What to eat with less than 5Eur in Groningen

It seems obvious that typical oversea students like me have the same problem: hungry, lazy to cook sometimes/most of the time and facing money problems because of spending too much already on alcohol, clothes, parties or fancy dinners. The best solution to save money concerning food is cooking at home, though I am not always in the 'cooking & washing' mood, especially when living alone. I believe we all are frustrated with looking for some easy take-away food other than McDonalds or cheap restaurants from Tripadvisors, which is not cheap at all. Below you can find my cheapest options for lunch/brunch/extra meals.

The most highly recommended restaurant to visit with a low budget by me is Bagels and Beans, which is apparently well-known to many people. There are bagels with plenty of flavours, bread types, cheese kinds and different drinks to choose from, ranging from hot to cold, tea to coffee and juice. I ordered a sweet bagel like a dessert but you can have it for lunch as well, which is perfect because lunch at school usually sucks here or there is no such thing as proper lunch at all. 

Wok box is a perfect option for Asian-food addict like me. You can choose between various flavours of meats and veges, plus the small box was enough to make me full. The most common flavour is sweet and there is nothing spicy at all.

Tosti World is without doubt the second best option because tosti burgers are cheap and taste amazing. I personally love the toasted salmon version, which I order twice for both time I went there. 

Normal burgers are a bit more expensive option as drinks and fries cost a bit extra. I personally enjoyed this but would not come back because of the price.

And don't forget you can always spot plenty of street-food in or near Vismarkt/Grote markt like fried fish/shrimp, fries, toasted chicken, kroket, kebaps, etc. Everything is made within 5 minutes and incredibly cheap so you can just grab and go!

Frozen yoghurt at Pure Frozen is not in the lunch list but its perfect for dessert after all the junk food filled in your stomach, isn't it?! And they look too cute to resist by the way.

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Also, in case you are addicted to sweet like me, don't miss trying bubble tea inside Amazing Oriental which is an Asian groceries shop, or at My Dream BubbleTea. Bubble tea, which is milk tea with jelly, may taste a bit weird to European people so make sure you like or have tried them before. There's always first time for everything anyway!

BON APPETIT!

My 10 favourite pics of Belgian chocolate

Let alone the bad experience that happened to me with Couchsurfing in Belgium, this 4-day trip to the small bordering country with Holland was incredibly sweet and worth the way I travel to eat. What I literally had for breakfast and lunch everyday were hot chocolate, cakes, chocolates, waffles, and fries which was the only not-sweet food. It was inspiring to see and taste how people create, sell and enjoy chocolate here in different ways that would never get people bored!

Home-made chocolate was the No.1 chocolate everyone must try in Brussels. I came across a store named Chocolateri near the center Grand Place and met a lovely girl working there with her dad who literally made chocolate in the store. We had to come back the next day because she was so nice and the chocolate we bought taste even nicer!

Dark, milk and or white chocolates? I would definitely go for dark chocolate which you can only taste best by letting in melt on your tonge!

 Chocolate with cakes. It was fun to see cakes designed and inspired by many styles of different countries

Hot chocolate in Antwerp.

Chocolate in bakery stores

 Chocolate exhibited in museums

 Waffles wrapped with hot chocolates - the second best sweet food I favor in Belgium. 

 Fresh fruits covered with hot chocolates

 Chocolate as souvenirs. And obviously you can find chocolate in the shape of Manneken Pis every where.

Chocolate bars

Food you would not wanna miss in Rotterdam

The number one food I had in Rotterdam as well as Netherlands so far was Kroket. I am addicted to them!!! After long day visiting all the sightseeings including the windmills, Erasmus bridge, De Rotterdam and other spectacular architecture of a very modern Rotterdam, nothing could have been better for us than having lunch in RODIN. Compared to what we had to pay, the food was amazing, especially those huge fries which we had to order more. 

Sandwich with smoked salmon is also a good choice

 If you are a crazy foodie crawling for street food and casual street markets like me, you can't miss Binnenrotte markt - one of the longest street market of Rotterdam next to the Cubes house. The best things I tried here were cheese (apparently), Loempia or Spring Rolls as we usually call, rolled veges and dried fruits which are awesome because they reminded me so much of my childhood new year eves when we have a lot of them to fill in our stomach besides spring rolls and other so-called 'spring-foods'. 

I want to add bubble tea as well because I love them. 

