Andrew D.
Google
Hans Egstorf is one of those places you stumble into while wandering around Amsterdam and immediately feel like you’ve landed somewhere with real history and heart. The shop itself goes all the way back to 1898, originally founded as “Croissanterie Egstorf,” and it’s one of the oldest continuously operating bakeries in the city. It stayed family-run for generations, and a lot of that old-world charm is still visible today — especially in the beautiful Delft-style tiles lining the upper walls. The woman at the register told me they’re original to the building and each panel illustrates the traditional process of turning grain into bread. It’s such a sweet detail, and once you notice it you realize how much craft and heritage is baked into the place.
This was also the first time in my life I’ve ever had a stroopwafel freshly made — and wow. I finally get the hype. I’ve only ever had the chewy packaged ones from tins or airport shops, and while those are fine, a warm one straight off the iron is a completely different experience. Light, fragrant, soft, not cloyingly sweet, and somehow both comforting and exciting at the same time. I honestly didn’t know this is what they were actually supposed to taste like.
I’d just come from lunch, so I didn’t have the stomach to dive into anything else (tragic), but everything in the shop looked gorgeous — shelves filled with beautifully packaged cookies, pastries stacked like treasure, the whole place smelling like butter and sugar and childhood. And the staff could not have been nicer; very friendly without being pushy, just clearly proud of their bakery.
In short: charming, historic, and absolutely worth popping into — especially for a fresh stroopwafel that will ruin the packaged ones for you forever.