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De Haagsche Bluf (Or: Coffee and music)

Posted on April 21, 2014 by Niki

Marco and I went shopping this afternoon — I needed a new pair of sneakers as mine had seen better days. We knew we wanted to go somewhere for coffee afterwards but we weren’t sure where. We were going to try Hometown Coffee (the last time we tried there were no free tables and it was a bit too cold to sit outside) but we ended up elsewhere.

More specifically, in De Haagsche Bluf (English), a luxury shopping area in the middle of centrum. We decided to have coffee at Kaldi (English). I had my usual coffee and Marco his cappuccino, and we split an American cookie with white chocolate chips (American = large, soft cookie). Yum.

But unexpectedly we also had some musical entertainment:

It was pretty cool, as the “stage” was actually the front part of the building, simply pulled down like a drawbridge. Here is a close-up.

Great music! Sort of jazzy, with the drums and clarinet alongside.

Categories: Daily Dutch living | Tags: Cafes, Haagsche Bluf, Music | Leave a comment

Easter and… furniture (Or: Dutch B2 course #24)

Posted on April 18, 2014 by Niki

Here is a random thing that I learned yesterday during Dutch class: on Easter Monday, some Dutch go to a meubelboulevard, or a furniture store shopping mall. At least for the last few decades. Part of this is because furniture stores are open on Mondays although these days more stores are open on Mondays than just furniture stores. They also lure you in with irresistible discounts.

A local mall in The Hague (with mostly furniture stores) by the name of Mega Stores also has a chocoladefestival (chocolate festival) on Monday to celebrate the holiday. They have two chocolate fountains and children can also make bunny ears crafts.

I also found an old article (unfortunately in Dutch) from 2008 about the traffic around Ikea in Delft. The traffic was so bad that by the afternoon Ikea was asking visitors to stay away from the area and not come on that day in an attempt to lessen the traffic headaches people were experiencing on highway A13. Of course, Ikea seemed to be a hot place to be back then – they also closed a few exit ramps (afritten) leading to Ikea due to the traffic nightmares it was causing.

Of course this just reminds me of when Sonic restaurants opened in northern New Jersey, causing such bad traffic jams on the highway exit ramp that the police were called in for the first few weeks.

Categories: Courses, Holidays | Tags: Easter | Leave a comment

Videochats (Or: Electronic birthday cake)

Posted on April 14, 2014 by Niki

Yesterday I had a videochat with my parents to celebrate my birthday. Imagine my surprise when the videochat connected and I saw this cake:

German chocolate birthday cake!

That’s right. They bought a cake for me, even though I was in a different country! I then got treated to “Happy Birthday” from my parents, all the way across the ocean. 🙂

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

Awwww (Or: birthdays and romance)

Posted on April 13, 2014 by Niki

From Marco. 🙂

Categories: Marco&Niki | Tags: Baking, Birthdays | 6 Comments

Old commercials (Or: “I feel like posting tonight”)

Posted on March 31, 2014 by Niki

Back when I was a kid we had commercials for a product called “Chicken Tonight”. Small world I suppose – it was originally sold in America under the Ragu brand, but Ragu is owned by Unilever, a Dutch company. According to Wikipedia (same article in Dutch) it is no longer sold in America, but it is still sold in the Netherlands.

Of course the flavors are quite different in this country – while in America you had flavors such as Honey Mustard and Country French, here you have flavors like kerrie met ananas (curry with pineapple) under the Knorr brand. So we made that tonight, just to have a blast with the past type feeling.

Best part, of course, was the ridiculous commercials from the ’90s where people would say “I feel like chicken tonight, like chicken tonight” while flapping their arms like chickens.

Youtube commercial

Categories: Food | 3 Comments

Who are you referring to? (Or: B2 Dutch course #16)

Posted on March 22, 2014 by Niki

There wasn’t much in my notes from Thursday’s class – we did a lot of practice exercises it seemed. One thing I did write down was this exchange:

Pretend someone calls you and asks Is Mary daar? Is Mary there?

How do you refer to ‘Mary’ when you answer? Nee, …. is niet hier. No, … is not here.

In English it would generally be ‘she’ or ‘he’ (ze/zij or hij). It’s possible in Dutch as well. But in Dutch you can also say: Nee, die is niet hier. die refers back to the question, rather than the person itself. (This is much like my last post about Er, where I said er could refer to an entire idea/phrase/statement.)

