Category Archives: Dining out

Dining out

Karma-o-zing!

SO, we went there. To the one-man-show of the culinary scene of HRLM, as the fancy ones say. It wasn’t a success, and I am going to explain, in a certain length (as you were expecting me to) waarom en daarom.

The concept is pretty simple: one man cooks, serves, entertains the guests, makes the coffees and hands out the jackets. How does he do it, you may ask? Well, taking a lot of time, my answer. And cutting a couple of “optional” corners. For example: “entertaining the guest”, scrap that. If you’re going to Karmozijn for “Dinner and Show”, fuhgeddaboudit. The guy won’t talk, won’t smile, he is “focused”, let’s put it that way. And he needs a new shirt. At least a couple of sizes bigger. Especially around is belly. And for Saint Agnes and all the Martyrs let go of the apron! It only make it worse.

Anyhoe! The food/time ratio in Karmozijn is one serving per hour. We were there almost three and a half hour (19:00 until 22:15) and got to grab one amuse, one entree, one main course each. Half a bottle of Sancerre, one bottle of water, one glass of Sauvignon Blanc completed the banquet. We were two (of course I was with the Vrouw) and we were together with 14 other guests, so a grand total of 16. Not to bad, thinking that the final bill, for the two of us, was 109 € and that he has to pay only for a young-and-capped dishwasher. But the concept would not be unsuccessful (it is not, in fact! The guy has been running his show for 16 years! That speaks volumes on the local masochistic tendencies, married with a deep ignorance of what “truly good food” really is!) were the food to be good.

And about the food: the amuse was a croquette, of some fish of sort which didn’t taste much, of fish or anything else. A croquette, basically. Completely forgettable. Or “very delicate”, as someone will say. The entree (Marbrè) was better, but only because there was some foie gras in it. Still, it wasn’t  “cooked” truly, more “assembled”. No spices, no herbs, no “liqueur” worth mentioning, nothing, nada, no depth, no “extra layer”, NIX. Just a bunch of meat. And a looooooot of sauce (are we Dutchies, after all?!!) smeared all over the plate. Of all kind, shouldn’t you like this one you’ll go banana on the next one. Pesto? Bring it on! Mustard? Aw-right! Mayo? Why-not! Way too much for my taste.

The turbot was just turbot, the veggies on the side completely uninspired. And the same as the ones on the plate of my wife. Who did choose the lamb, mind you. The wine was ok-ish, but again: nothing noteworthy, I also shop in Okhuysen occasionally ( I saw more than a few bottles from their assortment in Karmozijn) and I know they DO have better bottles.

We decided to skip on the dessert, it was already late enough. All in all: disappointing. If you wanna run a one-man-show, go ahead. But it’d better be good, else you won’t have anybody else to share the blame with.

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cooking at home, Dining out, Eating in Holland, Haarlem, Invite a friends for dinner, Leisurely cursing, restaurant

Should we dine out tonight?? Well, jeez, maybe…maybe…NOT?!

As an Italian who lives in Haarlem and has a serious passion for food I always feel embarrassed when friends come over and would like to have a little dining out in the town. The food scene in this city is inversely related to its beauty: “appalling” is the word which comes to my mind. And I believe it has to do with the customers: as long as they’ll keep cherishing the “all-you-can-eat” over “it’s food, it goes inside me, it turns into me! I’d better select what I’m going to let into my mouth” the restaurants here will be as follow:

-“Fried air&decor”, like the “Het Diner” by Herman Koch explains very well: much ado about nothing, pretentiousness at its best, hungry belly while leaving the premise not to mention quite lighter wallet and a head full of question marks: “did i truly have a “culinary epiphany”?”, “was it truly an “unforgettable experience”? Most (but not all) of the michelin-starred restaurant of the area belong to this category: m&l, cheval blanc, chapeau, de bokkedorns, de vrienden van jacob, etc etc most of these truly charge a lot for very little, quite skillfully presented and quite pretentiously put forward. Not for me, if I’d like a “caprese salad” (mozzarella and tomatoes sliced together, dressed with olive oil and basilico) I’ll make it myself at home, thank you very much, I will not pay 18 euros to be served one.

-“Decent cooking mismatched for top-of-the-pop”: here you have the various Lambermont, Willendorf, Truffles, etc. Good food, decent ingredients, correct cooking, but nothing else! No fanciness, no inventiveness, no nothing, nada. Again, the bill tend to be a bit on the high side for something I can also cook at home, with a bit of effort! Which goes most in being able to find the right ingredients, for those who don’t know about that (counting the millions, still) the meat they serve you is not from AH, and it tastes better, doesn’t it? But it’s not purchased in Brasil and air-freighted during the night, try the Lindenhoff in Abcoude! One note for you, Truffles people: nobody wants to wait 40 minutes between “gewoon” dishes, and if you’re going to serve me chantilly creme with strawberry for dessert after an endless night of waiting for my food, do expect me to be pissed off.

