Gryphon Travel

Today we went on a 6 stop food tour through Amsterdam. Including beverages.

First stop was dutch apple pie, which I have certainly had a time or two in the US. And each time I had it I asked myself,  “How is this different than regular apple pie?” The answer, to myself, was always “I think the crust is different somehow.” Yes, apple pie conversations are almost exclusively with only myself. Turns out David is not a big pie man. My new answer is the apples are cut thinner and layered horizontally. The crust is more flakey and the overall pie is less sweet. Also, they always serve it with whipped cream instead of ice cream. It was very good, even David liked it and he’s not a big pie man.

David enjoyed his pie with a dutch beer, I had a latte macchiatto, which the dutch apparently call coffee the wrong way.  Because it has more milk than coffee.

I’m not going to take you through the entire food tour. Mini pancakes, balls of fried potato called Bitterballen, kapsalon (layers of yummy foods), and chicken satay. What is not to like? But let’s talk about the Jenever and the cheese.

The Jenever is a Dutch distilled grain alcohol they served to us in dainty fluted port wine style glasses. It was about 30 seconds after David and the male half of the Jersey (Old Jersey, not new) couple downed it like a shot that they told us it was a sipping drink. Anyone who has had one of my old fashioneds knows, David does not understand the idea of a sipping drink. David’s inability to sip aside,  that was a lovely alcohol and I would sip it again.

But our favorite was the cheese. Because cheese is amazing. They gave us 3 different gouda cheeses, from young to 3 year aged and they were all great. Our favorite for just straight up munching was a goat cheese that translates to the “Hopping Goat”. We went back and bought a huge chunk, which was practically free compared to US prices for fancy cheese.