Amsterdam: the food
 

Folks, the discussion on these forums makes me think that Amsterdam dining, while not bleak and depressing, leaves a bit to be desired. So far, our strategy is going to be:

Breakfast: substantial hotel breakfast (staying at the Ambassade), leading into

Lunch: We'll do herring and french fries one day, but need other suggestions for lunch ideas

Dinner: Rijstaffel at Blauw; Need a couple of other dinner ideas, mixing it up between casual and upscale.

Our many interest is quality, it doesn't matter if we find it at a hole in the wall or a white table cloth place.

Also, vegetarian suggestions appreciated.

The food can best be described as hearty rather than very sophisticated - much like German food.

I don't do herring - but we found tons of places that had decent sandwiches and pancakes (sort of crepey) for lunch.

But there are tons of places with perfectly good food. Ask in your hotel for advice.

Aside from being robbed in our hotel room, we found Amsterdam to be a delightful city in which we dined really well! Two restaurants to recommend: Lucius, Spuistraat 247 - all about fish, fish, and some more fish. Have your hotel make a reservation - it is on the small side and heavily visited.
The other is Fraisch (pronounced Fresh). I didn't take a card so I don't have an address. Both places are pricey, but well worth it.

Croquettes are traditional and delicious. I had a "butter fish" at a restaurant just a few doors east of the Concertgebouw that was very good.

Herring and French fries for lunch?
Herring is a snack, eaten raw with onions, never seen a Dutch person combine them with patats. If you want cooked fish find a kibbeling stand.

Try Hema or La Place for lunches, even simple dinners at La Place. You will find La Place in the V&D store or at the fantastic library (the one I recommend).

If you search you will find good food in Amsterdam. I promise. It may not be conventiently in teh touristy centre but it is there.
If I have good food out in the sticks it must be available in Amsterdam.

Have a look at Iens.nl for reviews and suggestions, with addresses. You can choose what type of cuisine you want - there are lots offering vegetarian food.

http://restaurantfraiche.nl/ is the restaurant carolll is referring to.

I think with a little hunting you can have some very enjoyable meals in Amsterdam. Look for "brown cafes" - we really like De Reiger near the Anne Frank house. There was also a very good Italian restaurant - Hostaria - in the same area, not sure it is still there. I think there many more new "cutting edge" places for the young and hip, if that is your scene. We were very pleased with the culinary slice of the city.

Savini is an absolute favorite for great pizza and chianti. It is located about 2 blocks from the train station area. Can't think of street name, but it is across from Crowne Plaza Hotel, if you can find that location on a google search.

Thanks to all! These are just the finds I am looking for.
Nytraveler, of course I'll ask at the hotel. But here I am looking for fodorite advice.
Carroll, so sorry to hear about your back luck. But thanks to you we will definitely try Lucius! And perhaps fraiche.
Heti, sorry if I offended your sensibilities. I will be sure to separate my visit the the herring stand from my visit to the patat shop.
Savini sounds great, although I am not sure we will be near the train station much.

Great ideas all. Keep those recommendations coming.

We ate twice at Foodism:
http://www.foodism.nl/
Everything we tried was very good.

We found the food in Amsterdam exceedingly lacking and for lunch surprisingly monotonous.

I wish I had specific suggestions. The best meal we had was at De Reiger in the Jordaan and that inconsistent.

My best meals in Amsterdam (I hadn't done any research, just what I happened upon) was one Greek restaurant in Leidseplein, and a fairly spectacular little Italian place that had inside seating but also sold things to-go by weight. Too long ago to give you the particulars, just saying don't think of only what you might consider regional specialties as what might be good or even great.

We ate at Lucius twice and had wonderful fish there. Stayed at Ambassade but ate breakfast in the neighborhood after first day,. Hotel breakfast was quite pricey for what was served.
Make sure you have a rijstaffle. Also we loved the herring and onions sold at streetside stands.

Thanks everyone, Lucius seems luscious.

We ate really well in Amsterdam. Between the Paranakan restaurant, a thai place, the shwarma and gyros, Argentinian steakhouse, and a few cafes with sandwiches, crepes, etc. We had lots of good food.

