Dutch Desserts

Alright, so by now you must have realized that my life revolves around food. This should probably be attributed to my Italian heritage, and going to my Grandmother's house for giant Italian buffets. (Interestingly, she wasn't actually Italian - that was my grandfather, who passed a decade before I was born. Still, she knew how to cook all the Italian staples...her sauce recipe is famous in our family). Since the Dutch eat to live, not live to eat, this becomes a bit of a problem - hutspot (mashed carrot and potato) just is not that exciting to me.

While their standard diet might be a bit bland compared to what I'm used to, the Dutch have some AWESOME sweet food, which almost makes up for all the mashed potatoes. I have already talked plenty about Dutch pancakes, but here are some other awesome examples.

1. StroopWafels

These are the quintessential dutch cookie/candy/snack. Consisting of two thin waffle/crackerlike discs with caramel syrup pressed in between, these were basically the first "Dutch" food I had. Rachel, the other girl here from Oxy, always has a bag of them with her - wonderful since I steal them all the time. (To be fair, its an even trade - she makes sure I eat during the day, I make sure she doesn't walk into traffic and get run over by a bike).

2. Kwark

The best way to describe Kwark is a cross between yogurt, and cheesecake. It is basically a thick, sweet, creamy yogurt. You can get it in many flavors - so far I've tried apple/cinnamon, lemon, and vanilla bean. (Vanilla bean was by far my favorite, it tasted rather decadent). The picture below is my favorite brand so far, but my albert hijn doesn't carry it - I have to walk down the street to the Spar to get it. Not a huge deal, but I just have to remember to do so, since I can't be bothered usually to go to two grocery stores in one trip.

3. Vla

My favorite of all the Dutch sweet food I've tried. A light custard, its comes in a juice/milk carton, and you have to pour/shake it out (a lot of yogurt products come this way here). Again, it comes in many flavors, but I vastly just prefer plain (blanke) vla. A dutch friend first introduced me to vla by giving me blanke vla, and handing me a shaker of cinnamon to mix in with it. Yum! I am definitely addicted to it, to the point of me wanting to figure out how to make it so I can still have it when I go back to the States - it can't be that hard, right? Right!!?!

Jacquie vs. Dutch Pancakes Part I

For those of you who don't know what dutch pancakes are, you are really missing out. They are actually a lot closer to crepe than what Americans view as pancakes, and in my opinion, are much yummier.

When Andrea was visiting me last week from England (aka, going to watch tennis in Rotterdam), she and I went to the Pancake Bakery. Needless to say, Andrea had picked well. The place was quite small, so when we got there we had to wait outside a few minutes before we could even get a table. (There wasn't really room to wait insides even, just a little foyer where we could pretend not to be cold). Luckily we were seated pretty quickly, but being right next to the door we could see that there were people waiting throughout our entire meal. We didn't even go at a prime food time - maybe 1pm on a Friday? We sat at the table in the bottom right corner.

There were WAY too many pancakes to choose from, both savory and sweet. Andrea and I both ended up getting one with banana, whipped cream, and chocolate syrup, though I do definitetly want to go back and try the savory ones some time. The pancakes were HUGE! I wish I had had my camera with me (sorry Dayna!), because they were definitely picture worthy. (You'll have to settle for the one I stole off the pancake bakery website). Neither of us were even able to finish our pancakes, though I'll brag a little and say that I finished more...though I was in sugar overload the rest of the day...always a good thing for me, but maybe not so much for everyone around me!