Sustainable Living
A handmade furniture workshop in Amsterdam since 2011: solid wood, made to measure, and clever pieces that turn a small apartment into an office by day and a bedroom by night.
6 min read · Oct 2026
Sustainable Living
Wooden handles, horse-hair and boar bristles, plant fibres, and the miswak twig — what to brush with when you want no plastic at all.
6 min read · Oct 2026
Food & Drink
A complete guide to the sugars in our food: how each one is built, how the body breaks it down, the health problems linked to each, and the rare cases where sugar genuinely helps.
14 min read · Oct 2026
Food & Drink
A consumer and maker's guide to every sweetener sold in Europe and the US: what it is made from, how the body handles it, what the latest research says, and a clear good, careful or avoid rating.
16 min read · Oct 2026
Food & Drink
What inulin, oligofructose, GOS, yacon syrup, soluble corn fibre and IMO actually are, what they do in the colon, which claims are proven, and who should be careful.
11 min read · Oct 2026
Food & Drink
Dates, figs, bananas, apples, sweet potato, carrots, carob, malt, amazake, cinnamon and vanilla: how whole foods deliver sweetness with fibre, minerals and polyphenols, and how to cook with them.
10 min read · Oct 2026
Food & Drink
A practical cheat sheet for shoppers and food makers: the best sweetener for drinks, baking, ice cream, fermentation and chocolate, the 50 names sugar hides under, and EU labelling rules.
11 min read · Oct 2026
Sustainable Coffee
Most coffee crosses the ocean on diesel container ships. Kaap Koffie and Tres Hombres carry theirs on sailing cargo ships — slowly, beautifully and almost without emissions.
6 min read · Oct 2026
Sustainable Coffee
Brazil grows about a third of the world's coffee, and much of it is harvested by machines that shake the trees. Efficient, controversial, and very different from the hand-picking of specialty farms.
8 min read · Oct 2026
Sustainable Living
Щрак brings Bulgarian social enterprises together in one welcoming Sofia space, creating visibility and routes into work for people with disabilities and other communities facing barriers.
10 min read · Oct 2026
Sustainable Living
The original drinking straw was a hollow stem. Here is why reed and wheat straws beat paper and bioplastic, and which makers sell them without glues or plastics.
6 min read · Oct 2026
Parenting
Today’s parents are questioning inherited patterns and learning new ways to care. Grandparents deserve a place to learn too: not a lecture, but preparation for becoming reliable members of a modern family.
9 min read · Sept 2026
Parenting
A quiet collection of real birth stories from mothers, shared anonymously or with a first name only. No advice, no judgment.
2 min read · Sept 2026
Parenting
The Dutch maternity system is built on a simple idea: birth is healthy until proven otherwise. Independent midwives lead low-risk care, home birth is a normal choice, and after the baby arrives a kraamzorg maternity nurse comes to your home for days — cooking, teaching, watching, reassuring. It is not perfect, and the home birth rate has fallen, but as a model of humane, mother-centred care it remains one of the best examples in the world.
8 min read · Sept 2026
Sustainable Living
Most cleaning cupboards are full of promises and half-hidden chemistry. We searched for a fully natural line that still gets the job done — and found Sonett.
5 min read · Sept 2026
Sustainable Coffee
A practical checklist for anyone building a roastery: green coffee, grinder, cupping bowls, sustainable bags and the quiet tools that turn a first roast into a repeatable craft.
5 min read · Sept 2026
Parenting
Enemas before birth, caesareans without a medical reason, medication to stop milk, early formula and supply, and why night breastfeeding really is harder. What each practice is, why people choose it, and where the criticism deserves to be questioned.
14 min read · Aug 2026
Parenting
One pair of oversized merino men's sweatpants from John Merino in Amsterdam, worn from early pregnancy through a year of motherhood, worn into holes, and then repaired with a patch made from barely-worn baby trousers. A small story about circular clothing, repair, and what motherhood actually does to a body and a mind.
6 min read · Aug 2026
Parenting
Haemorrhoids after pregnancy and birth are common, temporary and rarely discussed. What they are, why pushing invites them, and the remedies worth keeping in the drawer — eucalyptus cream and the Dutch classic, Curanol.
9 min read · Aug 2026
Sustainable Coffee
Why a bag of specialty coffee costs several times a supermarket one — picking, altitude, yield, processing, and the difference between fair trade certification and the way specialty coffee is actually traded.
8 min read · Aug 2026
Sustainable Coffee
There are only four real ways to take caffeine out of coffee, and only a few dozen plants in the world that do it. Here is the index of methods, an honest chemical-versus-not assessment, and a directory of the known facilities by region.
14 min read · Aug 2026
Parenting
Breast milk changes by the hour, by the day, and by whether the baby is ill. Night milk is not day milk. Milk fed to a sick baby is not the milk from a week before. Here is what is actually happening, and why pumping cannot reproduce it.
9 min read · Aug 2026
Parenting
A personal review of breastfeeding clothing that does not rely on zippers, with a recommendation for Latte Mamiato in Antwerp.
5 min read · Aug 2026
Habits & Lifestyle
Not a cure-all, but the closest thing I have found to nudging the body back online — and a quiet recommendation for Gil Ton at AcuMed in Amsterdam.
4 min read · Aug 2026
Sustainable Living
What menstrual products are actually made of, what the evidence does and does not show, and the reusable cotton setup we would recommend to anyone starting from scratch.
8 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Alcohol-free brewing stopped being an apology about five years ago. A short guide to what actually improved, how to read a 0.0 label, and the Dutch shop we order from.
6 min read · Aug 2026
Sustainable Living
Most mattresses sold today are petrochemical foam. Here is what the evidence says about emissions, heat, durability and end of life — and three makers working entirely in plant and animal fibre.
