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We often make a few trips up to Amsterdam from our home in the South. After all, Amsterdam is the main place where all the museums and stuff is going on, so it is pretty hard to avoid! Plus, there is a great Science museum there... however, this time we were there for the Festival of Light... and during our walk, we had to stop for a quick dinner somewhere!

Apologies in advance for the photo quality... it was dark, and I'm not taking photos of food with a flash! I still have some dignity left to lose!

The Space

I don't know... the restaurant has a particular sort of ambience... glowing would be way of describing it. Now, I like a dimly lit restaurant, as I've mentioned before in previous posts... but sometimes, the atmostphere is not really enhanced by so many colours and lights. It sort of gives it a bit of a tacky feel... we would have passed this place by, just by the looks... except there were hungry hungry hippos in our entourage!

The Menu

This menu was on the very very long side. Sometimes, with the Italian restaurants, you have line by line descriptions of each and every variation of pasta and pasta sauce and pizza topping that is possible. It's fine for reading when you are sitting down for a meal... but it does make for lots of photographs....

Also, the fact that Amsterdam is such a tourist town means that the menu is also in a number of languages...

If I can, I will generally try and get something from the Specials menu. Unless there is really somehting from the main menu that catches my eye... I just think that this is the sort of thing that they are going to have the most practice in cooking and would generally be popular (hopefully for a good reason!)

Entrees and salads... Some of the entree's defintitely looked interesting, but we were really here for the mains. We didn't want the meal to drag out, as we still had more walking to go and the return trip back home!

Risotta and Pasta based dishes... these were the sort of things that we were after! Quick and filling for a cold winter night!

Pizzas would also fit the bill... however, we did have way too many pizzas in the previous month... and so this was skipped over as well!

The various fish and meat based main courses... now, if I was here by myself (like on tour...) and we had enough time... then I would have gone straight for one of these!

... and you can't forget the desserts!

The Food

My oldest girl is absolutely crazy about gnocchi (to tell the truth, I also love it!)... and so there was a simple Gnocchi with tomato sauce... and it was great! Sometimes, it is easy to over do the sauce and accompaniaments with the Italian food.. simple, and good!

Papperdelle with Wild Boar! I've never had that... well, not intentionally... so I had to try out the Wild Boar. Again, it was really quite good!

So, we were pressed for time... but we made time for dessert! A Tiramisu... which was absolutely delicious and well presented!

... and a berry Panna Cotta. Again... great presentation and very very tasty!

The Experience

The staff were incredibly friendly... and the food was very very good. Despite the fact that the restaurant was busy, the wait time was not too long...

That said, the look of the place could really use some work. Perhaps there will be people that like this sort of ambience... but for me, it almost turned me away before I stepped through the door.

Luckily, I did go in... as it is quite a good Italian restaurant!