You can only find bubble tea in YoYo Fresh Tea Bar or some Asian shops in Netherlands. 

The whole trip was ideally and spontaneously amazing in a unexpected way party because of our host, who gave us such a nice treat with Broodies and more Croquette (shrimp) as if they knew these were my favourite dishes. I could not know how to thank them more than writing on this blog, since the host even drove us on his boat to another city so that we could see the windmills. What an experience!

More about our trip can be found here:

#1 Thing I love about living in Groningen - Vismarkt

Young people would normally seek Groningen as a student town for crazy nightlife, parties and coffee-shops or as a touristic destination for martini tower, museums and beautiful gardens. However, the best experience I had so far about living in Groningen is shopping in Vismarkt.

I would love to go to Vismarkt every Friday to buy all the fresh cheap vegetables and fruits as if I am still in the middle of the summer in a tropical country. And since I have started to love cooking more and more, I would rather go to the middle of the town with my bike for 5 minutes to grab the ingredients from Vismarkt instead of eating high-calories food in a fancy restaurant.

And if you are looking for a bit more meat then toasted chicken and deep fried fish are definitely  great choices. I have been trying so much food and cooking for international evenings so many times this month that I should reorganise my eating habit next week and doing sport more often instead of making excuse that I cycle every day.

Or if you wish to be a more healthy traveller!

 One of the brightest things about Netherlands is that it is rich in culture and is colourful literally. You can easily look for nice flowers with good deals easily in front of Vismarkt.

Groningen coffee bike

Short trip to Zwolle - my first time with Blabla Car

Whenever it comes to travelling in Holland mostly everyone is always so excited about Amsterdam, coffeeshops or  red light districts but I was quite not of them. I wanted to see the whole picture of Netherlands; to learn the Dutch culture, language and cuisine from local people, and even to visit smaller towns which no-one cares perhaps.

After our crazy Beach party on Wednesday at which I was completely out of my mind, we (me and a lovely new friend from Morocco but live in France) woke up quite early and went to Zwolle, a city nearby Groningen to pick up some important documents and do a little bit of travelling. I did not expect it was such a lovely city where we would genuinely relax after our mad nightlife.

Statue of Archangel Michaël in front of the Church of St. Michaël.

By Herman Lamers

We came across lots of interesting architecture and statues which I believe was one of the most remarkable feature of the city. 

Museum De Fundatie Zwolle

After wandering around the small town with no map and already feeling like we have seen almost everything, we decided to eat in Tosti World . The price was amazing compared to the fact that I could have chosen the fillings. We both take salmon burgers which were pretty tasty!

And do not forget to fill your stomach with dessert bought from a local ice-cream store.

La Dolce Ice-Cream

Our trip did not end in a boring way here. The best thing about Zwolle was to go back to Groningen with a Dutch guy we found on Blabla Car - a site which connects travellers with drivers who have empty seats. Herman was a very funny, talkative and caring driver who seem very smart and strong-minded. We shared a lot, laughed a lot during the short drive and I learnt lots of new things about him, who has been living in many places around different continents like us. 

It's the people that matter, not the place!

I-EAT-STERDAM part 2

One picture worths a thousand words. That is true!

Every photo has an interesting story behind it. Here's mine :)

My most memorable food-ish expererience in Amsterdam was at Albert Cyup Markt - the biggest street food market in Amsterdam. I enjoyed the energetic, chaotic and noisy atmosphere of the market made of dozens of stores and flows of buyers.

The first 'dish' ever I tried in Albert Cyup was poffertjes. You can have a sweet taste of these little tiny pancakes just with a few coins.

Fried fish was definitely better than haring. 

Another must-try food in Nederland is waffels. This reminds me of the sweetest gift ever I received from my tour guide in Amsterdam back then in Helsinki when we first met. A package of sweets like Stroopwaffle always make wonderful gift for friends when travelling around Europe. 

We end the food day by a huge dinner with lofs of meat, potatoes and cabbages before lots of drinking and partying. It was a nice and warm experience to enjoy for the first time traditional home-made dishes (Andijviestamppot met spekjes and slavink) with the Dutch people.

Dutch beer are amazingly cheap and well tasting with plenty of flavours that females would love to try! I was running around the story like a little kid crawling for candies when I saw 50-cents beer and ciders, which should normally cost 1-2 euros in Finland where I lived.

Now it's your turn to share your stories behind the dishes ;) !