Diatribe on Dutch Food
Posted on Sep. 3, 2008 at 05:06 in Maastricht, Netherlands (Subscribe)
So far my culinary experience here in the Netherlands has been quite disappointing. It could be just because of the fact we eat the majority of meals in the cafeteria. This is not the cafeteria I envisioned. At Baylor's cafeterias, there are tons of choices and the majority of it is pretty good. Here we get one, sometimes two options for meals at lunch and dinner. It doesn't help that I'm EXTREMELY picky about what I consume. I don't like mayonnaise, pork products, gravy, olives, mushrooms, the majority of salad dressings, tuna, etc.
An exerpt from an email I sent to Frank:
It's hard to explain but everything tastes different. like milk is gross to me, peanut butter is gritty/grainy and doesn't taste at all like peanuts, the salad dressing is blechhhh, even ketchup tastes different (actually better, there's no corn syrup in it). I have taken to putting this stuff labeled "Hazelnootpasta" on my toast. I think it's the poor man's version of Nutella.
Yesterday I went to the grocery store and finally was able to find Gouda. Here they call it "Goudse" and they have different aged versions. I got the oldest one- it was Parmesean-esque in the fact that it was aged for so long, but it still retained the more creamy texture of the Gouda I have had before. Spinach tortellini, sundried tomato/oregano pasta sauce ( zongedroogde tomaat & oregano), cinnamon-raisin bread (krenten-rozijnen brood) and some delicious cherry tomatoes ( cherry tomaat) were the other things I picked up. It was all pretty good, not anything to rave about, but much better than the cafeteria food.
I'm hoping Amsterdam's cuisine will redeem itself.
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