Canals – Local tips (bars & cafes)

Struik is a typical relaxed, ‘easy going’ café. The audience is a mix of locals, old & young, varying from hip to old fashioned.

At Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays dj’s are playing their music: hiphop/soul/classics. Popular but original at the same time. Once in a while special events take place.

The graffiti on the brick wall changes every now and then, made by several artists. Struik has a small lunch and snack menu; and most days of the week you can enjoy a great dinner for a lousy €7.50! Check the website to see what’s on the menu! Every day another ‘theme’!

Great to start off your night, or to hang around all night. Guaranteed you meet some nice locals!

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Bar Struik | Bars, Music, Snacks | Beer € 2.00
Rozengracht 160 | Canals
Mon 17:00 – 01:00, Tue – Thu 10:00 – 01:00, Fri 10:00 – 03:00, Sat 11:00 – 03:00, Sun 11:00 – 01:00

The cosy Café Proust is located on the charming Noordermarkt, right in the middle of the great atmosphere of the Jordaan and it’s many daily markets.

The interior can be described as no-nonsense, modern and cosy. In fact, Proust recently got a huge makeover! The greens are turned into cosy reds! 
Tourists, locals, students and market visitors drop by to have lunch, dinner, relax for a nice cup of coffee or some beers. On market days the café gets really packed, although the atmosphere remains laid-back.

The menu changes every now and then. The quality is definitely above the average café-level. The Proust Hamburger is a recommendation, and so is the salad/pasta/soup of the day. Something what also should not be forgotten: the quality-price ratio is great! The new chef offers you a superb variety of dishes…even cheese-fondue!

The absolute eye-catcher of Proust is the gigantic pistol-lamp (designed by Hans van Bentem ) above the bar. Madonna has one as well!

In summer you are lucky if you can find yourself a seat outside as the terrace is, unfortunately, quite small. On the other hand, this preserves the intimate atmosphere.

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Café Proust | Bars, Coffee & tea, Restaurants (International) | Beer € 2.20
Noordermarkt 4 | Canals | +31206239145
Mon 09:00 – 01:00, Tue – Thu 12:00 – 01:00, Fri – Sun 12:00 – 03:00

Cafe Weber is a bar where most people in Amsterdam have been at least once. It is one of those places where you end up after a long evening for a final drink. The bar is open till three o’clock during the week and four o’clock in the weekend. This means it is usually one of the only options left after all the other bars are closed.

But if you think it is a dodgy bar in a strange little alley you are wrong. The bar is quite trendy and it is not only for the late hours, you can also go here a bit earlier (it opens at 20:00) for a drink, this is not a bad idea as it will be the only time when you will easily find a place to sit. The later it gets the more crowded it will be and you will have to squeeze yourself through the masses of people. But if you do spot an empty seat don’t hesitate to squeeze yourself in. People will  take advantage of any seat they can get even if that means sitting very close to your neighbours.

As I said the place is quite trendy and the interior is very nice. They change the colour of the walls and the other decorations every once in a while. Inside it used to be very smoky but with the new smoking policy this isn’t a problem anymore inside. Now everyone is crowded around on the street in front of the bar to smoke a cigarette. Sometimes it is as busy outside as it is inside.

The Weber bar is situated together with two other bars on the Marnixstraat. The bar next to it is called Lux and is almost identical to Weber. Choosing between the two bars is usually a matter of where there is the most space. A bit further on is the bar Kamer 401. This is slightly different than the other two. It is usually not as crowded and there are more places to sit. It also closes at the normal closing times. This bar is a good option if you like a bit more space around you but my favorite has to be Weber!

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Cafe Weber | Bars | Beer € 2.20
Marnixstraat 397 | Canals
Sun – Thu 20:00 – 03:00, Fri – Sat 20:00 – 04:00

P.King used to be a Chinese restaurant but as you walk by there is not much that will remind you of that except the name and the dinner menu. For the rest the style is quite different. It has a sixties style retro feel to it, especially the dining room upstairs which you should really take a look at if you get the chance.

