Dutch snacks

I was tempted to entitle this post "Dutch food" but I think many Nederlanders would quickly point out that what I'm about to talk about is not a true representation of their "food", so I'll stick to what I know best from living here...  their snacks!

I've been living here for 8 months now and there are loads of foods I would definitely miss if I come back to the UK.

Firstly, they make the best pancakes in the world here (not really a snack but considered an actual meal here, and they are certainly the price of an evening meal back in the UK at approx. 9EUR for 1 pancake)... they taste like nowhere else in the world and I love them.  Back when I visited Radboud University in Nijmegen for a week, I found the canteen there served pancakes once a week... here in Leiden I've been here for 8 months and they've only served pancakes twice in that time... maybe I should be grateful for the sake of my waistline.  What a shame they don't celebrate pancake day here like in the UK... but I suppose you could argue that any day could be pancake day with the numerous pancake houses in each city.

Secondly, FOOD FROM THE WALL... yes, how can you possibly resist food when they put it in the WALLS?!  It looks at you as you walk along the street or the train station or the shopping malls... just begging you through the little glass doors, to eat them!  They're kinda like giant vending machines full of deep-fried meat.  Items range from huge elongated chicken-nuggets to frikandels (elongated meat thing in a sausage shape), crockets (kroketten) deep-fried bread-crumbed mashed up bits of meat (MUCH tastier than I'm describing, believe me), something when directly translated is called a "Meat staff" (you couldn't get away with that name in the UK) and other deep-fried items such as cheese, rice and even balls of noodles!


If you go to a pub for after work drinks or networking events etc, all drink occasions include plates of these crazy deep-fried snacks plus spring rolls etc... forget two pints of larger and a packet of crisps, here it's a heineken and a plate of bittenballen (deep-friend breadcrumbed balls of meat-goo!) - heavenly!

But what I can't understand, is that back in the UK for lunch, most people I know might have a sandwich, soup OR salad.  Here, people have sandwiches, soup AND salad.  And when I say sandwiches, I failed to mention that this would usually consist of half a loaf of bread in one day and often (but not always) contain smushed up versions on the deep-fried snacks I've just mentioned.  Not to mention then washing it all down with two pints of milk and some yogurt!

So why is it that the UK is a much more obese nation than the Netherlands?  Can it really just be the cycling they do here?

Right, all this talk about snacks is making me hungry.... gotta go look in the walls....

Dutch music

I don't know much about Dutch music since my time here... I mainly listen to a station called "Radio Veronica" (you can try it yourself here:  http://www.radioveronica.nl/player/radio-veronica)  and have developed an obsession with saying "alleen echte hits staan voor jou klaar" (Only real hits, are ready for you - or something along those lines)... it mainly plays English/American music with the odd bit of BLOF or Golden Earring thrown in (Dutch people believe these Dutch bands are really famous around the world but I would beg to differ having never heard of them before I arrived here) but I must admit, their stuff ain't bad!

However, the most entertaining aspect of Dutch music so far is their wonderful version of "Your sex is on fire" which in Dutch the lyrics are "Ik wil sex met die kale" - directly translated "I want sex with that bald man" (I kid you not) and this is a very popular song, I hear it on the radio a fair bit and during the carnival you couldn't escape it, it was blasting out from every pub on every corner for 4 days solid.

So... this is something everyone should have the opportunity to enjoy... here it is:

How English am I?

So, in one of my last posts I was busy wondering how Dutch I was after my time in the Netherlands.

Well, after a week back in the UK in June, I found all this stuff I'd been missing without even realising it... stuff like bread and butter with my meals, cheap pub grub, faggots and mushy peas, blackpudding, bacon and sausage sarnies, orange squash, cider, indian takeaways, hills and nice landscape, carpeted floors and big supermarkets.

There were other things I just felt really out of touch with... my boyfriend driving on the left constantly freaked me out as I thought we were going the wrong way... and having to walk up hill occasionally gave my calves something to moan about.

As an aside, earlier this year a new Scott exhibition opened up in the Natural History Museum in London to celebrate the centenary of his expedition to the South Pole.  I read at the time that “a shopping list on display conveys the very British character of the mission. One can't imagine Amundsen's team taking along 320 kilograms of marmalade, 225 kilograms of tea, 72 bottles of port or 540 kilograms of suet.”

