Dainobu

On Friday, I went out for lunch a little earlier than usual (I'm usually a late luncher) to try to catch the Malaysia Kitchen truck. They had samples from Bentara in New Haven, which I loved during undergrad, and I wanted to try some (since I haven't been back to New Haven in years). I had tried going the day before (also for Bentara samples) but was a few blocks away when they ran out, so I decided to try to go earlier on Friday. They were over by Grand Central for a Malaysian food event there so I expected the free samples to run out quickly. They did. I missed it by about 2 minutes. I was sad. So close, yet came up empty.

I was also perplexed about what to do for lunch since the Malaysian food hall event was packed. I wanted something healthy and lighter, but what to get? The pizza trucks sounded too heavy, I wasn't really looking for a rice dish, Uncle Gussy's took the day off after their free giveaway the day before, so what to do?

I walked around some more and then saw the awning for Dainobu (47th between Lexington and 3rd). I always knew it was there, but had never actually ventured in. Why not try it?


Dainobu is a grocery store with a variety of prepared foods, including rice dishes, yakisoba, salads, sushi, sashimi. I also saw in the foursquare tips that they have a counter in the back where they put together some hot dishes like mapo tofu. But since I wasn't feeling a heavier rice dish and since it was my first time there, I stuck to the cold cases.


I debated between a bunch of salads and then finally decided on the calamari salad, partly because it would be healthy and partly because it was labeled a delicacy. Someplace new, try a special item, right?


It was OK. It was clean and light, the calamari wasn't chewy, but it also didn't have very strong flavors. There wasn't anything wrong with it, but I think I was just looking for something with a more powerful flavor at the time. (Anyone know what the green vegetable is in it and if it's related to broccoli?)

The calamari salad may have just been OK, but the sushi roll I got, I loved:


I forgot how good a fatty tuna-scallion roll can be. The fish was fresh, rich and full of flavor, and the roll was really good. It came with 12 pieces, so the price wasn't a bad deal. I would definitely go back for that. And maybe a different salad like the glass noodle salad I was initially looking at before finding the seafood delicacies. Actually, I could go for a fatty tuna-scallion roll right now. Yum.

Jia Update

I'm glad I went to Cafe Jia when I did last time to try the teppanyaki. I walked by today and the sale was no longer 50% off - only 25% - and it didn't cover teppanyaki anymore (only hot/cold buffet and salads). Still nice to get a discount, but I'm glad I went last time because I got a great deal!

Enchiladas

I've previously written about El Rey del Sabor, the awesome (and authentic) Mexican cart near my office, and their delicious tacos. Today, by the time I got lunch (2:30), I was super hungry and didn't think tacos would be enough.

So, what did I get?


Their awesome enchiladas.

(Yes, I use awesome a lot when I describe the food from El Rey del Sabor, but it really is good.)

It comes with three enchiladas (I got chicken) topped with your choice of sauce (I love the green sauce but have gotten mole before too), a white sauce (sour cream?) and lots of cheese. On the side there's rice and beans topped with red onions. Delicious. And very filling. And only $8.

I'm so glad El Rey is in my area. Sometimes I just want some good Mexican food (and Chipotle is more "burrito stuff" than real Mexican) for lunch and they're perfect for the craving.

Manneken Pis

Yes, Manneken Pis. No, not the little peeing statue in Brussels, this is the fry stand in Amsterdam. Do you notice a theme? Yeah, we went all out on the fry stands.

As mentioned, we did a lot of food research prior to arriving in Europe. There were two fry shops that were mentioned by everyone. First and foremost is Vleminckx Sausmeesters, and the second is Manneken Pis. Most people talk about the Brussels branch, but this place almost always seemed to have a line. It could be that it was located on a main street close to the Central Train Station and situated near tons of canal boat tours, but it could actually have been really good.

Even though we had just eaten dinner, a little snack couldn't hurt right? Sigh, we're so fat.

Me buying our little treats (l) A little fry stand at which to eat (r)
Overall we were not too impressed. Don't get me wrong, we love fries, and we love fries with Dutch/Belgian mayonnaise, but these still fell short of our first fry experience. Maybe we were too full from our dinner that night. Who knows. The fries were still crispy, and the mayonnaise was still tasty, but overall, it just wasn't all that.

Teppanyaki

When it's cold out (50s, but a 20+ degree drop from yesterday) and there's a lot of work to be done on a Friday, that sadly calls for a lunch close to the office. Fortunately there was a new place (opened this month) called Cafe Jia a block from the office and I went over to check it out.


I figured it would be like the generic midtown deli (sandwich, salad, hot/cold bar) but I ventured in to see if anything would inspire me and well, I was cold (so cold that my hands were shaky!).