The cafe is open the whole day for breakfast, lunch, dinner and drinks. No matter what time I go, I always enjoy the laid back chill vibe. The menu during the day is quite standard but with a couple of real good choices like for instance the typical Dutch bread with ‘kroketten’.

At dinnertime the menu is Cantonese with lots of different kinds of rice and noodles with chicken and meat to choose from. I really like the sweet and sour chicken. You can choose to have small portions so you can share and try different things.

I like to go here before or after I go to the cinema, for instance the Tuschinski Movie Theatre is really close.

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P.King | Bars, Coffee & tea, Snacks, Restaurants (Cantonese) | Main meal € 10,00
Herengracht 515 | Canals | +310203208175
Sun – Thu 09:00 – 01:00, Fri – Sat 09:00 – 03:00

STOUT = Naughty! Because rules are there to be broken. Because risky business, the sin and sense go frequently nicely together. Giving meaning to enjoyment, is what restaurant STOUT does! Therefore every guest is a welcome challenge, every product, selected carefully by the Chef, prepared in a stimulating way, every wine a sunny holiday and every employee an individual with a refined feeling for your wishes. Thus it is the challenge, which seduces us and seduction, which we defy.

The kitchen staff is inspired by the international kitchens and trends and is very familiar with the metropolitan and most recent developments, tendencies and developments of high-quality food & beverage products, concepts and formulas. Purely to keep informed; Naughty! He does not obey to fashionable one day trends. We are naughty! , a little bit wrong, a source, to enjoy!
© Website Stout, free translation by author of this article.

Stout is one of my favourites for lunch and I love to go there for a coffee when I finished my shopping in the Haarlemmerstraat.

I like the ‘broodje ½ OM’ in particular, a nice roll with thinly sliced pastrami and cooked calfs liver slices: very Amsterdam! The fresh fruit juices are also very good. The focaccio STOUT, is a cheese melted tuna sandwich is also very good! Coffee’s and espresso’s are of very good quality and delicious.

The service I experienced as personal and friendly, and they changed chefs I will see what happens in the future?

They now have a menu for autum en winter!

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Stout | Bars, Coffee & tea, Restaurants (international) | Broodje ½ OM € 7.00
Haarlemmerstraat 73 | Canals | +31206163664
11:00 – 01:00 daily

At the end of the very lively Haarlemmerdijk you will find the oldest cinema in the Netherlands. The building of The Movies does not look very impressive from the outside, but when you enter it you find yourself in a different era.

The whole interior is in the original, well-preserved Art Deco style. In the café or in the film rooms you feel as if you stepped back into a time when cinema was young and exciting.

The bar inside the cinema is rather large, with a drinking and an eating area. The place feels more like a café than the bars in bigger cinemas, and you don’t feel pressured to go to your seat in the film room. The beer that they serve, from the south of the Netherlands, is one of my favorites.

A delicious, cold beer makes for a very pleasant cinematic experience, and The Movies is certainly a good place to watch a film. Their program usually consists of a mix of art films and more mainstream cinema, so you are likely to find something that suits you. If you are in the neighborhood but you don’t feel like settling in a dark room, you might just want to take a peek at the interior, or have a drink or a meal.

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The Movies | Bars, Cinemas | Movie € 9.00
Haarlemmerdijk 161 | Canals | +31206386016
Check the website for opening times

This is still a relatively new wine bar in Amsterdam on the Prinsengracht. Next door they have a restaurant called Envy. In both establishments it is all about the wines. The combination wine and food is important, but the food comes with the wine instead of the other way around.

It is quite an expensive place, but all waiters are real trained professionals. They all have a sommelier certificate and they know all about the wines they sell (and that is a lot).

Personally I think that the nicest item on the card is the “flight”. This is to taste several different wines from the same grape or to taste similar wines from different grapes, for instance Chardonnay, Bourgogne or Champagne. The staff tells you everything about the wines, from which grapes they are made off, which year the wine is from, on which land it has grown and what the taste of the wine is. And of course all special items which are typical for a particular wine.