So, that got me wondering what makes me English?

Let's start with what's not very English about me:

1)  People keep thinking I'm australian since I arrived... wonder why?

2)  I don't drink tea (unless I'm not feeling well)

3)  I don't eat jam or marmalade or scones

4)  I don't know what the hell "high tea" is but they seem to think it's very English over here!  People pay a lot of money to go for high tea.

5)  I don't drink beer and I'm not a larger lout!

6)  I know the difference between the "Netherlands" and "Holland"

My "English" traits:

1)  Cider drinker and proud

2)  I put milk in my tea (if and when I drink it)

3)  I cycle everywhere on a 21 gear mountain bike (despite the distinct lack of hills in the Netherlands!)

4)  Brown sauce eater

5)  I eat cereal for breakfast

6)  The things I have to import from home to live:  Brown sauce, cereal and crumpets

7)  Unlike the Dutch who quickly get off their bikes, flip a switch to lock it and walk away within seconds, it takes me 10mins to untangle my UK-style bike lock, wrap it around something, fiddle with the keys, get it all jammed up, unjam it all and then finally lock it and walk away with oily and dirty hands

8)  The ignorance of only speaking one language

My Dutch discovery of the week

Good news everyone (just in case you were all panicking)... I've discovered that Dutch baked beans (although they come in glass jars and are called white beans) are just the same as our baked beans back home.  I'm sure Rich will be relieved as there's one thing I won't be asking him to stuff into a suitcase (along with the regular supply of brown sauce and breakfast cereal).  Believe me I'm very pleased as I once tasted French baked beans and never, ever will again, put it that way!  - I'm pretty sure they had no flavour, just red food colouring.

Anyway, feet up now with a jacket potato, cheese, beans and brown sauce... you can take the girl out of England but you can't take the England out of the girl!

How Dutch am I?

So, the other day I found myself cycling in the rain with a bunch of flowers in my hand and I've never felt so "Dutch" since I've been here.  And I got thinking, just how Dutch am I after 4 months living in the Netherlands?

Okay, so this is my list of things that I think make me more Dutch:

• I have my Dutch name "van Carroll" :-)
• I have an addiction to HagelSlag
• I love the pea soup and the Dutch snacks (kroketten, bitterballen and frikendals!)
• I cycle everywhere
• Lovin' the Dutch cheese
• I now know more Dutch (in 3 months) than I knew of French after 5 years of studying for GCSE French!
• I like the fresh fish especially in sarnies from the fish sellers at the market (rather than chucked down my throat bread-less)
• I can cycle non-handed for 6 pedals - I've been practicing on my way to squash but that's a bit lame compared to the Dutch who seem to go for miles non-handed while texting or something else, but then my bike isn't one of these sitting up straight "grandma bikes"
• I have now cycled while taking a phone call, reading a text message and carrying flowers (not all at the same time tho).

But, the things I make me very "un-Dutch" are:

• I really like wishy-washy BIG English/American-style coffees (lots of coffee, lots of water, lots of milk), not these tiny senseo things that I feel like I could inhale within a few seconds
• I WILL NOT eat bread and cheese/meat for breakfast (aren't they sick of bread with cheese and meat by lunchtime?) and I really can't live without cereal
• I don't see the point in flowers
• I do not have to drink milk or yogurt with every meal (but I do like it)
• I use lights when I cycle and I have a 21 speed mountain bike
• I serve beer without an enormous head and everyone complains!
• I really miss cider while living out here
• ...and I'm still working on my pronunciation of Scheveningen!!

Frantic februari

Wow, yeah, so I'm not doing such a great job of blogging lately, my apologies!  But februari was heel druk (very busy).... and yes, I now write in a strange mixture of Engels-Dutch - you should see my emails to Dutch people (besides, some Dutch words just look better than English ones... for example "appel"  "wafel" "appartement" etc, my spelling in English is certainly going downhill!

