Which food or meals are typical of the Netherlands?

Question

Main courses, desserts, entrees... whatever. Knock yourselves out, as long as its dutch.

And you can throw in some places of interest within the Netherlands while you're at it.
Thanks.

Answer 1

Food
As shown in Van Gogh's Aardappeleters (The Potato Eaters), the main ingredient in old-fashioned Dutch cooking is potatoes. These are often boiled and are usually accompanied by meat and boiled vegetables. The Dutch traditionally don't use very many spices and are very fond of pouring gravy onto everything. The food sounds bland but over the years I have had some incredible meals in Holland. One of my all time favourite restaurants is actually Dutch.
Aside from all the potatoes the consumption of dairy products is extremely high, which, according to some scientists, accounts for the high average height of Dutch men and women - personally, I blame their liberal views on drugs. Some of my favourite Cloggy cuisine includes:

Vla: This was my staple food when I lived in the Netherlands. I ate it for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It's a thick sweet milk pudding which is similar to English custard. It's available in numerous flavours - though the best is undoubtedly butterscotch. For true heaven add a box of Dutch style chocolate sprinkles to the vla.

Hagelslag: Found in small boxes on every Dutch breakfast table, these chocolate sprinkles are wonderful when sprinkled on bread or added to val. The white chocolate ones are especially lovely. Dutch people find it rather strange that other countries don't have these.

Drop: Nothing is more Dutch than drop and I am reliably informed that I am the only non-Dutch person to ever like it. Dutch people consume this sticky liquorice sweet in industrial quantities - it verges on an addiction. Two Dutch people meeting anywhere away from their beloved flat land will always ask, 'Do you have any drop.'

According to my girlfriend the times when one might enjoy drop are:

When you are depressed and need cheering up
When you are happy and want to celebrate
When you are hungry
When you have just eaten and need some help with digesting the meal
Just before bed
Before, during and after sex
Most people find the taste rather difficult to stomach and I have often heard it described as tasting like old socks.
Frikandel: A wonderful Dutch snack comprised off all the bits of horse the butcher hasn't been able to sell rolled into a long sausage, deep fried and served piping hot. The best ones are sold from greasy spoon style fast food stalls at railway stations.

Fries: The Dutch love their French Fries and it's somewhat of a national obsession to stand on street corners wolfing down a steaming bag of fries covered in saté sauce, or more traditionally, mayonnaise. As Vincent from Pulp Fiction reminds us:

Vincent: But you know what they put on French fries in Holland instead of ketchup?
Jules: What?
Vincent: Mayonnaise. I seen 'em do it. And I don't mean a little bit on the side of the plate, they ******' drown 'em in it.

Even more extreme is a patatje oorlog - literally meaning "French fries war" - indicating French fries with mayonnaise, ketchup and saté-sauce sprinkled with raw onions. The best fries can be found from stalls around Dam square and cost about US$0.50 for a large bag. Eating fries is one of the best things about Holland for me (perversely, my Dutch girlfriend refuses to let me eat fried food at home as it's unhealthy).

Haring: Another common sight on the streets of Amsterdam is people sliding raw herrings down their throats. This is something of an acquired taste and one which I am still working on. The first catch of the season is called Hollandse nieuwe ('Dutch new') and is considered a special treat.

Pea Soup: Another famous Dutch delight. Traditional recipes are passed from mother to daughter and guarded almost as closely as the Dutch guard their money. Dutch pea soup is a meal in itself and is full of fresh winter vegetables and chunks of bacon and sausage. You should be able to stand a spoon upright in a good pea soup.

Dutch Cheese
Holland is justifiably famous for its cheese, even if it does generally export only the lower quality cheeses - which I am sure the Dutch find terribly amusing. I always used to think of Dutch cheese as bland until I visited a cheese shop in Amsterdam and tried some of the local cheeses. Most have strong, complex flavours and are best enjoyed with a bottle of wine of two.

Answer 2

Poffertjes, chocolate hagel on bread, gouda, nasi goreng, honey cake w. butter, rusks w. butter, edam, vla, hutspot.....yum yum yum. Dutch food is big on veggies and dairy and is also has some heavy Indonesian influences.
If you're going to NL, definitely hit up Den Haag. There are a million yummy restaurants, DO NOT miss out on poffertjes. You'll never eat another American pancake again.