Toward the back I saw the teppanyaki section. I was intrigued by it, and also my subconscious was probably thinking about warm grills and fires. After surveying the other options and ruling out tacos (sigh, addiction), I decided on teppanyaki. One big factor was that the grill looked very clean. This is something I definitely pay attention to when ordering something like this because of my broccoli allergy and its incomprehensible prevalence in Asian cooking.

For one meat plus 4 veggies (plus sauce and either rice/noodles), it's $7.75. I got chicken with string beans, vidalia onions, shiitake mushrooms and red and green peppers. I tried for asparagus and snap peas but they appeared to have run out of a lot of stuff. The chef told me that a lot of people had come through earlier in the day and apologized for being out of so many things. Also, he only had white rice left (I was hoping for brown, but oh well). It's OK with me -- at least there's good turnover.


I watched him cook the chicken, add the veggies and then add the rice. For some reason I thought the rice would be on the bottom of the bowl and then the protein and veggies would just be on top, not mixed together, but more mixing was fine with me. At the end, he added a combination of the white shallot oyster sauce and the garlic teriyaki sauce (his recommendation was to mix them).


It's pretty good! It's filling, it feels healthy (although with all the oil that goes into teppanyaki it's probably not), it has veggies (half the time at lunch where I go is dictated by the fact that I want some form of vegetables), it's cooked on the spot, they give you a lot of food. And even better - today hibachi was 50% off, so lunch cost me less than $5! For that entire bowl of tasty food. Sounds like a good deal to me.

Toasties

I have passed by Toasties a few times before on 49th Street but haven't gone in because of the crowds. Not a big fan of long lines. But today there was only a small crowd at lunchtime so I ventured inside.


My first thought was that it was very much like Lenny's (knockoff?). There's a section for a pick your ingredient salad. There's a spot to order your sandwich and a different spot to pay. There's the sandwich counter and next to it, a separate area for hot entrees (with hot sandwich options). The layout was just very similar. Some of their sandwiches also sounded remarkably similar to sandwiches we've gotten at Lenny's. The prices are in the same range too - about $7-9 for a sandwich.

So I got something different from my Lenny's standby (C1, whole wheat roll, no capers) - a hot sandwich called the Union Square.


After opening the sandwich, the size seemed a little smaller than the average Lenny's sandwich I get (but since I only get the C1 these days, I don't remember the sizes of other sandwiches there). But it ended up being pretty filling. Also, the flavor of the sandwich was really good and all the ingredients mixed together well. So I was satisfied with it.

The Union Square close-up:


The sandwich consists of grilled cracked pepper turkey with melted monterey pepper jack cheese, grilled onions, romaine lettuce and dijon mustard. I love mustard and it was a good mustard. I would get this sandwich again. It's relatively simple and with the ingredients, I could probably make this at home (although they wouldn't be grilled onions). But since I don't have a panini grill at work to make it myself, and since sandwiches always taste better when someone else makes them, I'll be back to Toasties.

Crisp

Today for lunch I took a short walk to Crisp for some much-craved falafel.

I went to Crisp a lot over the summer when they had good coupon deals. $5 sandwiches? Yes please! Unfortunately I don't think there's going to be many coupons for the general public anymore because they have moved to a VIP program where you pay for a loyalty card. I suppose if you go there all the time it could be worth it, but I don't think it's worth it for me for a few reasons. First, I can't guarantee I'd go often enough to make it worth it since we have so many in-house lunches and there are so many options in midtown. Second, most of the new discounts are conditioned on buying drinks and I don't buy drinks with lunch, so it wouldn't be of much help for me!


The Crisp sandwiches are served in special boxes where you "unzip" the middle to create a "handbag" for your sandwich. I ordered the Crisp Africa sandwich, which is my favorite of the bunch. The sandwich today looked completely different from both sides so here's a look at both sides:


It comes loaded with veggies (corn salad, sweet potatoes, cherry tomatoes, green onions) and nice sized falafel, and accompanied with a North African peanut sauce and habanero harissa sauce. The sandwich can sometimes be a little spicy, and just generally, is really good. I like most of the "creative" combinations because they're different from the falafel you can get at most places and make Crisp unique.


I attempted to go through the entire sandwich menu during the summer but out of the 8, I only got through 5. There's also hummus platters with sides but I like the way it all gets mixed together in the sandwiches better. If you're looking for a different take on the falafel sandwich, check out Crisp. Good flavors, good price, healthy lunch (or dinner).

Bird Thai

After following Rick Steves' walking tour of the Red Light District, it was time for dinner. The RLD isn't too far from Amsterdam's Chinatown, which we started wandering around. One of the places on our list was Bird Thai which was really 2 different restaurants - the actual Bird Thai restaurant and the sister Snackbar across the street. I was hoping to try the Snackbar since it was a little less formal and cheaper but it was packed when we got there. Luckily the wait wasn't too long but still allowed me to take a few photos while we waited.

