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Lemon cake part two (Or: Marks and Spencer)

Posted on August 31, 2014 by Niki

A while back I had taken a picture of the lemon cake at Marks and Spencer (which opened this year in The Hague). However the lighting wasn’t that great. So here it is again, as Marco and I went back last weekend…

lemon cake and coffee by Marks & Spencer in The Hague

lemon cake, small coffee, large cappuccino

The lemon cake is actually quite sour, especially the top layer. The trick is the slightly wet-looking area just below the icing and dark brown layer. Quite sour! Definitely recommend trying it out if you enjoy sour items.

And now I want lemonheads…

Categories: Food | Tags: Candy, Marks and Spencer | 2 Comments

Lay’s potato chip flavors (Or: Stokbroodje met kruidenboter)

Posted on August 27, 2014 by Niki

A few weeks ago Marco brought home a new Lay’s flavor for their ‘Do us a flavor!‘ contest. Of course, flavors are different depending on the country the chips are being sold in. The four flavors for America this year were cappuccino, bacon mac and cheese, salsa mango, and wasabi ginger.

The Netherlands have their own flavors, of course. A few weeks Marco brought home one of them:

The flavor is french bread with garlic butter. Unfortunately you don’t get anything that tastes like bread in the flavor, just garlic butter (which comes across nicely).

Of course this is the country that has ‘normal’ flavors of barbecue ham and of patatje joppie (a sort of Dutch sauce that goes well with French fries apparently).

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Roger’s 40th (Or: Birthday party at Paraplu)

Posted on August 24, 2014 by Niki

A month after Marco, Roger also turns 40. We celebrated the event by going to Paraplu in The Hague – the first time for me. As usual, I had the kipsaté (chicken on a skewer with peanut sauce). Yum! Also the first time I ever had kroepoek (the white disks) paired with peanuts and peanut shavings directly on top.

As a surprise, a family member had ordered a birthday dessert for Roger (and the table). Quite spectacular:

Good times en lekker eten!

Categories: Food, The Hague | Tags: Birthdays, Desserts, Restaurants | 4 Comments

Birthdays (Or: Flowers, balloons and key lime pie)

Posted on August 12, 2014 by Niki

Over the weekend we had a birthday party for Marco (slightly delayed since some of our friends were out of the country). Since it was his 40th I decided to be slightly evil and buy some themed balloons. “Keep calm — you’re only 40” balloons, to be precise.

Very colorful – not quite the rainbow I was going for, but it works. One of the guests also dropped off flowers…

Marco decided to show off his creative baking side by making key lime pie using Keebler graham cracker crust (recipe here).

And of course he added his own touch by freezing some of the raspberry syrup mix into Captain America shield molds. Yum. And crazy…

Categories: Friends&Family | Tags: Birthdays, Flowers | Leave a comment

News on the teletext (Or: Differences in culture)

Posted on July 10, 2014 by Niki

So about a month ago Marco and I were reading something from Teletext. That is a sort of information retrieval system for your television, created back in the early 70s. Of course, it is really ugly/gaudy/you name it, but it was apparently great before the advent of the internet. Below is only one color scheme. (I don’t really use it much, but I didn’t grow up with it either.)

Imagine my surprise reading this article. Not so much for the content, but for the random use of a swear in the middle of an official news piece. Although shit is not such a strong swear word in the Netherlands — somewhat more akin to the Americans use of ‘damn’.

The actual news item above talks about an American mayor who stepped down after getting caught throwing a bag of poop on the driveway of a political rival (who voted against the mayor’s plan for a dog park). He initially denied the charge but unfortunately for him he was filmed doing it.

But then there is the random English phrase thrown in there. Tja equals something like ‘yeah, shrug’. Shit happens. Puns…

But it is rather mild. Just weird to see in an official news source!

Categories: Culture | Leave a comment

17 June 2014 (Or: Pearl Jam concert in Amsterdam)

Posted on July 6, 2014 by Niki

This photo was from the 2nd night that Pearl Jam was in Amsterdam, taken by Marco:

I wasn’t present at the second night, only at the first one. You can see where we were standing — in the standing area in the middle you can see a definite line/division where they had placed a metal divider to keep people from pushing too much to the front. We were right outside the first area with the divider right in front of us. The second night only Marco and Roger went; they definitely had nosebleed seats!

It was a great night of course – the only thing I wished was that they had played Future Days from the new album. (YouTube | Lyrics)

Categories: Marco&Niki | Tags: Music | Leave a comment

World Cup/Netherlands

Posted on July 6, 2014 by Niki

ARGHHHHHHJHHHHHHH!!!!!!

Yes! Yes! Yes!

Categories: Sports | Tags: Football | 1 Comment

Tasty Fridays (Or: Cheesecake Company in The Hague)

Posted on July 3, 2014 by Niki

A few Fridays ago some of my coworkers and I celebrated the impending weekend by getting some cheesecake from the Cheesecake Company in The Hague. Officially it was a cheesecake tasting – everyone took a little bit from each piece.

I don’t remember all of the fruit flavors, but ones I do know are: plain (lower right side). Directly above that is razma-limey, with the lime on top. Definitely my favorite fruit flavor. To the left of the plain one was double chocolate-chocolate chip. Dreamsicle (a sort of orange and vanilla swirl, based off a cream popsicle) was in the 9 o’clock position. Lastly, next to the strawberry up top was mango (with all of the yellow pieces on top).

Other fruit flavors that were there included blackberry, blueberry, bosvruchten (forest fruit), and more that I can’t possibly remember. But it was delicious! They are right next to the Grote Kerk in The Hague, on Torenstraat.

Categories: Food | Tags: Cheesecake company, Desserts | Leave a comment

Orange fever (Or: Dutchies take first place in group B)

Posted on June 23, 2014 by Niki

Nederland 2 – Chili 0

The game between the Netherlands and Chile was closer than the score would show – the first Dutch goal was in the 77th minute by Leroy Fer and the second one was in extra time by Memphis Depay.

With this win, the Dutch take first place in their group (B) and play again Sunday at 6PM local time. Go Dutchies!

Blokker winkel orange World Cup decorations

‘Blokker’ store in The Hague with decorations

Categories: Sports | Tags: Football | Leave a comment

Time for chocolate (Or: Homemade rice krispie treats)

Posted on June 21, 2014 by Niki

As mentioned in the previous post, on Thursday night I had a barbecue at my teacher’s house. I decided to make rice krispie treats (Marco and I had a lot of fun in the kitchen making them!)

Above is a photo of one of the pans of rice krispies, after pouring the melted chocolate but before spreading it. Lekker!

My classmates definitely enjoyed it. Marco took most of the leftovers to work on Friday for his coworkers. I heard it was also a hit there (although one of them said he wanted to run up and down the hallway repeatedly after eating all that chocolate).

Categories: Food | Tags: Chocolate, Desserts | 1 Comment