Just for fun: Food culture in the Netherlands

Hi and thanks for the question.

I'm afraid this may crash and burn; of all the wonderful things about the Netherlands, Dutch food is not one of them, unless you like Potatoes that is.

I hope someone proves me wrong. 

Cynic
Expat Team

Well I am no expat, but I can say something about our food.

We love our patat with mayonaise, selfmade peanutbutter sauce or other sauces on our fries.
Patatje oorlog

Our favourite snacks are frikadellen, kroketten, kaassoufles, bamihappen, berenklauwen.
Also very populair are kapsalons: a large bowl with fries, shoarma, lettice, lots of sauce topped with cheese. No it isn't very healthy


On market days you can find our Stroopwafel freshly made very delicious!

Healthy foodies: boerenkool met worst (recipe), hutspot (recipe), erwtensoep (split pea soup), bruine bonensoep (brown bean soup).

More yummy snacks:
Bossche bollen (tradition is to eat it with knive and fork)


Tompouce


Poffertjes


Oliebollen


Speculaas


Gevulde speculaas


Haring

You forgot my favorite: bolussen. Yeah I know, a local treat.

Primadonna wrote:

You forgot my favorite: bolussen. Yeah I know, a local treat.

Yup also very yummy!

ROFLMAO - You'll notice the staple in all the non-sweet foods - potatoes.  Shaorma is probably one of my favourites, but it's not Dutch - more likely Turkish.

I like most of it, except the fish - bah, niet lekker (although everybody else in my family loves it).

Cynic wrote:

ROFLMAO - You'll notice the staple in all the non-sweet foods - potatoes.  Shaorma is probably one of my favourites, but it's not Dutch - more likely Turkish.

I like most of it, except the fish - bah, niet lekker (although everybody else in my family loves it).

I know Shoarma is Turkish, but the kapsalon dish is an extreme popular Dutch invention. It was "invented" in Rotterdam and nowadays it is literaly sold everywhere. I don't like meat so I never ate it, but I tasted the vegan version and it was okay.
Kapsalon is the Dutch word for barber or hairsalon, so the name is a bit silly 

Never tried the Kapsalon; I'm back in November, so will lookout for it. 

Cynic wrote:

Never tried the Kapsalon; I'm back in November, so will lookout for it. 

I can't promise you wil like it

There was a huge argument over it some Amsterdamse restaurants claimed it was an invention from Amsterdam, that didn't do well. A lot of people don't like Amsterdam and many Rotterdammers have a huge dislike for that town. So it was a furious debate! lol

A famous Rotterdam saying is that what is earned in Rotterdam, Amsterdam will spend it all.

Well that was some kind of local info I guess

I forgot the most important foodie of The Netherlands: DROP!! Yearly we consume about 32 million kilos of it. It is typically Dutch

Your post offers a delightful glimpse into Dutch cuisine! Discovering the unique flavors of the Netherlands. From classic street foods like bitterballen to festive treats like oliebollen, Dutch culinary delights never fail to tantalize the taste buds.

I've only had kapsalon a few times but it's an amazing addition to Dutch cuisine, and the story is great too. It's called kapsalon because there was a hair stylist that kept going to this kebab place and would ask for a custom dish...other people started ordering it and it got so popular that it got put on their menu and was named after him.

It's definitely NOT healthy. While Dutch food can be really tasty and often has a lot of really fresh vegetables, etc, most of the stuff they are known most for is desserts (stroopwafel, etc) or what I'd call beer/drunk food. Kapsalon falls into the latter category - in fact I think the only times I've eaten it was after an evening where I sat with some friends on the terras and had a few pints.