And since this wasn’t the most comprehensive post, here’s a picture of dessert!

cinnamon ice cream with chocolate sauce and whipped cream

It’s from Spize, a Thai restaurant in The Hague. We went there back in January. Yum!

Categories: Courses, Food | Tags: Desserts, Dutch language | Leave a comment

Celebrations (Or: St. Patricks Day in The Hague 2014)

Posted on March 16, 2014 by Niki

a day early, but…

Of course when the previous place you lived was Pearl River, NY with the second largest parade in the state (at 100,000 spectators)… anything else will look really, really small in comparison.

The celebration in The Hague was basically one plaza. But, people seemed happy to inebriate themselves:

There was also a live band:

And festive head gear on sale:

And a jolly demonstration of head gear:

So yes, it isn’t quite the same as a crush of 100,000 people, but it will do.

Categories: Holidays | Tags: St Patrick's Day | 4 Comments

Bagels & Beans (Or: More cheesecake and coffee)

Posted on March 11, 2014 by Niki

A few weekends ago we took a trip to Bagels & Beans, primarily known for their coffee and bagels (as if you couldn’t guess from the name!) They do have really nice bagels – examples include plain, cinnamon raisin, and everything. If you want cream cheese, you’ll get a generous portion as well. Always way more than I need, though I don’t like as much as most people do.

But we were there long enough that we decided to order round two… this time I went for an iced coffee and we shared a cheesecake.

It wasn’t as good as the Cheesecake Company, but cheesecake isn’t Bagels & Beans speciality, either. Don’t get me wrong – it was perfectly decent cheesecake. 🙂 The iced coffee was pretty nice though. It’s funny, I never really drank coffee when I lived in America (until the last year I was there), but now I am quite used to the nightly ritual of coffee after dinner, or coffee after I get back from my Dutch lesson at 10PM. It doesn’t really ever keep me awake, so I don’t have to worry about that!

Categories: Food | Tags: Bagels & Beans, Cafes | 5 Comments

Sour lemon cake (Or: Surprises at Marks & Spencer)

Posted on March 9, 2014 by Niki

So as I mentioned in previous blog posts, Marks & Spencer has been open since February 20th in The Hague. I’ve been there three times now and still haven’t stopped to look at the clothes… I guess it really revolves around the British food offerings.

Marco and I decided to head over there at lunchtime for some coffee. I staked out a table (a requirement usually, as it’s still pretty busy) while he went to get coffee for me and a cappuccino for him. He also came back with lemon cake. (Side note: they had a lot of different cakes and more hearty foods like the British fish & chips and the Dutch toasties, but less things in the middle like croissants).

coffee and cappuccino (the lemon cake is hiding in the shadows to the right)

The lemon cake was definitely a surprise in terms of sourness. I love sour candy, so for me that is a pleasant surprise. The top was covered in icing which was definitely the highlight for sourness, but even the cake itself was still pretty sour. I still pucker my lips just thinking about it!

The cafe itself is on the top floor. All of the tables are by the window, although it might have been better to make the seating area a bit bigger to get more tables in there as it is usually pretty busy. Due to the way the building is constructed you don’t have the best of views outside (Hema is still the best for people watching) so here it is mostly to sit and bask in the sun while the time of day is right.

Categories: Food | Tags: Cafes, Marks and Spencer | Leave a comment

Marks & Spencer is back (Or: Time for cake)

Posted on February 27, 2014 by Niki

Last Thursday, Marks & Spencer opened its doors in the heart of The Hague. It is a British retail chain that used to have a few stores in the Netherlands (including in The Hague and Amsterdam) though it closed its doors years ago. Unfortunately (or fortunately, due to the crowds) I was at work so I did not check it out until this past weekend. Marco and I went on Sunday, right when they opened at 12PM. The crowds, geez! We checked out the food section, but it was pretty hard to move around. We did spy this crazy cake, however:

The box reads “extremely chocolatey loaded party cake”

Looks pretty delicious, but I suspect anyone who eats it would be instantly diagnosed with diabetes afterwards. We didn’t have much time to take any other photos – it really was quite crowded and we did not stay that long. Perhaps next time. I am interested in going there to have a cup of coffee – though it might be a few months before the place calms down a bit. The chain does seem to have a bit of a cult following…

Categories: Food | Tags: Cafes, Marks and Spencer | 1 Comment