I visited Amsterdam in November of last year. The moment I stepped foot back in England I already wanted to go back. It really is such an amazing and fascinating city. Since going, I've wanted to talk about my experience to help those who are planning trips but if I included everything in one post it would be more like a book! So I'm going to divide it into segments for you. Today, we discuss the food!
The food was one of the best parts of this city break. We did a mix of planning places we wanted to eat at before traveling and finding places on the spot when we were hungry. We were not left disappointed!
When we arrived, the first thing we did was have a Dunkin' Donut coffee. Being from the uk we don’t have Dunkin's so of course we wanted to try it even though I never got a donut. It also was the closest place for a quick coffee from our hotel. It was such a great coffee, it was strong and sweet but not overwhelming full of sugar! I really wish we had Dunkin's in the UK after trying their coffee. We ended up getting coffee nearly every day in there. 10/10 recommend.
As we spent the first afternoon exploring we had some chips and cheese sauce which were, well, basic. The chips were great but the cheese sauce tasted like own brand, cheap, watered down Wotsits. As you walk around the city you'll see various chip shops, I would still recommend trying them but for me, the cheese sauce was just not it.
We also tried some Tony's Chocolate and did the create your own chocolate bar. It was such a fun little activity and they only took around 2 hours to make our bars! Now, I know it's just chocolate, but this really was a nice chocolate bar! If you have time to grab some Tony's, you should! Even if you don't create your own, they're still tasty.
On our first night we went to Ramen Kingdom which is opposite the central train station. 100000/10. This was truly the best ramen I’ve had and the dining experience was just spectacular. The whole evening was amazing, the aroma of the broth filled the small seating area. The staff accommodated our group of 6 in such a small venue, at no point would your water cup be empty and the food… mouth, watering. The noodles perfectly soaked up the flavour of the broth. The meat was well seasoned and well, it was just perfect, what more can I say? I crave it to this day and cannot wait to return. I really cannot fault this place one bit, if you do anything in Amsterdam you MUST go here!
Our next dinner was at a small German place near our hotel called Daniel's Currywurst. The owner cooked
our food and also had lovely conversations with us at the same time. He was one of the only people we met who was genuinely interested in talking to us, of course everyone will say anything to make them more money in a tourist city. It wasn’t exactly hard to tell we were tourists! It felt like we were visiting a friend who was cooking for us. The food itself was great, couldn’t fault it at all. It was such a rewind and relax dinner, just chatting and reflecting on our day. Something we needed after a busy day. Highly recommend.
Throughout the day we had done so many activities so food was pretty much grab a quick bite. We had a McDonalds at lunchtime. Of course you have to try McDonalds in another country! I had the honey mustard chicken burger. It was, well just a standard McDonalds but the burger was very tasty and I wish it was a menu item over here! One thing I thought was weird was they don't salt the fries.
This city never sleeps, but it doesn't feel like a city like London because there's barely any tall, cement and window towers, offices etc. You get that rush of a city without the ugly buildings and over stimulating architecture. I was really craving a bubble tea at around 11pm on the Saturday night and luckily found a place open late a few minutes from our hotel. The bubble tea itself was
amazing in flavour but for €5 was a bit pricey. Although I do recommend having a late night walk with a snack or yummy drink. Although it was November, it wasn't awfully cold. It is such a beautiful city I never wanted to go back to the hotel, that night I would've been happen to just wonder around until sunrise.
On the last full day we did a walking food tour which was an adventure! One downside, it was raining like mad and so, very, windy. We powered through. I think it would’ve gone a little bit better if we had planned ahead of time but the places we went were not disappointing! We started off at Omelegg for breakfast.
The food was delicious but the service wasn't as great. It was a very small restaurant and they ended up taking a table away from us (group of 5) to allow another two customers in, but this meant we were so cramped, our food couldn't even fit on our table properly. Our elbows were constantly knocking each other when we tried to eat and to be honest, it just wasn't great. At the end we were told the bill cannot be split which was a shock as it didn't state that anywhere on the menu and our bills was nearly €100 although we worked it out. The food was worth the not so great service, I had a BBQ chicken and bacon croissant with scrambled egg and I never thought all those food items would go together but it really worked. I would recommend this place if you're not in a big group and probably only on a week day as we did end up queueing for nearly an hour on a Sunday, and the queue only got worse.
The next stop for us was the famous Van Wonderen stroopwafels. Of course we had to try these! Expect a queue but it does move fast, it was nice that inside the shop wasn't crazy busy because of the queuing system they had in place so you could take those insta photo and get the full experience inside. Every single waffle is made to order so it's lovely and hot. I really recommend going to grab one of these! It was a bit sickening towards the end and I only got a mini size, but everyone has their own likes when it comes to sweetness.
We then went to Captain Candy and well.. it's just so not worth it. We spotted this place on tiktok but when we arrived and bought some sweets we realised it was just a standard pick n mix chain. The sweets weren't very nice to my taste and of course it is so overpriced. It was fun to be surrounded by barrels of candy but I wouldn't go back here, and I definitely wouldn't buy anymore sweets from here. Sorry Captain.
We then ventured outside of the city centre and visited the Foodhallen. We were wet, cold and hungry. The moment we stepped inside of the food hall I felt some relief. It was warm, the air was filled with various different food smells. Every direction you looked in there was a different cuisine, it was heaven!! We opted to try two stalls. We got a chicken tikka wrap.. in a naan bread!
And also some bao buns and gyozas. The chicken tikka wrap was full of flavour but was let down due to the naan bread wrap, it was a little tough and I was scared of losing a tooth. But the Buns and gyozas were out of this world! The buns were fluffy and warm. The gyozas were crispy and full of flavour! We then spent some time just relaxing here. It had been some what of a stressful day so it was nice to be in a relaxed environment before making our way back to the city centre.
On our last morning we only had 2 hours left in the city centre before we had to get to the airport so we opted for a small little place near our hotel for some food called Quartier Putain.
We got there for opening time and had a coffee and croissant. It was the cheapest meal we had and I wish we had visited this place earlier. They had some great looking menu items but we were rushing to explore whatever we could before leaving so went for the quick option. I know it was only a croissant but it was very tasty! Especially for the low price we paid. The coffee was also phenomenal, probably better than Dunkin's. If you're looking for a quick and easy breakfast option that isn't fast food, I highly recommend going here!
And that was the end of my food journey in Amsterdam. There's so many more places and types of food I want to try in Amsterdam, you can bet I'll be visiting again when I can! I hope this helped you in deciding on some food planning for your trip. if you take anything from this post it is VISIT RAMEN KINGDOM! I will never shut up about it.
Thank you for taking the time to read this post, I hope you have a lovely day <3
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