Radishes at Borough Market

The underground is warm and stuffy. People are huddled close and we can smell all cultures mingle together while more and more people get in and only a handful get out at the next station. Yes, we must be getting closer to our final destination. It’s still early on the Saturday morning and the crowds thin out a little once we leave the subway station and venture out onto the street. Fresh air!

The Entrance to Borough Market

We need to walk around the corner to find Borough market; slightly hidden away under a bridge and in an alcove with small letters telling us this is Borough market. But what a market it is! I had heard about Borough market of course and expected a nice market, but the amount of produce for sale here is amazing. How I would LOVE to have a market like that at our doorstep… Imagine the wonderful things we would able to make with all those gorgeous veggies, meats and fish.. Not to mention the spices, breads and other goodies for sale. It’s still fairly quiet at this time of day (I think we were there around 9.30-10 am) so we have a chance to walk around before the crowds descent on the market in full force.

Sunny and delicious breakfast at Roast

We were advised to have breakfast at Roast, right above the market, and that is certainly no mistake. I have delicious small pancakes with a rhubarb puree and fresh cream while Tom goes for the fried eggs and toast. The service is impeccable and maybe even a little bit too much for my taste. I like people to be polite but there is such a thing as overdoing it.. But still, I would rather have this then the dreadful service we can sometimes have at home. Roast is certainly not cheap but then again; nothing in London is really cheap so that is something you’ll have to accept when you come here! Although I do have to say that the dimsum at Princess Garden was actually really cheap considering the copious amounts of food we received, but ok…

Beautiful fish

To me there is no better shopping then on a good market. I love markets as they usually reveal the true nature of a city or a country. And obviously I am not talking about a touristic market where they only sell souvenirs. We’ve had our share of those too! Imagine the disappointment when you’re in Asia and after searching high and low, you find the fantastic market everyone was talking about, only to find out it has only souvenirs… People do find it strange that you want to go to a produce market… You can’t buy anything, so why go?? But to soak up the atmosphere of the place and to look at all the goods for sale, that is the just the ultimate experience for me. I’ll let the images do the rest of the talking!

Man selling noodles

Yummy big sausages!

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Cucumbers?

Call me weird but everytime I see an ingredient that I don’t know or have never seen before I can’t resist and I just have to buy it. Today I was visiting one of my favorite places to buy meat and vegetables which is the Lindenhoff in Baambrugge. I went there to get a good piece of meat for dinner since my father in law was coming over and I figured we could all use a good piece of something. So I got a really nice piece of veal and started walking around the vegetable area. They grow a lot of their own produce and when you arrive at the farm (the shop is located in the farm where the raise the cows, calves, pigs and lambs you buy in the shop) you can actually walk into the veggie garden. They had a lot of stuff this time of their own garden and I saw these little green spiky monsters. I picked up the basket they were in, took a good look, put them back and then started getting the stuff I needed to have for dinner (lautrec garlic, celeriac, roseval potatoes, apricots and carrots. Didn’t need the last ones but couldn’t resist those either.

They do look a bit chinese if you see them like that, don't they?

When I went to the register to pay for my goodies I asked the girl at the counter what on earth those things were. Well, she tells me; those are mini cucumbers.. Ok, they are green but that is sort of where it ends in terms of recognizable. So, yes I bought them and now I have no idea what to do with them. I tasted one and indeed the have a cucumber taste but the texture inside is different. More spongy I would say then regular cucumbers. The outside also appear a little tougher. A supermarket cucumber is cruncy on the outside while this one doesn’t break immediately when you put your teeth in it.

I am hoping someone has a suggestion on how I could use these? I haven’t thought of anything other then the obvious boring salad option. Any advice?

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Gorgeous breads

I know I have complained many times already about the lack of ingredients here in Almere, but not too far from here, there is Amsterdam… And well, what can I say; Amsterdam is simply food-heaven, certainly compaired to these parts. The only problem is really that the parking in Amsterdam is so outrageously expensive that the food automatically also becomes very expensive. It’s – if traffic permits – only half an hour drive and then a short walk from the Central Station (where you can park the car) and that walk alone brings you through the Haarlemmerstraat which is also a fantastic street if yoou’re looking for any special foods. Getting to Amsterdam by train with two people is about 28 euro’s, parking costs are 4 euro per hour, so technically it’s cheaper to go by car, although we tend to stay in Amsterdam for a couple of hours making the bill go up drastically.

Noordermarkt

But again for the produce you can find here, it’s worth it, although it does take you the better part of the day. The market is very busy (also lot’s of tourists go here) so navigating around takes time.

I needed to find certain things (I cannot tell you what yet!!) for this months Daring Cooks challenge and I knew there was absolutely no way I could find some of the things in my hometown, so Tom and I went over to Amsterdam and spend a few hours at the market (well, we had lunch ofcourse somewhere as well..:) )and wow, what a joy to walk around there. It’s a farmers market, but a really large one. Lots of different fruits and vegetable stand and they even have a whole stall with nothing but fresh herbs!

Muffins

So while this is definitely not a market to go to if you just quickly need something, it is worth taking the time to go there on a saturday if you really need something special.

Or ofcourse, if you’re visiting Amsterdam on a saturday, then definitely go to the Noordermarkt! The market is there every day of the week, but only on the saturday it also doubles as a farmers market. I have all the stuff I need for my Daring Cooks recipe, which I will be making tomorrow, but… your’re gonna have to wait untill the 14th of next month to see the results of that!…..

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