First vegan cheese store in the Netherlands just opened

A few years ago Brad Vanstone started to eat a predominantly plant-based diet, out of concern for the environment, as dairy farming is for a large part responsible for global warming. Replacing meat and milk was easy, but he couldn’t find a satisfying alternative for cheese. He started making plant-based cheese just for at home, which grew into a company! Originally under the name ‘Plantbased Cheese’, Brad was selling the plant-based cheeses at various markets in Amsterdam.

Late 2019 the name changed to Willicroft, coinciding with the opening of the store and the introduction of the products to various supermarkets outside Amsterdam as well. Read more

Trevi’s: an authentic yet VEGAN Italian restaurant!

trevi's amsterdam

No surprise with his Moroccan-Italian background, Salah Ait has been eating pizza all of his life. At a young age he worked as a pizza delivery boy, later as a cook and manager in various restaurants. It has always been his dream to open up his own place, and with Trevi’s this dream has become reality!

Since he has been vegetarian all of his life, and recently gone vegan, of course his restaurant had to be a vegan place. Named after his hometown Treviso (nothern Italy) which he left four years ago to settle in Amsterdam. Read more

Oliver Green: all vegan healthy bowls and smoothies in Oost

oliver green

Originally started out as an idea for a vegan store, then turned into a cafe. Oliver Green is the brainchild of Stefan and Merel. They started eating plantbased a few years ago for health and environmental reasons. But they felt Amsterdam is lacking places where you can get healthy vegan food in a convenient way, and so, decided to create that place themselves! Read more

Willem-Pie: vegan bakery in Slotervaart

A few years ago Willemijn van Wenum said goodbye to her career and started doing what she loved to do most: baking vegan pastry! Starting out with selling cakes to various restaurants, she opened a half year long pop-up store end 2018. A year later she opened her own real location of Willem-Pie in the space of a former bakery, enabling increased production and the possibility of selling it to people directly. Read more

2019: increased visibility of veganism

Time for a recap of 2019! Yo, 2018 was a good year for veganism in Amsterdam and 2019 no less. More options in restaurants and supermarkets, making it easier for people to be vegan. Also, the increased visibility of a vegan lifestyle helps to normalise it which is great, as dealing with social situations as a vegan is not always easy.

At the moment Happy Cow lists 374 vegan friendly restaurants in Amsterdam, of which 39 are fully vegan! Albert Heijn added little vegan signs (see pic above) to various (not all) vegan products in the supermarket, this is huge. Many big nationwide companies are currently working on vegan options, this year for example Hema, Ikea, Multivlaai, Subway and Bakker Bart came with a vegan meal.

The changes in Amsterdam have not gone unnoticed, newspaper NRC highlighted several developments in a big article last summer, also quoting yours truly.  But hey let’s have a look at this year’s developments! Read more

Who doesn’t like pancakes?

vegan pancakes amsterdam

Finding vegan pancakes on a restaurant menu in Amsterdam used to be rare, but nowadays there are PLENTY options! A few hip pancake places opened up which of course have vegan options (can’t open a new hip place without it) but also traditional Amsterdam pancake places all of a sudden realised you CAN make a pancake batter without using milk and eggs.

So broadly speaking you can choose from vegan and vegan friendly-places, new hip pancakes places, or traditional pancake places. And then there are some others. Most places offer either American (thick and fluffy) or Dutch style (larger and thinner) pancakes. We found 13 places with vegan pancakes on the menu, check ’em out! Read more