The spice trade relationship between Indonesia and Netherlands date to centuries back and there is no place better than the Netherlands to have the rijstaffel experience when in Europe!
During my week’s stay in Amsterdam with friends is when I visited the ”Sama Sebo” Indonesian restaurant. It’s quiet near the Van Gogh museum, so after a refreshing experience of art in its best form we were all looking forward to a scrumptiously heavy lunch(also considering the fact that we had skipped breakfast that day, we were quiet hungry 😉 ). The specialty of rice table aka rijsttafel experience is that, your meal is not split into starter, main and dessert, it’s all in one! You get 20-28 dishes laid onto your table from which you can choose and eat till your tummy cannot take it anymore. I know what you must be thinking now, with all these dishes in front of you ranging from different varieties of chicken, shrimp, tofu, fried and sweet sour vegetables, fried banana, beef varieties, different varieties of sauces, fried shredded coconut to pickle varieties wouldn’t one get confused as to where to start and end?!? But there is a way to it, of course, you put rice on your plate in the centre and you put each dish bit by bit around the rice in small portion, thereby making sure you are trying each flavour and experiencing the different spices on its own and not mixing them all up. And yes it was quiet an experience.
Next visit to Amsterdam I am certainly coming back here 🙂 🙂 🙂 .