Saving for a rainy day: Sugar & Spice and all things nice
Please note that since writing this blog post, Bar Huf has closed down
Please note that since writing this blog post, Sugar & Spice has closed down
Us Amsterdammers love to talk about the weather. In fact, it doesn’t seem to be unique to Amsterdam or even to the Dutch; us Brits love a good weather chat too. And since I’m a British Amsterdammer, it’ll come as no surprise that I muttered about “this bloody kut weer” (in a weird English-Dutch mash-up) several times during the weekend before last in what felt like Noah’s Flood: the Remake. (Yes, you’ve all forgotten it now because it suddenly turned to summer here, but sometimes these reviews just take a little longer to write than others, ok?)
I had friends in town, which meant that (failing an ark) I at least had an excuse not to cycle, and instead we took a cab down to Gay Street (formally known as Reguliersdwarsstraat) for dinner. I’d been wanting to try Bar Huf (part of a quartet of bars in the same area, all part of the mighty Tao Horeca Group) for a while – ever since, in fact, a friend’s medical emergency pulled me away from what promised to be a great night out there once before. (It seems that even the Amsterdam Foodie will put a gall-bladder catastrophe over finishing her dinner – who knew?)
So, second time lucky, I turned up to be greeted (yes, actually greeted – as in, at the door!) by our host. Ok, so they might not answer their emails, but I’ll forgive the Huf crew just for saying hello to me. (If you’re reading this and you’ve never been to Amsterdam, believe me when I say this is a rarity.) We ordered a bottle of Barbera and got to work on the menu. It’s sort of gastrobar food, but not in that annoying way that England seems to have of doing gastrobars these days – i.e. either a) pretentious, b) not actually gastro at all, or c) both.
Nope, Bar Huf has got it just right: burgers, bar snacks, Philly cheese steaks, and a few fish/risotto-y type options. Oh, and a totally delicious giant pork chop with potato gratin and coleslaw – Lekker with a capital L. The Honey Badger reported the Philly cheese steak not to be very, well, Philly-ish; but he liked it, even if they’d somewhat adapted the original recipe to the European palate. I had the burger (delicious and spot-hitting, albeit with an excess of bun), preceded by some surprisingly good fried things. I’ve never really been much of a fan of croquettes (they make me think of Febo), but Bar Huf’s trio of shrimp, ham and cheese croquettes were of quite a different calibre. All in all, for its diner-chic appeal, genuinely gastro bar-food (served till midnight, too!), and uncharacteristically friendly service, you can’t go too wrong with Bar Huf to kick off your night out…
Next morning, after a few too many drinks the night before, it was still raining and heads were sore. Through what can only be described as a biblical miracle, we managed to drag ourselves to the Rembrandthuis for a spot of redemptive culture, replete with broken umbrellas. En route, we headed to Latei for brunch. The last time I remembered being there was approximately 12 years ago when I was a student at the UvA, when all those retro lamps and orange knick-knacks seemed pretty cool. Now, I wasn’t so sure. But that aside (because I’m not here to judge the décor, after all), the food kinda sucked too. The coffee was fine (or maybe it was just so necessary at this point that it was hard to tell) but the omelette was a thin, bland egg pancake thrown onto two slices of bread with no butter and the merest scraping of cheese. My hungover body was not impressed.
Still gasping for calories (particularly of the carb-laden kind), we wandered soggily down the Zeedijk to Sugar & Spice. The boys were gutted they didn’t have milkshakes (like I said, it was that kind of day) but my girlfriend and I slipped gratefully into a carrot cake/cheesecake haze, warmed by a cup of hot, fresh mint tea. The cheesecake was of the yummy, lemony, baked variety, and the carrot cake (which I should probably be calling a carrot cupcake, by rights) was moist and topped with the lightest of cream-cheese icings. Just what the doctor ordered. We wished we’d gone to Sugar & Spice in the beginning and kicked off with the quiche for brunch instead – it looked a darn sight better than Latei’s omelette attempt.
So, next time it’s raining (which, realistically, will probably be in a couple of days) and you’re in need of some comfort food, head to Sugar & Spice by day and Bar Huf by night. But the less said about that omelette the better.
