Rainbowls, Amsterdam

Rainbowls describes itself as “plant-based, all natural and highly addictive”. We agree!

As the new kid on the block in Amsterdam, their colourful smoothie bowls transport you directly to Bali.

It was created by 25-year-old Mirre van Klaveren, after she was inspired by her travels through Indonesia, and especially Bali.

There she was amazed by the wide array of exciting healthy food and innovative places to eat.

The location

Rainbowls is located in the Pijp, one of the most famous and trendiest neighbourhoods of the city. There are several bus and tram stops close by. It’s only a small walk away from many other culinary hotspots, cool shops and the famous Albert Cuyp market.

The crowd

The crowd was very mixed- young Insta girls, a young family, two guys hanging on the bench out front.

Essentially, this place is for anyone who enjoys a good smoothie bowl.

The space

You enter through an inviting bright pink painted door and there’s a couple of wooden benches with pillows outside. Once inside, you have the choice of eating in or grab and go. You order at the bar and the bowls are delivered to your table. One of the side walls is made of timber, adding a tropical vibe. Here, several items for sale are on display – cookery books, coconut shell bowls and beautiful wooden cutting boards. The bar at the back of the space is dressed with clean white tiles. Sitting is not super comfortable, as, apart from a set of exotic looking woven lounge chairs, most of the seating consists of  long window benches and woven stools. Right now, seating is still limited, but Rainbowls is new and still evolving. There’s currently no WiFi, but this may change.  Nevertheless, the café has a really relaxed ambience and low noise, so having a conversation with my fellow eater was no problem!

The fresh juice test

We had a green juice made with spinach, cucumber, celery, Granny Smith apples, ginger and lemon. However, their signature drink is the iced rainbow latte. We thought it was a work of art! It was a layer of red cold pressed beetroot, followed by a yellow layer of ginger and turmeric, ending with a layer of green matcha. It has three different types of plant-based mylk. We think it is the happiest drink you will ever drink . It was very refreshing too on a (non-typical Dutch) warm, Summer day.

The little things that make a difference

Sustainability is a very important component of the DNA of Rainbowls. The smoothie bowls are served in coconut shells, you eat with sustainably produced wooden spoons and the bill is emailed to you, rather than being printed.

What we ate

Rainbowls is all about smoothie bowls.

With a choice of a pink, violet, orange, yellow, green and blue bowl, the whole rainbow is covered!

There are also three different types of açai bowls, plus chia and porridge bowls as well as vegan sweets like banana bread and carrot cake.

We chose the Orange Bowl, the Violet Bowl and the Yellow one – which we were told is the most popular and it was also our favourite! It contained banana, coconut, passion fruit, turmeric, ginger and pineapple and had the perfect sweet-sour balance. The Violet bowl with raspberry and blueberry was also really nice, it tasted like a ‘regular’ berry bowl, but we liked the addition of cauliflower. We were less enthusiastic about the Orange bowl with carrot, orange, ginger and mango.

For dessert we had a raw chocolate pie and something very special- a vegan ‘roze koek’ (‘pink cookie’), which is a famous, typically Dutch cookie, from  Donny Craves who specialises in vegan cookies and sweets. The pink layer is made using beetroot and in total the cookie is has 21 grams of veg-  not bad! Since the cookie was very sweet, tasting it together with the raw chocolate pie, which had a very pure and slightly sweet taste, was not a very good idea. Nevertheless, we enjoyed both very much!

What we’d go back for…

Next time I am definitely trying the Blue bowl!

 

The bill

Rainbowl € 9.50
Rainbow latte € 4.50
Juice  € 4.95
Vegan brownies € 3.50
Raw choco pie € 4.50