RIJST TAFEL, people, not

rijstaffel
rijsstaffle
rijstafle

use iens.nl to find a good restaurants. I can assure you that's how the locals end up in those restaurants.

there's no use asking around on forums such as fodors, because most people here are well on the tourist trail, even if they try to get off it.

also a very good resource for amsterdam is

http://www.parool.nl/parool/nl/14631...rk/index.dhtml

well worth the google translate.

point is, don't expect to get exceptional food for average prices.

Here is an interesting article on pop up restaurants in Amsterdam: http://www.theguardian.com/travel/20...pots-amsterdam

Maybe something there appeals.

We enjoyed our dinner at De Kas, located in Frankendael Park. They have their own nursery that they harvest from, and are willing to do vegetarian menus.

http://www.restaurantdekas.nl

We rented an apartment for a week in a decidedly residential neighborhood, north of the Jordaan, and the food there was acceptable but certainly not memorable or worth recommending.

We enjoyed our meal at First Class that we went back a second time. It's in Centraal station accessed from platform 1. It is in the former 1st class waiting room. We had spent a week in Paris and I was craving steak (which I have never found good in France) and the filet mignon was excellent.

We rarely ate lunch that trip because we'd been upgraded free at the Moevenpick and our suite included breakfast daily. Normal cost was 35 euros each! It was stunning with more choices of more things than I've ever seen but if we'd had to pay that would have been over 100 euros a day!

Do buy frites and eat them with mayonnaise as you stroll around.

IMDonehere, you wonder where the Amsterdam locals go, don't you? North of Jordaan is not "residential" as in "less touristy".

So, why didn't you go to Belhamel, or Lof on Brouwersgracht and Haarlemmerstraat?

Sorry, Menachem, we stayed in an apartment complex in a decidedly residential area, I think it is called Nord-Holland. There were no tourist attractions and if there were other tourists their cameras and upside down tourist books were not present on the main street Spaarndammerbuurt.

One morning we took the 14 bus to the end of line to Flevopark and walked back most of the way back to the Centraal Station. At the end of the 14 line we did find a delightful bakery in the midst of no where.

I do not know the know names of the polysyllabic neighborhoods we encountered, but we intentionally strayed from the normal tourist routes and still the food was mediocre at best.

Even the french fries which looked forward to eating were OK, but nothing exceptional, nothing to recommend.

I struck up a convo with a fellow traveler who frequented Amsterdam and he gave me a few suggestions...The only one I can remember was Kantjil & de Tijger (www.kantjil.nl/en/) where we had dinner and thought it was quite good.

For breakfast we either had crepes or just snacked from the many bakeries which was always very nice...I would say to skip the hotel breakfast.

Thanks everyone. I have made reservations at Blauw for Rijstaffel and Lucious for seafood. The rest we will play by ear. Taking into account all your suggestions.

You were in de Indische Buurt, somewhat of a getto and a desert, as far as Food goes. It's getting slightly better there, because it's getting more gentrified, as in: they're doing a lot of social engineering and are pushing out the poor people who are now in affordable rent accommodation.

Gastrobar on Sumatrakade seems to have a following, but also attracts very mixed review on iens.nl

http://www.iens.nl/restaurant/36233/...-the-gastrobar

Your best bet would probably have been a Turkish restaurant on Borneostraat

http://www.iens.nl/restaurant/31453/...-antep-sofrasi

This is why I keep placing links to iens. I visit Paris quite a lot, and there I'll use cityvox to end up in restaurants with good guest reviews. I know that if I walk in from the street the chance is high that I'll end up with a dud.



@packmybags: Blauw is supposed to be quite good and innovative regarding Indonesian cooking.

Lucius is getting a 6.8 at iens.nl

http://www.iens.nl/restaurant/781/am...taurant-lucius

the word "tourist trap" is used.

I'd reconsider and book at Vis Aan De Schelde if you want seafood

http://www.iens.nl/restaurant/1471/a...isaandeschelde

8.5

I know where I would go.

A secret tip:

http://www.iens.nl/restaurant/35509/...wicked-kitchen

So in essence, you must spend at least 35 Euros in the right neighborhood in just the restaurant in order to get a satisfactory meal. But it is our fault for staying in the wrong neighborhood and finding mediocre food elsewhere. Got it.