The entourage is also very nice. On the left, red wines all hanging on a wall of bricks, then you have the bar and on the right the entire wall is covered with one large refrigerator with all white wines, rosé and champagnes. The opposite is one large couch with small tables and bar stools. It is a very modern interior.

I really recommend this place for an appetizer or an after-dinner wine. It is a nice, upper-class wine bar with specialized staff who have fun at what they are doing!

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Vyne | Bars | Flight of 3 wines € 11.00
Prinsengracht 411 | Canals | +31203446408
Mon – Thu 18:00 – 00:00, Fri – Sat 17:00 – 01:00, Sun 17:00 – 22:00

The last time I was on my way to Waldorf I was in a hurry. I was going for a drink with a friend but left my house later than planned. And as if that wasn’t bad enough it was very very cold and the rain was pouring down. By the time I got there I hoped my friend would be waiting for me inside, warm and dry. But she wasn’t. It turned out the cafe wasn’t open yet and she was waiting in front of the door just as soaked as me… So it turns out Waldorf doesn’t open until five! It used to be open for lunch but I guess it isn’t anymore. But you are still welcome for dinner, and it’s good!

The food Waldorf serves is mainly Italian and very tasty. The thing I like about the place is that you can eat Italian food without being in either a too tacky or too posh Italian restaurant. Simple pasta dishes are served, but you can also order meat or fish.

The restaurant has a very retro feel. All of the furniture looks as if it comes right from the fifties but at the same time it all looks nice and fresh. The carpets on the tables are typical old fashioned dutch style. You will still see those in other real old fashioned Amsterdam bars. I love the picture on the wall of a winter landscape, although looking at it makes me feel cold!

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Waldorf | Bars, Restaurants (Italian ) | Pasta (main) € 12.00
Elandsgracht 2 | Canals | +310207787564
17:00 – 01:00 daily

Walem is the place to be, when you are in the mood for great drinks, sandwiches on the canalside with a great terrace. They serve smoothies, but also a good white house wine. The famous dutch bitterballs and the tuna sandwich are also good.

To kick off after a hangover, start the morning with their nice and tasting croques. But best of all is the location and the gorgeous staff. Cute waiters in black, serving with a smile.

In summertime they have a nice terrace next to the canal, so waiters have to cross the road and sometimes that causes a traffic …!

It’s next to the Famous Metz & Co on the corner of the Leidsestraat and the Keizersgracht: hard to miss!

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Walem | Bars, Coffee & tea, Restaurants (International) | Lunch € 25.00
Keizersgracht 449 | Canals | +31206253544
10:00 – 17:00 & 18:00 – 22:30 daily

You can find Wolvenstraat by the address because this bar basically has no name. Locals just refer to the bar as ‘Wolvenstraat 23′, but you won’t miss it as it’s located in the popular 9 street district.

Atmosphere is created by the laidback crowd, art on the walls, furry pillows and blankets, retro-styled interior and the friendly cat who sleeps undisturbed. Comfortable enough to stay lounging till cocktail hour starts or even longer..!

This may not be the place for an extensive diner, but for some high quality bites it’s definitely worth visiting. The Thai salad is suberb and so is the cheesecake.
Service is friendly and polite.

At night, the perfect place to go for a beer, wine or exciting cocktail! The mix of trendy young locals and expats make this bar an absolute ‘place to be’, but then with the lack a ’seen and want to be seen’ atmosphere. Think relaxed and cosy with suitable music.

A reliable place with delicious food and a great atmosphere!

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Wolvenstraat | Bars, Coffee & tea, Restaurants | 3 course menu € 17.00
Wolvenstraat 23 | Canals | +31203200843
Mon – Thu 08:00 – 01:00, Fri 08:00 – 02:00, Sat 09:00 – 02:00, Sun 10:00 – 01:00