A few years back, I decided to give up flying. I love travel though, so I've been exploring more and more places that you can get to on a train from the UK. For me, that's meant more time in the Netherlands - just a couple of hours away from London on the Eurostar and I get to check out all the vegan food in a whole new country!
The Eurostar stops in two Dutch cities: Amsterdam and Rotterdam. Having been to Amsterdam a handful of times, me and Mr Flickingthevs decided to haul ourselves off to Rotterdam instead to explore the architecture, brown pubs and local vegan places.
Our first stop was Backyard, a buzzing, bright-and-airy, bare brick and cosy lighting type of place in the centre of Rotterdam.
Backyard is an all-vegan place, so there was no shortage of choice on the menu. However, I only had eyes for one thing: kapsalon!
Kapsalon translates as 'hairdresser' (so Wikipedia tells me, I sadly speak about 10 words of Dutch) and was created 20 years ago by hairdresser from Cape Verde, who had the genius idea of putting together schwarma meat, chips, cheese, lettuce and a variety of sauces including garlic and sambal. He'd go to his local kebab shop and order this wondrous creation so often it would be known as the order for the hairdresser - kapsalon - and soon other customers would order it. Now it's a staple of kebab shops in the Netherlands and beyond, apparently.
Backyard has improved kapsalon in one important way: making it vegan! The Backyard version of kapsalon is also notably different to the original in that it's badged as 'healthy'. I'll leave that to you to decide whether that counts as an improvement or not.
The vegan version has most of the same ingredients as the original: chips, schwarma, lettuce, and the twin garlic and chilli sauces - although a couple of switcheroos have been made: it's sriracha mayo standing in for the original Indonesian chilli bomb of sambal, and the chips are sweet potato rather than white). Interesting, there's no vegan cheese to be found, but there's some extra veg instead: cucumber, tomato, onion, and lots of crispy fried onions on top.
Behold the kapsalon in all its glory:
I'm guessing the Backyard kapsalon doesn't bear a whole lot of similarity to the original kapsalon, which sounds like it's the sort of greasy delight that tastes best at 2am after a couple of pints. Backyard's kapsalon seems like a more chilled out equivalent, made to be enjoyed with brunch than beers.
Authentic or not, I found myself thankful to the hairdresser whose brainchild I got to enjoy. Sure, I feel like the original sambal heat wouldn't go amiss, but it's still a fun, messy plateful and I enjoyed it a lot.
Backyard
Korte Hoogstraat 14
3011 GL Rotterdam
+31 10 842 8263
info@backyardrotterdam.nl
I don't often visit the same place more than once when I'm travelling, but while I was in Rotterdam, I found myself in Sue for breakfast twice in one weekend.
The first time, I had a very sensible scrambled tofu on gluten free toast (everything in Sue is gluten free, handy if you're handling an allergy) with avocado and tomatoes. I feel like scrambled tofu is one of those dishes that every vegan has their own version of, so if you're going to put it on the menu of a restaurant, your version has to be decent too. Luckily, Sue nailed theirs.
On my second visit, I opted for the breakfast platter, because it featured one of my favourite type of cuisines: one where you get to try a little bit of everything, all on the same plate.
There's a trio of dishes there: chia coconut pudding, avocado and hummus on toast,
a pancake with fresh fruit and syrup, and you get an orange juice for good measure.
Normally, I eat all sorts of healthy stuff at home and get my junk food fix when I'm out, but Sue made me reconsider my choices: Sue's food manages to pull off the amazing trick of both being healthy but feeling like a treat. If I'd spent longer in Rotterdam, I probably would have gone back for a third time.
Oh wait - I kind of did. Sue also sells a range of raw cakes, so I snapped up a takeaway to enjoy later. Like the breakfast, Sue's cakes manage to feel light and indulgent at the same time - I'm not sure how they managed to do that, but I'm very glad they did.
Sue
Karel Doormanstraat 372-374
3012 GR Rotterdam, Netherlands
+31 10 226 5066
The last place I enjoyed during my all-too-brief time in Rotterdam was
Rozey.
Rozey is a vegetarian place, but around 95 percent of the menu is vegan. What makes it particularly fun is the set-up: you pay one fee (around €32.50-42.50, depending on the time of day), and that covers all your food and drink. You can order as many beers, wines, soft drinks and hot and cold small plates as you like, with the proviso you can only order a couple at a time.
The menu is HUGE so you'll definitely find something you enjoy. We took the culinary equivalent of a world tour, roaming through all the different cuisines on the menu at will. We stopped off in Vietnam for summer rolls, in China for Beijing style oyster mushrooms, and stopped off in Japan for some sushi; we headed off to the US for a tiny burger, and landed in Europe for a vegan scallop (made of mushrooms) with beure blanc. There's a whole roster of desserts you can pick from, but we unfortunately never made it that far, having overindulged on the savoury small plates.
Some of the dishes were amazing, some were just fine, but getting to taste so many different dishes made it a super fun experience.
I was obviously too into trying out all the different dishes to take any photos, so here are a couple of samples from Rozey's instagram:
Rozey
rozey.nl
Wijnhaven 85
3011 WK Rotterdam, Netherlands
+31 6 38274888
Lots of impressive vegan food in Rotterdam! I like the thought of following in the steps of the hairdresser. It reminds me a bit of the halal snack pack that is very popular in Australian kebab shops though I don't feel the name has such an interesting backstory. I love that breakfast platter - so hard to choose between sweet and savoury food at breakfast and this looks like the best of both. And the idea of one price and just munching through so many options sounds fun. Now I would love to get to rotterdam to eat all the good food and sing that Beautiful South song about Rotterdam!
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