-to be continued-

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cooking at home, Cooking in the Netherlands, Dining out, Eating in Holland

The Very First Rant!

A small pond among the dunes of Kennemerland!

A small pond among the dunes of Kennemerland!

Dear unknown all,

this was the first and only post of my “The non-Brit Food Review” Blog, which I planned to curate while in Dubai, to show the Way, the Light and the Life to all those wannabes who like to place their glutea on a random chair in the weekend and shout “lemme som sciardonne’,  mate, I’m as dry as a dry sausage fest!” with their breath already foul with beer, and thinking they’re having a GREAT NIGHT, mate, what a GIG it was!

Well, think again.

Read over. Learn some. Discover some. Criticize none. As you can’t talk. YOU cannot talk, I am suspicious you can’t even THINK straight, so, firstly, learn, read and meditate, meditate and read, and then, if TRULY necessary, approach gently, as I like to use only my bare hands to kill people.

This is for the Brits, of course.

Same rules will be valid for my new attempt, “The non-Ducht Food Review”, though I have to say: Dutch are a mystery to me! Amazing people, funny, warm, kind, with a NICE country (I love northern weather, all drizzling and cold, don’t you? Well FUCK YOU far away from here if you don’t, A_.U_.B_.) but they eat TERRIBLY at home, most of the time, WORST in the office and on their working/studying place, which is why they think that they eat GREAT when they go out. Not a chance!

Pretty average food, bit pretentious in presentation, far away from the substance, far away from the REAL DEAL!

Which is like: in the “Pork Rotie au Pommes” , yes, you should worry about the apples, they have to be organic, they have to be green, blah blah blah, but, hey, wait a second, what about the PORK?? I want to have faxed the fucking ID of the pork I will be eating! I want to know him intimately! It has to be a friend of mine, I have to cry when I slaughter it! It is the noble sacrifice of a noble animal to feed and nurture my not-so-noble self! It has to be GOOD F.F.S.! Stuff the apples, I can by some AMAZING sauce or juice to fix the apple taste, where can I buy some PORK JUICE to fix the pork? Uh? Pork juice, anyone? Straw or glass?Bloody hell! There are plenty of nasty things you can do to make an apple grow bigger but NOT EVEN CLOSE AS MANY AS YOU CAN TO A PIG! And you are SURE that the pig has eaten it, you can SEE it happening! With an apple tree what do you do? Uh? Clorophile-check? X-ray a PLANT? CAT scan?????

THEREFORE: the basic first. We (My beloved Ingrid and I) will go out every now and then, we’ll keep the bill, we will show it in detail and discuss it in sarcasm, as we like to do. Then we will try to do it at home, the best we can, we will film the purchasing of the ingredients and the associated bills, the cutting&cooking and we’ll show you the final result. Then we will EAT IT OF COURSE YOU FOOL and tell you how good or bad it is, which was better between the restaurant’s and our own, compare the prices and the overall experience and give the final judgement on it. After which: lekker tartje, koppie Te, lekke slape! Stay tuned!

Oh, a brief note before starting: also my real job (selling great Olive Oils from Italy and other countries) website links here, but the two efforts are separate except for one thing: I use my oils for cooking, as obvious. You can do it though with any other extra-virgin first cold press olive oil you can find in any QUALIFIED shop (hint: AH is NOT a qualified shop!), if you uncertain on how to choose it, a simple rule of thumb: a bootle of oil CANNOT cost less than a packet of CIGARETTES! NOT-A-CHANCE. For the rest, explore, experiment and enjoy the ride, you can only get healthier. Well, maybe also a little fatter.

But fat people make sex KA-BOOM, mind what I’m telling you.

”

Stuff the Friday brunch! I am Continental, I do Continental! I don’t drown in booze on Thursday night, I have no hangover nor an ugly fat bag to forget, left home the day before, I am not a Brit and I don’t do Friday brunch! I do Friday’s Breakfast, which means: PAUL! Not the MoE’s one, no-one sane will ever get even close to it (also because “Le Pain Quotidian” on the second floor is oh-so-much-more-CONVENIENT-FOR-GOD’SAKE!!!).