So, my excuse for the lack of blogging activity is the fact that during februari I was actually only at home for about 9days in the whole month... I spent the first week with the nuns on my intensive Dutch language training course, then it was my birthday and I spent a long weekend in Maastricht with Rich (it was their "mardi gras" carnival... ik was een kikker) and the last week of feb I was away at a conference in Zurich.  Zurich is beautiful but you certainly pay for the experience, around £7 for a cup of coffee and the conference meal (3 (tiny, tiny) courses) cost £70!!  I wasn't even full afterwards!  So I'm glad I got to see it on a work trip as I definitely wouldn't go back for a holiday, not when lunch prices are like evening meal prices!

A really busy but interesting month!

Here are some pics of the crazy carnival:



Unfortunately I have no pictures of Zurich as my camera was stolen on my last day :-(  Terrible timing as two days later I managed to explode the back tyre of my mountain bike, so it's been an expensive couple of weeks.

Well, the problem is that work trips go hand in hand with free food, free alcohol and no exercise so I'm feeling pretty unhealthy right now.  I thought I'd give up alcohol for lent but then I realised that St. Patrick's day is in the way and that would be a great shame!  Also, in an attempt to make up for the lack of sport and too much eating, I set my alarm 45min early every day last week planning on going for a 30min run before work each day, however, each time the alarm went off I just switched it off and went back to sleep again... this week I didn't even bother!

I did have a sporty weekend tho, Sat I went for a 2 and a half hour cycle ride (I cycled to the Hague, ate dim sum and cycled back again!) and Sunday I got my ass kicked in a squash tournament!

Until next time....

Lovin' the language

Sooooo, I've been learning Dutch for a few months now, mostly using the computer program Rosetta Stone but also learning from my many new Dutch friends and colleagues and I've also started having a few one to one lessons (I've had four so far).

And what have I learnt so far?

1)  It's really hard (I don't speak any other languages)
2)  You need a lot of saliva to speak this language, after an hour and a half lesson I feel hoarse!  Dutch people must feel thirsty all the time.
3)  I hate languages with male and female objects!

BUT I'm off to the "nuns" next week for intensive Dutch language training from 8am until 9pm!  I've heard I'll start having nightmares in Dutch! I was tested last week at a level A2 which I was really pleased with as it takes 6 months of university lessons to get to that level (and that's 6hours worth of lessons a week not including homework!).

But what's been the most interesting parts of learning Dutch so far?

Well, learning to tell the time was a real revelation, when my tutor showed me pictures of clocks I was thinking to myself, I need to learn how to say the time in Dutch, not how to READ the time off a clock face... boy was I wrong. So, if we say "half 6" in England, this is short for "half past 6" i.e. 6:30, but half 6 in Holland is 5:30... why? Because a half is smaller than a whole, so half of 6 is obviously 5:30! Not only that to say 5:25 you would say (literally translated) "five before half six" and 5:35 "five after half six"... go figure. It's amazing that I've been turning up to meetings at the right time. They also like to give everything in 24hour clock time here.

My favourite literal translations so far are:

Stropdas which means tie (as in a neck tie) but literally translated is "noose tie" or das can also be translate as badger so I like to think of it as a "noose badger"

Hagelslag, these are the choc sprinkles you put on your bread, this literally means Hail stones

Pindakaas, peanut butter (but literally "peanut cheese")

Handschoen are gloves but literally "hand shoes" (I suppose at least they don't have "foot fingers" I've heard a number of other languages do!)

Watje means wimp but lit. "little cotton ball" :-)

Slices of bread are called boeterhammen but lit. this means "butter ham"... what?!

They also don't say, I'm going to play squash, they would say, I'm going "squashing" etc

People also don't type "haha" to laugh, they type "Whahaha"

My favourite Dutch phrase that I've learnt so far is "there are bears in the road", i.e. stuff just keeps getting in the way! Nice. (cuz you obviously get a lot of bears in the road here).

And "tot" means "to", but if you say Monday to Friday in the UK, we mean Monday to Friday. If they say Maandag tot Vrijdag in Dutch, it means Monday to Friday but not actually including Friday, so you have to say Monday "to and with" Friday (tot en met)... so opening days of shops and museums has become a bit confusing!

I also went down to our department's basement last week and learnt the word "Eng" which means creepy... but "land" means country, so Eng-land literally means "Creepy/scary country", so now you know what the Dutch really think of us!

And finally... the @ sign is called "aap staart" here, that means MONKEY TAIL... how cool, so much cooler than "at"!!