11 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Small tins, named harvests, shops that answer questions. A practical guide to buying matcha in Europe without wasting money or tea.
6 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Mould versus yeast strands, vinegar batches, going on holiday, and when to stop. The part nobody writes because it is not photogenic.
6 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
A chasen, a wide bowl, a sieve, and water at the right temperature and hardness. What to buy, what to skip, and how to keep the whisk alive.
6 min read · Aug 2026
Sustainable Living
Sluishuis is one of Amsterdam's most photographed sustainable buildings. We put it through the four lenses — materials, waste and repair, energy, ethics — and then ask the harder question: how does it feel to live in?
9 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Most bad matcha is not bad matcha — it is good powder treated like instant coffee. Grade, water temperature, sieving and whisk technique, explained.
6 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Kombucha is sweet tea fermented by a bacterial and yeast culture. The method is simple; the failure modes are where the learning is.
8 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Kefir asks less of you than any other ferment: milk, grains, a jar, a strainer, one minute a day. Here is how to keep it alive and tasting good.
5 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
A starter is flour and water. A loaf is four ingredients and a schedule. Everything else people tell you about sourdough is decoration.
9 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Two to five days sealed, 10–20% flavouring, and a plastic test bottle. How to get fizz without shrapnel, and how to reuse bottles safely.
7 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Grades are marketing. Harvest date, origin, cultivar and milling are the facts that predict the cup. How to read a tin, and what silence on a label means.
7 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
A 3-litre jar, swing-top bottles, loose tea and plain white sugar. The kit is trivial; the sourcing questions are not.
7 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Before the jar: what the SCOBY is, what the two ferments each do, and the small number of facts that make everything else make sense.
6 min read · Aug 2026
Food & Drink
Before method, before gear: what separates matcha from green tea ground up, and why shade, steaming and stone milling change the cup.
6 min read · Aug 2026
Frogwise
Seven criteria, applied the same way every time, published in full so you can disagree with us.
6 min read · Jul 2026
Parenting
Foam, latex, springs and certificates — a plain reading of the evidence on what your child sleeps on for ten hours a night.
8 min read · Jul 2026
Sustainable Coffee
Compostable does not mean it composts in your garden. A practical guide for roasters choosing a bag.
7 min read · Jul 2026
Sustainable Coffee
What switching from gas to electric actually does to your energy use, your profiles and your costs.
5 min read · Jul 2026
Sustainable Living
VOC limits, mineral paints and why the smell of a freshly painted room is information.
6 min read · Jul 2026
Sustainable Living
Twelve weeks of ordinary family laundry, one set of stains, and a look at each ingredient list.
9 min read · Jul 2026
Parenting
What is Lotus Birth? Lotus birth—also called umbilical nonseverance —is the practice of leaving the umbilical cord uncut after childbirth, allowing the baby to remain attached to the placenta until the cord naturally…
7 min read · May 2025
Parenting
How I Found Out About Pain-Free Birth & 2 Short Birth Stories Everyone around me seemed convinced birth was going to feel like a marathon… in fire. I nodded politely, but in my head I was thinking: Surely there’s a…
5 min read · Apr 2025
Parenting
Home birth—the decision to deliver a baby in the comfort of your own home—is experiencing a quiet resurgence. While still relatively uncommon in many countries, the Netherlands offers a shining example of how this…
4 min read · Apr 2025
Parenting
🌸 Top Books for a Beautiful Birth & Empowered Postpartum Journey Whether you're preparing for your first birth or looking to enrich your knowledge for a more empowered experience, diving into the right resources can…
2 min read · Apr 2025
Parenting
The most natural way for labor to start is when a woman’s body decides the time has come. A surge of hormones sets contractions in motion, pain is eased by the body’s own chemistry, and birth begins in its own rhythm.…
4 min read · Apr 2025
Parenting
Childbirth is universal, but it hasn’t always looked the same. Across centuries, continents, and cultures, birth has evolved—shaped by beliefs, tools, traditions, and power. Here’s a brief walk through the history of…
4 min read · Apr 2025
Parenting
Recently someone told me that since labour carries the meaning of hard work, birth must be a hard work. In English ... however, birth goes beyond language. So I was curious what does labour translate into in other…
3 min read · Apr 2025
Parenting
A German-Engineer-Dad Compatible Guide to the Chaos of Tiny Humans Who Just Discovered They Have Opinions. Part IV of the Manual for Julian.
2 min read · Feb 2025
Parenting
The first night, the foggy days, milk, cramps, nappies, the witching hour and the first tooth — the newborn half of the manual, on its own.
7 min read · Feb 2025
Parenting
A German-Engineer-Dad-Friendly Field Guide to birth itself: contractions, the placenta, the water, the hospital, and the case for staying home.
8 min read · Feb 2025
Parenting
The edition that was promised: the nine months before the birth, written for a father who wants to know what is actually happening and what he can usefully do about it.
9 min read · Feb 2025
Parenting
💡 The Magic of Shared Resources As a start, I’d like to say—I’m a huge fan of the sharing economy in many cases. Sharing resources helps us consume less and build stronger communities , since trust and care are at the…
4 min read · Nov 2024
Parenting
How to Thrive (Not Just Survive) Pregnancy isn’t just about growing a tiny human — it’s about discovering your instincts, your power, and maybe even your sass. Yes, there will be nausea, aches, and mood swings. But it’s…
3 min read · Nov 2024
Parenting
👶 So What Happens After the Baby Comes? One big change: I connected deeply to my other mom friends. There is so much uniting in the experience. And no matter my attempts to keep connected to the non-mom friends too,…
3 min read · Oct 2024
