What would be a good Shabbos gift from US to Amsterdam?

imasinger

Tue, Feb 08 2011, 12:33 pm

My mother is taking my DD on a trip to Amsterdam, and they are being hosted for Shabbos meals. They probably won't have opportunity to go to their hosts' before Shabbos without some inconvenience. We are debating between flowers, and possibly some food that would be welcome and different there. Or maybe something else, but it has to be something they could use on Shabbos if they bring it with them (it looks like there is an eruv).

Any ideas?

solo

Tue, Feb 08 2011, 7:45 pm

how bout wrapping some candy on a pretty dish. that way the candy can be enjoyed on shabbat and ur host would have something she can use when its done.
if u pack it well (stick it in amoungst a pile of t shirts) I dont think it should be a problem to carry glass. if you are local to an amaizing savings they have these really pretty plastic trays you can use as well.
or how bout a bottle of whiskey from the duty free.

bringing flowers might get complicated.
wouldnt ur host hafta put thm in water? on shabbat?

Mrs Bissli

Wed, Feb 09 2011, 5:16 pm

From perspective of an European imamother that sometimes hosts American guests,

Do not bring:
- flowers, UNLESS you can get it delivered at least an hour before shabbat (can't trim and put in vase)
- chocolates (European chocolates have much higher cocoa contents)
- pastries (we once received Entenmanns--amazingly it lasted nearly 2months without refrigeration.
we DO have bakeries in Europe...)
- weird food things. Why do Americans think there are no foods in Europe? I once got a jar of peanut
butter, someone else brought Aunt Jemima pancake mix, Kool-Aid (which noone like) etc etc. I mean,
do you bring these if you get invited to your neighbour?

I like the candy dish ideas, jelly beans may work. Most people bring either wine or flowers (any florists can deliver before shabbat), chocolate boxes, maybe fruit baskets that sort of things. If you can arrange to bring before/after shabbat, regular hostess gifts (personally the best gift I got was a few assortment of handwashes from bed bath and beyond. We do have scented handwashes but still nice.)

Are you sure about eruv? Even if there is, I don't think it covers central Amsterdam.

Raisin

Wed, Feb 09 2011, 6:40 pm

mrs bissli, I appreciate the weird food things! or my kids do. Well, some of them. I used to ask americans to bring jelly beans - now my local supermarket sells jelly bellys and mike and ikes.

You can't go wrong with some nice candy. If they have kids something like twizzllers will go down well.

She can always drop it off after shabbos if it is difficult to get it there before.

yo'ma

Wed, Feb 09 2011, 7:03 pm

Raisin wrote:

We also get mike and ikes, but boy, they are so expensive. When my kids go to the states they usually bring back a small cheap nosh that they can't get here for the kids in their class. It's getting harder to do that because one of the stores here is importing all the goodies. LOL