There's A at the door of the Snackbar
We were seated at the counter instead of a table but that was perfect because of the great people-watching. We also got to watch the garbage trucks and the street cleaners in action. The guys from the garbage vehicle were tossing the bags in like it was a game. It was amusing.


One great thing about getting Thai food in Amsterdam was that even though the menu was in Dutch, it was also written in anglicized Thai. Therefore, we were able to recognize certain dishes because we knew their Thai names! Excellent! (It should be noted that the menus were also in English, but the Thai names gave us more "meaning.") I knew our love of Thai food and our constant visiting and ordering from Thai restaurants would pay off.

First, we ordered "lap kai" which we usually write out as "larb gai". The Dutch for this was "fijngehakte pikante kipschotel." It came with a plate of white rice, which we only see here at a few places. I actually really like larb gai with rice. It brings out even more flavors. It was really tasty and not overly spicy. A little expensive at 10 euro (it's usually about $7-9 at home), but it was good.


Next, we got the "kou pad kai" which was fried rice with chicken. In Dutch, it's "gebakken rijst met kipfilet." (I may have mentioned before that I love seeing the Dutch names for food, right?) The fried rice was really good.


Last, we got the "kai pad krapau" or chicken with basil leaves and peppers. This was really really good. It's hard to remember exactly since it's been so long, but I think this may have been our favorite dish. (Dutch: "kipfilet met basilicum en pepers")


We also got iced tea, this time it was a can of Lipton.

Not only were we sitting at the counter, but we were sitting on stools in the corner, so we were able to inconspicuously set up our gorillapod and take a picture of ourselves at dinner!


I would recommend Bird Thai for a nice Thai meal, especially if you have just gone sightseeing at the Red Light District. The Snackbar is nice and casual, and the food is good too.

Snack Time

During the afternoon of our third day in Amsterdam, we had lots of snacks and drinks, all things we couldn't get at home. (At least that's what we thought at the time.)

First, we stopped in to the cafe at the Van Gogh Museum after our visit and tried this drink:


It was nice and refreshing, not too sweet, with a raspberry flavor. It was also carbonated, which was a surprise to us.

On our way back to the hotel, we stopped at Albert Heijn. We got a couple of 100% fruit drinks:


The one I picked out (on the left) was a combination of apple, pear and raspberry. A picked out the other, which was called "summer juice", a combination of pear and cherry. We must have picked correctly, because we each preferred the one we picked out.


Then it was time to dig into the stroopwafels we bought the other day:




They were so good. Kind of rich and sweet, but such a tasty snack. We wanted more (but figured they weren't too healthy). A couple of weeks ago we were at Trader Joe's and were so happy when we discovered mini stroopwafels there (called "delicious caramel bites"). But they tasted different, which really disappointed me. The ones in Holland were so much crisper, the caramel didn't pull, it was just a perfectly textured wafer snack. I just checked and they are made by the same company with all the same ingredients! As A was saying to me, it must be something in the transportation from Holland to the US that loses some of the awesomeness (kind of like how Heineken tastes better and less bitter in Holland than it does here). I guess we should have bought some stroopwafels there to take home!

B+B Lunchroom

We needed to grab a quick lunch between our visits to the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh Museum, and walked around a bit looking for a restaurant. We passed one place on our researched list but it was an Indonesian place and we had just gone for rijsttafel the night before so we wanted to see what else there was. We wandered over toward Leidseplein (an area with a lot of restaurants) but stopped earlier when we saw a collection of restaurants in Max Euweplein.

There was a Hard Rock Cafe (but we can get that anywhere), an Irish pub (maybe), a Wagamama (we were interested but it was kind of expensive for Asian food) and a place called B&B Lunchroom which served sandwiches, baked goods and other snacks.


They had some seats inside but it was a gorgeous day so we sat at one of the outdoor tables and spent lunch people-watching and just enjoying the weather and being on vacation.

M got the spicy chicken sandwich which consisted of gemarineerde kip (marinated chicken), tomaat (tomato), sla (lettuce), komkommer (cucumber) and pikante saus (piri piri sauce), and apple juice.


The sauce was a little messy (and sticky). It was a little bit spicy but also kind of sweet. It was a good sandwich, not the best I've had but decent.

A got the Dutch style hamburger. It consists of huisgemaakte hamburger (homemade hamburger), salade (lettuce), tomaat (tomato), komkommer (cucumber), rode ui (red onion), gebakken ei (fried egg), kaas (cheese), mayonaise (mayonnaise) and bacon (bacon, obviously).


It was tasty but unhealthy (look at the ingredients!).

