Thursday, July 12, 2007

Who said pancakes are for breakfast?

In $40 A Day, Rachel Ray spent a day in Amsterdam. One of the restaurants she went to was Meneer Pannekoek (Mister Pancake).

Interestingly, the dutch eat pancakes for lunch and dinner, not breakfast. They also come in both savory and sweet kinds such as ham and cheese, tomatoes, mushrooms (anything you'd fill an omelet with) or sweet with syrup, with bananas, with nutella, etc.

Tonight for dinner, I went to the Pancake Bakery up the block from my apartment. I am getting tired of ham (my main source of protein in the Netherlands) so I got a "lemon and sugar" pancake. For those of you who would like to duplicate this experience, get a box of Trader Joe's Swedish Pancake Mix. Make the pancakes according to the box's directions, sprinkle on powdered sugar thickly, and squeeze on some fresh lemon juice. It was good, but not worth the 8 euro it costs (that is about $12, I think!)

A couple of interesting tidbits about the restaurant. First of all, it was the first restaurant in all of Europe that told me that they didn't have tap water. Personally, I think that is baloney because I know they have glasses and water. I didn't drink anything as I wasn't going to play that game.

Secondly, they had a special pancake on their seasonal menu called the "Paris Hilton" pancake - filled with bananas and nutella.

Finally, on the table they had a bottle of "American" pancake syrup, a bottle of butterscotch syrup, and an open vat of "sugar syrup." I didn't try any of them because my pancake was sweet enough.

Anyway, I figure it is not that radical to have pancakes for dinner here because it was morning in Seattle. :)

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