Typical Dutch 02 – bruin café (brown pub)

This is an extra video lesson to the post about “het bruin cafe” literally translated as the “brown pub”. These are pubs with a very traditional look: a wooden interior that makes you think of a living room. In Dutch, in stead of “cafe”, we can also say “ kroeg”. So, “de bruine kroeg”.

In the Netherlands we like this kind of pub. Especially in Amsterdam; you find there over 500 of these pubs.

So what is the origin of “het bruin cafe”?

In the 19th century, people started to serve alcohol in their “woonkamer” which is Dutch for living room. It was a form of extra “inkomen” (income). Often it happened in a situation when the husband got “werkloos” (unemployed), and then his wife served the drinks.

As there was no regulation, by the end of the century there were so many pubs, that it really became a problem. So the government introduced a “vergunning” (a license). And the “vergunning” to serve alcohol is called “tapvergunning”, derived from the word “tap” (same like “beer tap” in english)

Very typical for the “bruine kroegen” in Amsterdam is that the name of the cafe often is painted on the “ramen” (the windows).

Vocabulary you should know, related to pubs:

–  “een kroegentocht” is the activity of hopping from one pub to the other; usually with having in advance a plan of which pubs to visit and even with a specific sequence

–  “een kroegloper” is a pub crawler, someone who visit pubs regularly,

–  “een stamkroeg” is a local favourite pub where you go frequently

–  in the eyes of “de kroegbaas” (the pub owner) you are then “de stamgast” (the regular customer)

So that’s it. My job is done for today. “Ik ga een borrel pakken in mijn stamkroeg”. I am going to take a drink in my favourite pub. And with this lesson you are ready for the weekend as well. But attention, “drink niet te veel”. Don’t drink too much.

Hope you like this lesson. You now know what is a “bruin cafe”. For more weekly videos to learn Dutch, you subscribe to my youtube channel.

See you there.