a wicker basket.
Much of the Netherlands borders the sea, in fact much of the Netherlands was the sea before the Dutch drained large areas for farmland. So a robust seafood aspect to the food is expectable. At first glance, I thought the sign showed wrists in handcuffs, but after reading that ‘oysters are rich in ‘Vitamin Sea,’ I looked again and saw the oyster-shucking knife…
Zeewater, or literally Sea Water, is another Jordaan old-timer, from 1880. It sells a wide variety of fresh, smoked and cooked fish dishes as well as, yes, oysters. But no mermaids.
We got our samples here, too. Above, when you’re in business for 140 years, you get written up a few times…
Swieti Sranang carries on traditions from two long-time Dutch colonies, Indonesia and Dutch Guyana, now Surinam. Actually, that’s not really a long stretch since under Dutch colonial rule, many Indonesians and other Asians migrated to Surinam. If you’re looking at the sign and wondering where Afhaal is and what its cuisine is…don’t. It’s Dutch for ‘take-out.’
Our guide claims it’s the best Indonesian food in the city, which is a pretty big claim for a city with a long riistafel tradition and a large community of people from the former Dutch East Indies, but I wouldn’t argue. The chicken satay with peanut sauce and vegetables that we tasted was one of my favorites ever.
At the New Amsterdam Spray Water Factory, to be literal in the translation, the enthusiast owner sells a variety of beverages, including old-fashioned seltzer water in the.. well, in spray bottles. The owner restores old bottles, but the classics don’t leaves the premises.
And a stop for Stroepwafeln. At Tom’s Bread and other places that make them by hand on-site, they are much softer and more flavorful than the ones that come in supermarket packages or with airline breakfasts.
We didn’t visit Healthy Belly, and it might just be too ‘healthy’ for my taste, but their sign outside has a sense of humor about the struggle between what you want and what’s good for you. Below it, a sample of cultural diversity: A Japanese pancake shop.
Our last stop was at Cafe ‘t Smalle, in a building that used to be a distillery. It hasn’t really left that trade; it’s now a comfortable and pleasant bar specializing in genever, the juniper-flavored Dutch drink that is the ancestor of London dry gins. With our sample drink, we got another Amsterdam favorite, poffertjes. These are small yeast pancakes made with buckwheat flour and served with melted butter and sugar. On previous visits to Amsterdam, we’ve eaten them from street carts; it hadn’t occurred to me that they would be served indoors!
This picture was our one-clue mystery this week, brilliantly solved by frequent solver George G. I would have settled for ‘Amsterdam’ or ‘Netherlands’ (or maybe even ‘Holland’), but George followed a trail of small clues and actually located Cafe ‘t Smalle. If you’re curious how, read on!
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