Eating my way through Europe

Like living with people, traveling with people, one learns an entirely different side of their friends. For those of you who know me well, or know me at all, I've certainly learned my fair share about the people I've lived with, and now travelled with. When traveling, everyone has their thing: the one thing that they are interested in, that they want to see or do in a certain or every country we visit. Each of us, who I've been traveling with has their thing: Becky loves her art museums, ohh does she love them. Avery loves taking photos, which I inturn love to mooch off of her ; ) and Hannah loves Roman & Greek history and taking inappropriate pictures with me.

"What is my thing?" you ask. Take a guess...

Food.

As each week we prepare for our next upcoming trip, we sit down to figure out what there is to do there and who wants to do what. We look into buying tickets in advance, which I really don't understand why people aren't smart enough to do more often. The sheer greatness you feel when you see a line and realize you can simply walk up to the front, watching everyone else stare in awe and jealousy. Anyway, we look into everything. I usually read things online or in my handy abroad guides passed down from friends or consult with Barb & Eric and other friends. And then I look into the food. I've quickly learned that I like going into a city knowing what foods they're famous for and where the best place to try it is. Luckily for me, everyone seems to always want to partake in this because who isn't interested in food?...Which brings me to this week's adventures, or, in many cases, menu: Amsterdam

So what is Amsterdam famous for?
-The Van Gogh Museum
-The Rijks Museum
-The Anne Frank House
-The Red Light District
-Tulips, Windmills & Delph China (Yes, Nana, I felt as though I had teleported back to your kitchen)
-It's lenient drug policies
-Wonderful, Glorious Fries with a large assortment of sauces
-Eat your heart out pancakes
-Almost, but obviously not quite, New York style bagels
-Rice Tables
And that's exactly what we did, minus the drugs, of course.

Friday afternoon, we set off for Amsterdam. After checking into the lavish Marriott hotel, we asked the conceirge, ahh the beauty of a conceirge, where we could find something to eat. He sent us off to the square. We walked around to find a bakery with bagels and pastries and a fry stand with a million sauces. Avery & I were quick to hop on the fry wagon buying ourselves a large cone of fries with Dutch mayo, Curry Ketchup and Peanut Sauce. This is where I will first use the word glorious to describe the fries but fear not they will be even more glorious when I tell you about the second time we ate them.
The next morning, we slept in and then went to find either a bagel or pancake place. After resigning to the idea that no, pancakes are not everywhere in Holland, we went to Bagels & Beans, a bagel shop I had heard about from friends. I tried a tomato bagel with chive cream cheese, avocado & tomato and while it was no Gotham whole wheat honey bagel and definitely not a Perfectos French Toast Bagel with Honey Walnut Cream Cheese, it was good. Crunchy on the outside and perfect. I hadn't realized I even missed bagels. Although too small to eat in the odd way I enjoy bagels (picking off the crust and dipping it into the cream cheese, and yes I know that description is awful and unclear: just feed me a bagel and you'll see how I pick it apart), it certainly lived up to my expectations. And I can't believe I just rambled on for that long about a bagel. After a nourishing breakfast, we headed over to the Van Gogh Museum, skipping all lines, and I couldn't help from reverting back to summer '05 reading Lust for Life, and then to the Rijks museum. We went to the Flower Market and walked around the canals stopping in stores here and there. This brings us to glorious moment number 2, when we ventured to a fry stand that Avery's Dutch friend had told us was the best. She was right. We each got ourselves an afternoon snack of a small cone of fries. I got the mayo, I don't even eat mayo!!, and curry again. But was sure to try everyone else's sauces. The menu had 22! Did I mention I love sauces? Always have, always will. I really think they make the meal and definitely the fries, or anything else they are used to enhance. Just think about sauces: ketchup, salad dressing, tzatziki, BBQ, honey mustard, soy, ranch, marinara, teriyaki, curry, nitty gritty sauce, yah I said it, even mayo...I could continue, but I'll spare you. (Conclusion from this tangent: Barb--I'm still waiting on our trip to sauciety.) Anyway, these fries were even more glorious than the night before and yes you could taste the difference.
We then went to the Elephant Parade, which pleased the Jumbo fan and the rest of us as well, and walked to the Portugeese Synagogue. Now you would think the 3 nice Jewish girls among us would have thought: hmm, it's Shabbat. But nope, we went all the way there to discover it was infact closed. So we hoped into a cab for some afternoon relaxation before dinner.
Dinner was at Sam Sebo's: a rice table which I had read about and Avery's dutch friend had also suggested. We had heard Amsterdam was known for its Indonesian food and rice tables were the place to try it. Now, mind you, none of us knew what a rice table was. I had read about it to try and figure it out but I can't stay I understood until it was all placed before me: candle heated grills with rice and a never ending assortment of different meat and vegetable dishes. Literally, there must have been 20+ plates on the table and each of them were absolutely delicious. I'm not sure I've ever been so full. Once we were finally able to lift ourselves out of our chairs and the restaurant was practically closing (we had a late dinner, it wasn't THAT BAD!!), we walked down to the I amsterdam sign for an ample photo shoot, because our afternoon attempt had failed due to crowds.
The next morning, we woke up to go see the Anne Frank House, which was something we were all most looking forward to doing. It did not dissapoint. We got there to find a small line gathering, and quickly walked to the front where we showed them our tickets and walked into the museum. The house was everything we imagined. It is extremely well laid out and organized and truly helps you understand what had went on within the walls of the house and what was going on in Europe at the time. It's remarkable. But also remarkable to think about how modern it all was and how something like that could have ever happened let alone so short a time ago. Another compliment to us, or Avery, who pre-bought our tickets, when we got out, the line, which we so quickly skipped, was literally around the corner.
It seemed only deserving that we treated ourselves to pancakes after Anne Frank, so we went to the famous pancake house nearby. With so many options, it was difficult to select a type. I went with apple & cheese, while the others selected theirs: Apple & Banana, Greek w/ Souvlaki and Apple & Bacon. Sorry dad, there was no blueberry. When our pancakes arrived, I was certainly pleased. With a little bit of maple syrup, my apple & cheese pancake was the perfect mix of sweet & salty. It was absolutely delicious, especially with a few bites of Hannah's uber-sweet apple and banana pancake in between! Full again, we decided to walk back to the synagogue, which was, of course, opened on Sunday via the Red Light District, a site a to see. We then walked back to the hotel to grab a bite to eat before heading to the airport for our journey back to London. And as nice and exciting as traveling is, I am always happy to return home.

This now concludes this edition of: I should weigh 6000 lbs.

Side Note: It's Marni's 21st Birthday and because I know how much of an avid follower she is, she's getting a very special birthday shout out. Happy Birthday!! In your honor--I will drink an entire bottle of water and begin planning our post abroad belated birthday bash, cupcakes and all, because I did just purchase The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook.