Greenwoods: English Tea Rooms in Amsterdam

Greenwoods is an English tea room and restaurant with two locations in the centre of Amsterdam: one at Keizersgracht 465, the other at Singel 103. As those who are familiar with tea rooms may have come to expect from the form, both locations specialise in breakfasts and teas. There are full English breakfasts; Eggs Benedict, Florentine or Royale; breakfasts with smoked salmon; yoghurt and muesli; and a global assortment of teas, with Darjeeling, Jasmine, Sencha and Lapsang Souchong alongside fresh mint and peppermint, Earl Grey, and what is described as an ‘English mélange’.

Both serve a selection of classic sandwiches, plus varieties containing ‘Granny’s meatballs’ and organic lamb; high teas with jammed and buttered scones; and a concise range of cakes. Keizersgracht 465 also boasts snacks, and a dinner menu comprising traditional English mains like fish and chips, steak and ale pie, and bangers and mash. The team rooms are cosy and compact, both featuring outdoor seating areas which look upon their respective canals; and they open daily at 9.30 am.

My partner and I visited the Keizersgracht Greenwoods a few days ago, and sustained an experience which was perfectly pleasant. My partner had two scrambled eggs, smoked salmon with dill, and brown toast; whereas I had the Eggs Benedict (two poached eggs with ham on toasted English muffins). I forewent the Hollandaise sauce meant to accompany the dish – an acceptable liberty even in the area of the world after which the sauce is named. We shared a hot chocolate, full of real milk chocolate and topped with plenty of cream.

A curiosity exists in that Greenwoods is ranked as one of Amsterdam’s very best restaurants – standing presently at number 7 out of a total 1,905. Perhaps this belies a relative lack of obvious breakfast alternatives in Amsterdam; perhaps it indicates something about the biases of TripAdvisor; or perhaps it simply shows that Greenwoods fills a need comfortably, capably and efficiently, in two busy parts of the city. I wouldn’t say that you absolutely have to go to Greenwoods; but if you are hungry and it is morning time, do not fear taking whatever brief detour leads you to one of their doors. Greenwoods goes about its business well.

http://www.greenwoods.eu/

Chang-i: Chinese Restaurant Review

My partner and I ate at Chang-i a couple of weekends ago, at the tail end of ‘Restaurant Week’ in the Netherlands – a week in which more than 1,000 restaurants throughout the country offer three-course, prix fixe dinner menus for €27.50 per person.

Chang-i is a Chinese restaurant located at Jan Willem Brouwersstraat 7, across from the Museumplein, down a residential street progressing beyond one side of the Concertgebouw. It boasts the innovation and the European influences of its modern Chinese cuisine. The restaurant was voted the second best Chinese restaurant in the Netherlands, and the best in Amsterdam, for the year 2011.

The meal my partner and I ate comprised, in the end, four courses, each consisting of three small dishes, plus an appetiser. Picking my favourites amongst this, I’d opt for, and would readily eat again, the stir fried gamba on a stick of lemongrass; the tempura chicken with a sweet and sour dip; and a pan-fried sea bass with rice and coconut. I have written a review discussing all of the dishes and some of the restaurant’s other facets, which I published this afternoon at culturedallroundman.com.

Kantjil & de Tijger: Indonesian Restaurant Remarks

Kantjil & de Tijger is a self-proclaimed ‘Indonesian restaurant with Asian influences’, situated in the very centre of Amsterdam, on the Spuistraat. With an extensive seating area across several open, enjoining rooms, the restaurant’s location makes it popular and busy. I ate there a few weeks ago and enjoyed the food and the surroundings.

Indonesian cuisine is varied, sharing links with cuisines in Asia and India. The confluence of this diversity, the coherence which Indonesian cuisine has won and by which it establishes itself, resides – at at least in my experience, limited, admittedly, to the several months I have now lived in the Netherlands – in peanut sauce and coconut. Satay – spiced, grilled and skewered meat – is typically served in a sauce constructed around peanuts; rendang, a spicy meat dish, utilises coconut milk; and coconut is also desiccated and diced and used to top a range of meat and vegetable accompaniments. These dishes are served with rice, the Indonesian staple; which may, under special circumstances, be served inside a wrapped banana leaf.

Kantjil & de Tijger’s menu is comprised of a host of small dishes, the idea being that you order several and eat them with rice. The restaurant offers four rijsttafels (‘rice-tables’), to share and priced per person, which each bring together a range of small dishes into a generous sort of tasting menu. The four rice-tables comprise: chicken, pork and beef; fish, chicken and beef; fish, pork and beef; and a vegetarian offering.

What I may possessively term ‘my party’ – consisting of my partner, my sister and my brother-in-law – tried the first of the four rice tables and we all enjoyed it and came away satisfied and hale of heart. It included a chicken and a pork satay in peanut sauce; a beef rendang; chicken thighs and legs in a rich soy-peanut sauce; boiled eggs; spiced and softened cucumber; and salad and vegetables in a sauce with crackers.

I think that Kantjil & de Tijger probably affords a good introduction to Indonesian cuisine; and in a relaxed atmosphere, particularly well suited for groups. The restaurant also offers a ‘To Go’ menu, with a takeaway in the rear entrance. The restaurant’s website is here.

NeL: A Restaurant on the Amstelveld

A restaurant review, sufficiently detailed and extensive so that I published it on culturedallroundman.com.

It concerns two visits to NeL, a bar and restaurant on the Amstelveld square, and takes in dishes including: orzo pasta with chicken, chorizo and tomatoes; a half lobster; steak, with pea purée, mushrooms, courgettes, amandine potatoes, and blueberry sauce; and deer stew with mashed potato and pear.