We had a delicious lunch at Harlem Soul Food very conveniently located at Haarlemmerstraat 77, Amsterdam. Really delicious hamburgers and novel nachos (yes you read that right!) Great lunch spot (and maybe more)

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Restauran...e.html#REVIEWS

Also down the block from it is a little cafe serving Tramezzini sandwiches .... not as good as Venice but we had fun (might be take out only, can't recall)

http://www.iltramezzinoamsterdam.nl/contact

We had some good Sichuan food at Sichuan Restaurant - you have to peruse the menu carefully to avoid the more traditional (western)dishes but are rewarded with spicy, delicious food for the effort

http://sichuanrestaurant.nl/

We enjoyed this Thai restaurant - service can be a bit slow

http://www.kularbmanee.nl/

And although the reviews can be polar we had an enjoyable dinner at Seasons (on the same block as the Thai restaurant) - spent a pleasant time chatting with the owner and ordered a second serving of the scallops

http://www.seasonsrestaurant.nl/en

We had such a great time in Amsterdam!

packmybags:

I had excellent meals in May 2012 in Amsterdam at:

• Restaurant ZaZa's
• Brasserie van Baerle
• De Knijp
• Restaurant Pulpo
• Restaurant Le Pecheur

I stayed in the area near the Rikjsmuseum and Van Gogh museum and could walk to ZaZa, van Baerle, De Knijp, and Pulpo. I took a brief tram ride to Le Pecheur, which specializes in fish and seafood. De Knijp and Pulpo were moderately priced. The other three were more expensive.

I used Trip Advisor to get a read on Amsterdam restaurants and sorted it out from there based on customer reviews, proximity to my hotel, and my food preferences. If you go to Trip Advisor, you can get reviews and access to the websites or you can just google the restaurants and get the reviews and URLs.

Have a tasty trip to Amsterdam.

packmybags:

I see that Yelp has said that Restaurant Le Pecheur has closed. You might want to check that.

Nope, IMDonehere: there are resources plenty for finding good restaurants. But don't go complaining that the food is mediocre if you don't use them. The locals do, that's where the reviews come from. You have to know where to go, and if you don't, which is unavoidable if you are a stranger in a city, ask people who are in the know: their knowledge can be had online, for free.

Wanderful: tripadvisor is mostly tourists. iens.nl is local people reviewing their restaurant experiences.

And the Het Parool page I linked to, proefwerk is a professional opinion, knowledgeable and balanced of a good cross section of restaurants. Even if you go by the marks given only, you'll have a good, local dining experience.

Menachem, we have visited 40 countries and half the states and understand that you are going to wonder into both good and bad restaurants, but I wish I found some good ones in Amsterdam.

This thread has details about my lunch at Seafood Bar, a well-regarded fish and shellfish restaurant near Vondelpark that we visited late last year on a layover from South Africa to New York; contemporary space; lovely staff:

http://www.fodors.com/community/euro...ansit-time.cfm

http://www.theseafoodbar.nl/menu/en

There are places you visit for the food, or the art, or the ambience. You do not visit Holland for the food. That can be a relief! Enjoy your liberation from mindfully appreciating every morsel of your meal, and get on with the other important things it does offer. Anyway, herring and onion is good!

Far discolor, I like your style!

I really wonder at people who have the resources available to get to a good restaurant who then choose not to use those resources, but afterwards see fit to complain about mediocre food. And then only remember herring. It really boggles the mind.

If I'm on holiday I'm extra careful with where I spend my money, after all, it's all for "play" so I try to make sure I make every euro count. I avoid going to restaurateurs who figure I'll be one of many guests who'll never darken their doorstep again. What's wrong with a little research? At home, would you go to a restaurant by vague recommendation only? Without checking reviews?

Fra Diavolo, you mean you do not want to eat well while in The Netherlands, considering a good meal is not to be had anyway? Please have mercy on people who live their lives here!

To state the obvious there are characteristics,good and bad, for every place. Amsterdam is a wonderful walking city with some world class museums. They people are extremely cordial and always seem ready for the next joke. They have preserved many of the charming buildings and canals and tolerate the quirky and the different. Public transportation is efficient.

When you find a perfect city, please report back to us but begging for mercy is not only unbecoming but an odd request.

You might want to take a look at my trip report on two weeks spent in Amsterdam; click on my name to find it.

IMDonehere: obviously people who live in Amsterdam will never eat a decent meal, since you haven't had one there. Pity those poor souls....