I’m talking about Mercato, the original Jumeirah’s Mall. You know, the REALLY fake looking’s one. The one on its own category of looking fake, the “MERCATOMALL” category. Beware of the moment she will tell you: “You disgust me, you are as fake as MERCATOMALL”.

But there’s a nice PAUL in MERCATOMALL. And it’s nice and quite, no problem in finding a seat,great service, except…

Except that SOME PEOPLE (Yes I do mean Lesbaneses) like to queue as early as 9:00 am to cater to their spouses and husbands and lovers and sugardaddies and sugarmommies, and to their families, and to their TRIBE, THEIR CLAN, THEIR GOD-FORSAKEN ETHNIC GROUP! Therefore 150 croissants are gone by 10:00 am, and PAUL (Any manager reading this? HALLOOOOO, ANYONE IN CHARGE OVER THEREEEE?) cannot do more than the assign quota for reasons which are beyond the expression’s skills of the attendant who is left alone on Friday, to face my rage.

Mais, Merde!

As the French say when they are rather displeased.

I still got my Lavazza’s cappuccino and the roccofallic sesame baguette, with butter, jam(s) and Nutella for Ingrid (which she calls “Pasta”, but she’s Dutch, and she’s lovely, so she has my blessing, since she is my blessing). The Lavazza cappuccino is just a normal cappuccino at the tasting (the cups are obviously wrong, you are serving cappuccino in tea cups, there are on the market cups for cappuccino, I am pretty sure of that, they are called, you know, “CAPPUCCINO CUPS”, you can go in a shop and say: “I want some CAPPUCCINO CUPS” and be offered, wonder of wonders, some CAPPUCCINO CUPS, or instead,  Ingrid can give you some good make and model, you can contact her but not too much, not too much or or I will contact you, and I will contact you way too much, oh yes way too much for you to like it!). But it smells better! It’s fragrant of coffee! It delivers  nasal pleasure! There’s also a miniminilittle plumcake which is make of a solified foam of butter and sugar, slightly aromatized, as we didn’t get enough calories with the rest of the breakfast, which is nice!

But the food is really the reason to go to Paul, it’s the real deal! The real McCoy! The real VAN DAMME!

Key hints for improvement: real magazines to read. BUY some. Not just complimentary copies. REAL magazines. “Property weekly” is not enough. “Gulf Yachts” IS-NOT-ENOUGH. 7DAYS…do I need to say more? A few copies. Some German one, those with impossible names, like the Suddeutsche Zeitung or the Frankfurter Allgemeine, something like that. Maybe some Japanese one! Or Chinese, the new wave. Or Iranian, more customer-oriented. Have a choice.

The service is like the decor: a little random. You can be very lucky, and get the good chair and a good waiter, or you can just wish you were elsewhere, but “elsewhere” won’t give you the food!

Ziad is my favorite, he will inherit this blog, one day. He’s Shrek-ugly, as much as polite (which is not easy, when you’re shrek-ugly, by the way!) and has a tape machine instead of his inner-ear. We change order on purpose 3-4 times just to see what happens, but he alwaysdelivers, damez-vous monsieur!

The bill for two, with a small bottle of local water to SPLURGE, is around a baby (100 dhs), which is annoying (22 euros? ehm ehm!) for we STILL are in goodybooby MERCATOMALL, n’est pas Les Champs Elysees, but…is it worthy? I will say: “Only for the food and because it is easy to find a seat on Friday at 11:00″.

No, Mr. Carlo, I asked you: “IS IT WORTHY?”

OK, you are going to find that out really soon! YOU HEARD ME MOTHOFUCKKA ! YOU STARTED DOOM NOW DOOM what you say? We have to go that mama is waiting? Oh well…

“

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cooking at home, Cooking in the Netherlands, Dining out, Eating in Holland

Hello Nederland!

Food is too important to be left in Dutch hands! Yes yes, they know their stampootje, but that’s NOT food, that’s just…stampootje, you know! Beef: stewed. Potatoes: stewed. Envy: stewed. Jus de nage: stewed! Even the mayonnaise that some SAD INDIVIDUALS (you read me, Pim!) insist to put on top of it. Everything’s stewed, the diners more than everything else, therefore: let’s bring some crispiness and life back into the food in the Dutchland! I am offering myself and a humble guide, chef, critique, conneisseurs and overall food bastard. Hey, I don’t miss a thing! I am fat, I am Italian, I can cook according to my beloved Vrouw, and I can pronounce “BRUSCHETTA” (pron. “Br-UUU-sk’-tT-AAAAAAHHHH”) like it should! Welcome to the non-Dutch food review, mostly about restaurant and eateries in the lovely city of Haarlem, NL, but also about everything else, yes, why not?

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