Posts Tagged With: Winter

Five Guys (Or: Time for a bit of fast food)

Posted on February 5, 2021 by Niki

Marco graciously allowed me to change our plans; we picked up Five Guys for dinner tonight. We haven’t been in there a year and a half, probably… definitely not since the corona crisis started. Which is a bit strange, since it is much quieter there these days. Unfortunately for them.

That’s technically where the line would be, if there was a line. And of course there are no free shelled peanuts at the moment.

But ignoring that – woo, Five Guys! Hamburger with jalapeños, grilled onions and mustard for me, with cajun fries. This time we were smart and ordered “cajun on the side”, so we could add the spices ourselves. That meant the spice was a bit more uneven, but at least they were not completely coated in cajun spices this time.

One of the two message boards at Five Guys, a staple by all of their locations I think.

350 snow plows ready to keep Dutch roads clear over snowy weekend from nltimes.nl. Snoooowww! And cold. With lots of wind. So we’ll just stay inside all week? (Of course some Dutchies will strap on their ice skates and rush outside.)

As frost and snow looms, the Dutch draw up rules for Covid-proof skating from dutchnews.nl. See what I mean?

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Falafel (Or: A tasty Sunday meal)

Posted on February 3, 2021 by Niki

On Sunday Marco and I had falafel for dinner. It is part of FOAM @ home, a pickup service offered every Friday.

It is one of those things – I am sure I have had falafel before (deep-fried balls made from ground chickpeas or lava beans, served in a pita). However I have no direct memory of it so it could indeed be the first time.

It was pretty tasty, a perfect light meal for a Sunday evening.

Eurovision planning live event in Rotterdam; In-person audience unknown from nltimes.nl. It seems like ages ago, but the Netherlands did win the Eurovision Song Contest back in 2019, which meant they were able to host the event in 2020. Only the 2020 event was cancelled due to the coronavirus, so they will be hosting the 2021 event instead.

Milder temps to give way for icy weekend from nltimes.nl. Brrr. Winter is coming back this weekend with temperatures around freezing and high winds. Also a chance of snow, but we will need to wait and see if that happens. Again, brrrrrr.

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Snow (Or: What is snow again?)

Posted on January 14, 2021 by Niki

Buienradar (“Shower radar”) says parts of the Netherlands are looking at snow this weekend. As usually happens, it’s a minuscule amount, maybe an inch or two. It will also probably disappear within 24 hours when it starts raining later on Sunday – but hey, it is still snow!

Snow expected in NL this weekend from dutchnews.nl

It’s definitely been a few years since it has snowed here. Maybe Spring 2018? I posted a photo of the Hofvijfer with snow on top of the water that month. Either way, this weekend should be interesting.

In other news, we had tacos last night and Marco took a photo of his. Check it out:

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Beef stew (Or: A blast from the past)

Posted on December 7, 2020 by Niki

Marco and I make beef stew in our slow cooker about once a year. The beef stew recipe we used this time was from Allrecipes. I like any recipe that only has two steps, don’t you? This time we did it on high setting (4-6 hours) because I had zero interest in stepping out of my nice warm bed before 09:00. In the end it cooked about 5 hours, with the last 30-45 minutes on medium instead of high.

The beef was so tender you could easily pull it apart with a fork. And as you can tell I think potatoes are the second hero of the dish, so I definitely made sure I had a lot of those. Finally, the bread in the background is from Albert Heijn and is their Liefde & Passie spelt brood (Love & Passion spelt bread – a bit hardier to help with the dipping).

The nostalgia is high with this dish. I loved eating this in the winter as a kid. This and chili are Marco and I’s favorite slow cooker dishes. Third place for me is probably pulled chicken.

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One night of frost (Or: Time to go ice skating?!)

Posted on December 1, 2020 by Niki

Here is another Dutch stereotype for you: the Dutch love to go ice staking. As I mentioned a few weeks back, the Elfstedentocht (Wikipedia) is the event that stops the country – except for the fact that it has not been held since 1997 due to a lack of ice. Opps.

But the Dutch are an innovative folk and will find any way they can to go ice skating. A student from the university TU Twente developed a system to help keep ice frozen for longer. And this was put to the test on Sunday night as temperatures dropped under the freezing point. He put foam concrete under a layer of asphalt, and then added a layer of water on the asphalt. It froze overnight, creating an ice rink. The foam concrete helps retain the ice that forms, keeping the ice rink intact longer.

