There are a number of Amsterdam foods you have to try when you are in the city. Luckily for me, my boyfriend is Dutch so I was guided by first-hand experience when sampling the local delicacies.
First of all, let’s talk cheese. If you like (okay, love) cheese like we do, you’ll probably end up spending a lot of time in the Cheese Shops. Conveniently enough for us cheese lovers, all of the cheese shops offer free samples, of a range of different cheeses. Jesus how many times did I just say cheese!? Whilst we wandered around the city, we sampled over 20 different cheeses!!
Amsterdam Cheese Shops
If you want a fun afternoon and practically a free lunch, I would recommend wondering around the streets of Amsterdam centre and exploring all the Cheese shops. Walk in and just taste all the free samples they have! It’s absolute heaven. There are a ridiculous amount of shops offering the same thing so you end up eating more than enough. You can buy some of the things on offer to take home with you too. If you walk down the main shopping street of Amsterdam (kalverstraat), you’ll easily find about 15 on just this street alone.
Haring Handel
Not quite full from your cheese adventure? Why not try a typical dutch snack?
You need to be a little more daring for this one. Haring is basically a raw fish, and it is consumed with onions and pickles. T was our tour guide for the day and got my sister and her boyfriend to try it. The look on their faces was priceless!
Getting there: The junction between ‘kalverstraat’ and ‘spui’ (it is easy to find on the Maps Me App)
Opening times: Mon-Sat, 12.00-19.00
Price: €2.10
You may have heard of the tradition, but if you haven’t it looks a little something like this.
You have to “dip it in the onion, tip your head back and chuck it in”
Although, many locals nowadays are seen eating it cut up in small pieces using a toothpick. A lot less messy!
Febo
Febo is again a typical Dutch snack. It is a quick version of dutch ‘snacken’
Snacken means to go to a ‘snackbar’ and order fried food, such as chips with mayo, frikandel speciaal or a kroket. Okay, these are all words that neither you or me actually understand. T helped me with this one! Basically, in English.. Febo is a ‘vending machine’ like dispenser which serves fried foods on the spot.
TIP! When you visit Febo, there is one thing you need to eat. Order The kroket!
Dutch pride, the Kroket is basically a french invention but they put their twist on it. It is a bread crumbed croquette with a meat stuffing and a gravy taste. They are really delicious!
Getting there: There are many Febo’s in Dam but the one we visited is located on Leidsestraat 94
Opening times: The best part about this thing is that it is open 11:00-04:00AM
Price: All the snacks in the dispenser are under €2. There are also burgers available for €2-3
Manneken Pis
Okay, try not to laugh at the name. I know when I first saw it, it made me chuckle, and again now.
Every day, for about 12 hours long there is a line outside this little chip shop on the busiest street of Amsterdam. We tried, we ate and we judged. This chip shop has been voted to sell the best chips in Amsterdam. To be honest I didn’t really get it. They are good don’t get me wrong, but chips pretty much taste the same everywhere. (Except chips from your local Chippy in the UK, they’re unbeatable!)
They have a wide selection of sauces which are amazing though! There are about 22 different ones to choose from, such as mayonnaise, vegan mayo, truffle mayo, cheddar cheese sauce, pesto mayo and the list keeps going!
Getting there: Located on the main street.
Opening times: 11.00 – 01.45AM
Price: 5 euros and you’ll have a medium size portion with sauce.
TIP! Medium was more than enough for me. They are decent size portions.