Answer 3

Netherlands Typical Food

Answer 4

Below is listed some typical Dutch food which you should certainly experience during a visit to Holland. Most of the listed food is available at any supermarket.
-Vla: a thick sweet milk pudding which is similar to English custard, made mainly from milk and offered in a variety of tastes ranging from vanilla and chocolate to strawberry. If you get the chance, you must try hopjes-vla and bitterkoekjes-vla which have a very typical and also unexplainable tastes.
-Karnemelk: literally 'churned milk' (buttermilk). It has a thin substance and is rather sour. It is supposed to be quite healthy, but admittedly you must acquire a taste for it.
-Poffertjes: these resemble very small pancakes and are traditionally served warm with lots of powdered sugar sprinkled on top. You can make them at home if you have a special pan, but it might be easier to go to a poffertjeskraam (kraam is literally a market stall, but also indicates larger eating-houses) and get them ready made.
-Hagelslag: traditionally lots of chocolate-snippers which the Dutch sprinkle on their bread. Nowadays it comes in quite a number of (chocolate-) varieties.
-Muisjes: literally meaning 'mice', it falls in the same category as hagelslag and is also used as bread-spread. Of course the ingredients do not consist of an actual mouse, although the blue & white muisjes do resemble very small mice crawling around on your slice of bread. Traditionally the blue & white muisjes are served on beschuit (rusk) to celebrate the birth of a child. Although now available in different varieties (like gestampte muisjes or 'crushed mice') it is essentially made from anise with a sugar coating.
-Drop: a sweet (liquorice) that comes in a very large number of different forms and tastes, from salt and hard to soft and sweet. It is very popular among the entire Dutch population and is claimed to have something of an addictive-effect if eaten regularly in very large quantities.
-Stamppot: a very down-to-earth meal consisting of mashed potatoes with varying ingredients like carrot (wortel stamppot), kale (boerenkool stampot) or endive (andijvie stamppot) and usually served with rookworst, a delicious, smoked, juicy, mild sausage.
-Pea Soup: Another famous Dutch delight. Dutch pea soup is a meal in itself and is full of fresh winter vegetables and chunks of bacon and sausage. You should be able to stand a spoon upright in a good pea soup.
-Patat: patat or 'french fries' may not be an exclusively Dutch food, but the thickness of the french fry itself and the fact that it is very often eaten with mayonaise ('patat met('patat with') is french fries with mayonaise) does make some foreigners stare. Even more extreme is a 'patatje oorlog' - literally meaning "french fries war" - indicating french fries with mayonaise and saté-sauce. ‘patat speciaal’ is french fries, mayonnaise, ketchup and raw onions. Patat in all its varieties can be obtained in any snackbar.

An iNteresting way to get takeaway in Holland is from the wall. There are snack bars that have rows of little windows where you slot in a coin and choose what snack you would like.
-Kroket and frikandel: both are fried, roll-formed snacks containing (some kind of) meat. Available at any snackbar and not advisable for vegetarians.
-Haring: a typical Dutch delicacy is eating a raw herring (fish) with raw onions. You pick the fish up by the tail and let it slide into your mouth gradually. Of course the head is removed and the fish has been cleaned. The first catch of the season is called Hollandse nieuwe ('Dutch new') and is considered a special treat.
-Stroopwafel: is a unique type of cookie that has been around for centuries. are made with two thin wafle-type wafers that have a very special caramel filling. The waffle is cooked at a very high temperature on a waffle iron then sliced in half. The syrup then spread on and the two halves come together again.
-Vlaai: this a pastry or a sweet pie typical of the southern regions of the Netherlands (Limburg and Brabant) but available all through the country. It comes in many different varieties and usually contains some kind of fruit filling.

Some great links to Recipes

1. Janneke's Online Cookbook: Great recipes!!
2. Henk's Hot Kitchen. Dutch / Indonesian recipes Henk's recipes are his personal interpretation of classical Indonesian dishes as prepared in the Netherlands by Indonesian immigrants and Dutch expatriates.
3. Discover Traditional Dutch Food Traditional Dutch recipes in English.
GOOD AFTERNOON. BYE.

Answer 5

Of course, everyone's favorite: fries with mayo.

Answer 6

magic brownies

Answer 7

http://members.home.nl/cookingdutch/
http://www.lonelyplanet.com/worldguide/destinations/europe/netherlands/

Answer 8

dutch food