Food, Glorious Food!

Food is one of those subjects that everyone is curious about in other countries. We can’t (and don’t like) to go long without it so it’s always on our minds and we romanticize the idea of eating exotic and novel foods. However, as our world is often a melting pot of mixed cultures and ethnicities, food tends to become a blend as well. Here in The Netherlands, we can find the influences of several cultures in the food and there are plenty of choices of foods from around the world to select from. You can find the presence of Italian, Greek, Turkish, Chinese, Indonesian, Vietnamese, Japanese, Indian, North African, Spanish, Surinamese, Brazilian, Mexican (and I mean really authentic Mexican), Afghanie and more here in The Netherlands. Many of these foods, such as Turkish food, have made their way into Dutch food culture by way of a large immigrant population in the country or through past colonization connections such as with Indonesian and Surinamese food. But while there is a plethora of cultural foods to choose from, if you venture into any non ethnic restaurant, you can be sure to find a few things.

1. Many restaurants do not serve breakfast. They may be open for coffee and other drinks but often food is not served until noon. Of the ones that do serve breakfast, don’t think you will find pancake, bacon and egg platters, my American friends. You are more likely to find some sort of bread-maybe sweet, maybe with jam and butter, maybe with some ham and cheese, but whatever it is, it will likely be simple.
2. Like many places in Europe, you are choosing between sparkling and still water, and it most likely is not free. A few places will do tap water but they may still charge you for the glass.
3. Lunch is usually a simple affair. The Dutch love broodje-an open face sandwich with a topping such as carpaccio, cheese or salmon. They also love a tosti which is just a sandwich with meat, cheese, tuna or salmon salad or maybe a combination of the above in it. Another lunch favorite on a menu are kroketten (usually two) which are fried and often filled with a meat ragout. You can count on it coming with a slice of bread and maybe some fries. Finally, you have the uitsmijter which is a piece of bread topped with ham or bacon, a fried egg and cheese.
4. You can always find beer, wine, tea and coffee on the menu.
5. Finally, you can expect to find a few small bites or snacks to go with drinks often including bread with a spread of some sort, bitterballen (much like the krokets listed above but smaller and round), and olives (typically green).

Now, you may be wondering what we eat at home. For the most part, we tend to continue making the same foods that we ate in the US. With the absence of some products here, a few of our old favorites are not able to be made, but, surprisingly, you can almost always find a way to either make substitutions or make homemade versions of items that can’t be found in the store here. We have incorporated a few Dutch foods into our meal repertoire though. We really enjoy erwtensoep in the winter-essentially pea soup that is eaten pretty thick and with Dutch rookworst (smoked sausage) cut up in it. Also, we eat stamppot which consists of potatoes and other vegetables such as carrot, onion and kale mashed up. This is then served with some kind of meat, typically sausage such as the rookworst mentioned above.

So where do we go to get the groceries for these meals? Most Dutch people will divide their shopping between small specialized shops, grocery stores and markets (open air stalls). While we mainly stick to the grocery stores, there are small stores for bakery items and cheese as well as butchers. You can also find small produce, organic and ethnic stores. Markets most often have produce, fish, cheese, flowers and other non consumable goods. You also often find stalls for spices and nuts.

A wide variety of cheese can be found everywhere, even at the grocery stores, but for a larger selection of meat and fish, it is best to go to specialty stores or the market. While there are definitely pork items, it can be harder to find pork products because there are many halal butchers who cannot carry pork items due to the large number of Muslim immigrant and refugee groups here. Also, the Dutch do not consume a lot of turkey so ground turkey, turkey hot dogs or turkey bacon are not available. And yes, this means they do not carry turkey at the holidays. If you want one, you need to go to the American expat store or to a poulier (a poultry shop) and order it. As far as fish goes, the most commonly found would be salmon and cod. Shrimp and mussels are also highly available as is herring. If you go to a fish market stall, you can find many different kinds of fish as well as other items from the sea such as octopus. And if fish is your thing, you can always stop at the stalls and order some kibbling which is breaded, fried fish (usually cod) that comes in a small basket and is eaten with a toothpick and maybe dipped in a sauce. It’s usually very fresh and quite good.

In the stores, you can find most of the produce that you need, but the markets definitely have a wider selection and more exotic items. While there is a good variety of produce to be found, you generally hear one of two things about Dutch produce-either people say it is tasteless or they say it tastes fresher than produce they have had in the States. I haven’t noticed things being tasteless myself. Of course, much of the food in The Netherlands is grown in greenhouses. In fact, The Netherlands is actually the world’s second largest exporter of food. The Netherlands takes a possible shortage of food due to increasing demand very seriously and are actively working to find new ways to grow more food in less space. Also, chemical pesticides are not used on the produce in the greenhouses. Likewise, less antibiotic hormones are used on the poultry and livestock here. Actually, in general less synthetics used to prolong shelf life are used here. What this means is that things will go bad pretty fast, especially in the heat of summer with no air conditioning, but they have less artificial additives. You may also find interesting that eggs do not need to be refrigerated here. This is because they are not sprayed with the chemical spray used in the US to clean the eggs. That chemical spray likely damages the outer shell of the egg which makes bacteria growth more likely unless the egg is refrigerated.

So there you have it-hopefully everything you ever wanted to know about food in The Netherlands. For more details on foods that you can find here that are unique to The Netherlands or originated here, you can read my past blog post at https://terisacunha.com/2019/04/04/bon-appetit-or-eet-smakelijk/. And if you still have burning questions about something food related, be sure to just ask in the comments. I’m sure I can be persuaded to do a little food research if you need me too!