The Best Restaurants in the Heart of Amsterdam

Located inside the contemporary Art’otel, ARCA is a brand-new restaurant and bar concept by the award-winning Portuguese chef, Henrique Sa Pessoa. It is the first project of Chef Pessoa in Europe outside of Lisbon. Patrons of the place can enjoy a memorable dining experience consisting of modern Portuguese dishes with unique Asian influences. The restaurant is designed in a fun and social way, which creates an inviting and elegant atmosphere. The interiors of the establishment are made up of high-end furnishings and wood-paneled walls in gray and black color tones.

The kitchen features a seasonal tasting menu along with an a la carte menu. Visitors of the eatery can enjoy home-style specialties, such as scallops with ginger and lemongrass, smoked Portuguese sausage served with egg and turnip greens, octopus salad with smoked paprika, duck and chorizo with vegetable rice, seared langoustine with coriander, lamb shank with mint jus, and beef sirloin with tarragon jus. ARCA also boasts an exquisite bar that offers creative craft cocktails. Pick a light apéritif to set up the right mood for an unmatched evening.

Bistrot Neuf is a quaint French corner situated in the Haarlemmerstraat 9 district of Amsterdam. It is a casual modern eatery that advocates a wine-based dining experience for oenophiles and epicureans alike. The decor of the restaurant is clean and contemporary in style, with a narrow passageway that guides guests through the kitchen to the dining area. This heightens the anticipation of the French food that you are about to savor. The interiors of the dining area are simple and minimalistic with cream shades.

The kitchen presents a 3, 4, or 5-course Menu Du Chef (Chef’s Tasting Menu) along with an a la carte option of traditional French delicacies that exhibit an original Amsterdam flair to them and are cooked to perfection. The patrons of the restaurant can relish scrumptious dishes, including steak tartare, homemade classic pate, ravioli stuffed with mushrooms and truffle, peppery duck breast served with butter-tossed red cabbage, spring chicken with soft spinach purée, and escargot garden snails with garlic parsley butter. The bistro also has a rotating wine list of over 60 varieties of labels from countries all over the world: Germany, Austria, France, and Portugal, to name a few.

True to its name, the Senses restaurant in the heart of Amsterdam is a fine dining establishment that offers its guests a tantalizing culinary experience. It has an open kitchen where food art is created to ignite all the senses. The entrance to this gem takes you through the Albus Hotel. Once you are inside the eatery, you are met with a modern and neat interior – a tasteful blend of hanging circular lights, velvety sofa furnishing, wood-paneled flooring, and colorful decor.

The kitchen is run by the award-winning chef, Jan Wijnbergen, who serves only a multi-course tasting menu made up of unconventional dishes created using only local sustainable ingredients. The culinary repertoire features smoked eel tacos with poppy seeds, poached chicken breast marinated with peppers and green onion served in a buttery emulsion, full lemon curd with foam of kiwi and cucumber, lamb filet thickened with bacon, watermelon tartare served with a parfait of Belfort cheese, and crispy duck breast with poached mushrooms in a horseradish foam. The tasting menu is paired with an excellent wine list developed to enhance and complement every bite of your meal.

Named after a famous market town in the south of the Netherlands, Breda restaurant in the Singel district of Amsterdam is a fine dining establishment to check out during your holidays. It serves a frequently changing French–Dutch fusion tasting menu featuring solely local Dutch produce. The restaurant possesses a brasserie-like setting with a retro feel. The interiors are luxuriously made up of simple vintage wooden furniture, hanging chandelier lights, and a thick wooden bar counter from Spaghetti Westerns by Sergio Leone.

Guests are offered a 5, 7, or 9-course menu which is meat and seafood-heavy, along with an optional wine pairing from a pleasantly extensive bar card. Although there is no written menu, some of the fabulous delicacies that can be sampled here are smoked mackerel with spring vegetables, pan-fried cod in lemon butter sauce, roasted duck with caramelized onion, roasted pork with charcoal grilled corn served on a bed of mashed potatoes, scallops with mushrooms served in a bisque, and beef wellington served with a pepper sauce. The culinary experience at Breda restaurant is refined and delicious, and we recommend you book a table in advance.

Nestled in the center of Amsterdam, Kaagman & Kortekaas is a French restaurant that draws inspiration from the contemporary bistros of Paris. It is a casual establishment where you can enjoy exciting dishes and their contrasting flavors. Opened in 2015 by Giel Kaagman and Bram Kortekaas, the place quickly became a success based on the general positive vibe around it created by local foodies. The bistro has a relaxed ambiance of semi-furnished walls, vintage wooden furniture, and monochromatic color strokes.

The kitchen produces an ever-changing menu that consists of wild game, fish, and seasonal vegetables. We would recommend you try the Chef’s Special where you can relish veal tartare with cuttlefish, lobster with Dutch rabbit in a leek and truffle sauce, scallop and lamb cutlet with sweet and sour Jerusalem Artichoke, veal cheek with a reduction of smoked eel skins, and duck breast with veal marrow and quail egg. For dessert, you can indulge in an unusual combination of chestnut, meringue, cherries on brandy, and langoustine. The wine list also changes based on seasonal factors.

Amsterdam is a city that is free-spirited and charming in nature. There is no shortage of awesome things to do here. The Dutch capital packs a huge cultural punch with world-class museums, glorious parks, innovative restaurants, picture postcard architecture, and iconic nightlife. It is undeniable that Amsterdam is famous for plenty of reasons and falling in love with this city is inevitable.

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