The best part? The ice skating rink can be found in the town Winterswijk, near Germany. The name translates loosely to “Winter neighborhood”, which is a great name in this case.

Video: Winterswijk skating rink open after one night of moderate frost from dutchnews.nl.

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Hot chocolate (Or: The case of the disappearing cookie)

Posted on November 29, 2020 by Niki

Yesterday Marco, Roger and I made a cup of hot chocolate before sending Roger off back into the cold. Hot chocolate, whipped cream, chocolate powder, and a piece of speculaas cookie (Albert Heijn link to the cookie).

Keep your eye on that cookie…

… by the time Marco noticed, it was gone. Marco did say the bottom of his hot chocolate did taste rather speculaas-y, though.

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Christmas crafts (Or: The joy of the unexpected)

Posted on December 28, 2018 by Niki

One gift that made Marco laugh (for a long time I might add!) was made by Marco’s dad and his wife:

The gift: two bottles of “melted snowman”

How cute is that? We now own two melted snowman! Complete with the melted ice (safely stored in a water bottle) and a tiny plastic bag containing his hat, nose, eyes, and mouth. Hehe!

Another craft from them was the yearly Christmas card – check it out!

Keeping company with the 2018 Christmas caed is an old tin (which previously had Lebkuchen in it) and a fully decked out library.

And a much deserved close up of the Christmas card, so that you can better see the intricacies of it:

Check it out…

Mooi! (beautiful)

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Just a bit of snow (Or: Buitenhof in the winter)

Posted on March 5, 2018 by Niki

The Netherlands has been under a cold spell recently. The wind changed direction and started coming from Siberia. No joke. There was one day with a temperature that felt like -20c (-4f). Brrr! 

But it did bring out some nice photos, including one of mine:

Snow on the Buitenhof, The Hague.jpg

I am happy to report that the wind changed direction on Sunday, so the breeze bit of snow is now gone again. Not that I have anything against snow, but this country definitely doesn’t know how to deal with it.

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Crunch crunch crunch (Or: Snow!!!)

Posted on December 11, 2017 by Niki

Snow!

Snow!

Snow!

In the last two days we’ve received more snow than I’ve probably seen in the almost 5 years I’ve been here (and wow, next Monday is officially 5 years!) Yesterday wasn’t too bad – most people did not have to work. Indeed, Marco and I went outside yesterday and took some pictures.

HTM bus 22 and December snow fall, The Hague city hall.jpg

snowfall yesterday. bus 22, with the oliebollen stand behind

But today would prove to be slightly more chaotic. Schiphol is currently trying to decide if they put out bedding for stranded travellers; about one third of the flights are cancelled and buses and trains aren’t running there. No trains to or from Amsterdam or Utrecht (in the heart of the Netherlands) at the moment. For a while the HTM buses here in The Hague stopped riding, but some lines are riding again.

I knew I had to go into work – my work computer was there! – but Marco was kind enough to walk me to my tram stop. It started snowing again in the late morning, so I stuck around until just after 1pm, and then went home to finish off my work there.

Continue reading →

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Snowmageddon (Or: Snow in The Hague)

Posted on February 12, 2017 by Niki

Okay, obviously the post title is a joke! But still, I was able to take some pretty pictures over the weekend of the snow in The Hague.

snow-on-the-nieuwe-kerk-in-the-hague

Considering the level of snow some parts of America get, this is obviously nothing. But still, it’s been about four years since I’ve seen snow in the Netherlands – there was some snow in 2012-2013 when I moved here (and way too much ice) but since then not much. The one time we really got snow, Marco and I were on vacation out of the country.

So yeah – it’s been about 4 years!

snow-on-flowers-in-the-hague

Rabbijn Maarsenplein

Both of these pictures were taken on Saturday. Overnight into Sunday we actually got a bit more snow – about an inch – but it’s all but melted now. But it was fun to see how happy the kids were to play in snow.

A neighborhood police agent was filming with a body camera as he participated in a (playful) snowball fight with kids from the Moerwijk district – see the video of the snowball fight on Omroep West.

Categories: The Hague | Tags: | 2 Comments

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