Our conclusion on the lunchroom is that it was good for what we were looking for - a casual lunch spot with pretty good food. It's a good place to go if you're in the area, but we wouldn't go out of our way to come back. Probably a better option than the other food choices in that little area. The prices were really decent too, which was refreshing. There were some other sandwich places we wanted to try but ran out of time, so we can't really compare about Dutch sandwiches. Next time!

Chipotle

So, did I get tacos for the third day in a row?

Well, I did get lunch from Chipotle...


... but I got a burrito bowl. I was hungry and they don't give you that much in the tacos. One hour earlier and I might have gotten tacos again.

I got a chicken burrito bowl with rice, black beans, fajita vegetables, chicken, tomato salsa, medium tomatillo salsa, corn salsa, cheese and lettuce. Yum. I don't usually get the medium salsa but I thought I'd try it this time to see if it added anything. It added a little spice which was nice. I think I shall add it from now on! I love the burrito bowls because they're so full of veggies. Makes me feel like it's healthy! At least I know it does well on the color diet. Ha.

Pietersma Snacks

So at Albert Cuyp Markt we chanced upon a little snack stand at the end of the block. As chance would have it (okay, we knew it was actually there) it was a fry stand :)

Pietersma Snacks!
We were most likely the guy's first customers since it was barely 11am when we got to his stand. But hey, this was our pre-lunch! Yes, we're fat, so what?!

What to choose, what to choose...
Golden, double fried thick cut potatoes. But what toppings to put on this set of crispy deliciousness? Since we got the "special" of curry ketchup, mayo, and onions with our first set of fries we opted for the more traditional topping of just mayo. We're not sure what it is about the mayo in Holland, but it's a whole lot better than what we have here in the states.

Hey, it's tradition
Awesome
Overall we still thought the fries from Vlaamse were better, but that could have been a product of the toppings. That doesn't mean these were bad fries, though. Far from it. In fact, I don't think we ever had any "bad" fries while on our European excursion.

I always look so happy with bad-for-you food

Taco Treat

If I haven't already mentioned it, I love tacos. I had tacos yesterday and tacos today, and could eat tacos tomorrow. Love tacos. (If I could add any more emphasis to that, I would.)

I mentioned this on our personal blog, but I had a really rough day today (starting last night). I was barely able to walk when I woke up and when I was walking, it was really painful. I went for physical therapy twice today, got help from my chiropractor and it turns out I have piriformis problems/sciatica. Yay. Significantly better right now, but still in pain.

All of this to explain that I couldn't move a lot. A was awesome and brought me lunch from Schnipper's. Chicken tacos!


The chicken tacos are 2 corn tortillas filled with grilled chicken, shredded romaine, green onions, pico de gallo, cheddar, guacamole, chipotle dressing and crema.

I love the tacos at Schnipper's. They only had fish tacos in the beginning but then they introduced the chicken tacos. They're both great, but lately, I seem to be getting the chicken more often. The tacos are full of flavor and packed with stuff, so they're filling too. This was the perfect pick-me-up on a rough day. Thanks A!

Poffertjes

One of the snacks we had at the Albert Cuyp Markt was poffertjes. Poffertjes are small fluffy Dutch pancakes with a spongey texture. They usually come with powdered sugar and butter.

I think there was only one place selling poffertjes at the market that day:


When we first got to the market, they didn't have any ready (it was on the early side). So we decided we would try again on the way back through the market since poffertjes were definitely something we wanted to try.

Another great thing about poffertjes - they're cheap! The snack only cost us 2 euro.


We watched them making more poffertjes. First, you fill the pans with the batter:


Keep checking them to make sure they're done:


When they're ready, pick them out and dust them with sugar:


And then you get a tasty treat like this:


Here's another look so you can see how they are in size:


The poffertjes were a great snack. Since our next stop after the market was to the art museums in Museumplein, it was just filling enough (with the fries we had) to keep us full until lunch. The Dutch are known for their pancakes - more on our favorite pancakes still to come!

Albert Cuyp Markt

We began our third day in Amsterdam with a visit to the Albert Cuyp Markt. It's an outdoor market that extends for a few blocks in the De Pijp neighborhood and has been around for years. The market is there everyday except Sundays, and offers both retail items (like clothes) and food. They also have stands for prepared food and other restaurants on the block.


We were really excited to go to Albert Cuyp Markt because we love visiting markets, especially farmers markets. We also heard there might be some free samples. Sure enough, we got to sample some cheese which was excellent.

Here's a brief look around the market:

Lots of fruit including these tiny strawberries

Lots of fresh colorful veggies

Multiple cheese vendors giving out free samples and slicing cheese in front of you... Dutch cheese is great

Interesting chocolate concoctions

The clothing ranged from t-shirts to ... more "colorful" clothing
While at the market, we also tried fries and mini-pancakes. Those posts are coming up next!