BAK | Fine dining Restaurant Amsterdam — Restaurant in Amsterdam

Very disappointing. We paid 100€ per person for four people for a very basic, unsophisticated 7 course menu. People don’t appreciate the value of money; I could get something ten times better for 5 times less in price in Spain.

Ambience - The location and the old warehouse building seemed really promising. Getting inside of the dinning area really created high expectations as you would have to go in a tiny adventure and find your way inside the building to the doors of the restaurant. It created a moment of fantasy and mystery. However, everything else was very very very disappointing.

Food - The food was fine but does not live up to the price. Portions were small to the point that you were still hungry once finished (this also has to do with the really long time periods that passed in between courses). The only thing that filled us up was the bread with butter that we asked for to remedy our hunger.

Service - The service was very inattentive and all over the place. When we first arrived they brought a menu with 9 courses, however they said the menu consisted of 7 courses; 5 starter, entrée and main + 2 desserts. The waiter had us insanely confused with the number of courses as they did not match the menu given. The waiter could not successfully explain the concept of the menu even after having asked him 3 times to clarify this doubt.

Additionally, the two waiters showed very poor professional behaviour throughout the experience. They walked with slouch shoulders, dragged their feet when walking, moved very slowly without urgency, did not make eye contact with the guest in any occasion and was very unresponsive to our needs.

The dishes in between courses took very long to be served as the service would mingle around the restaurant doing nothing - pretending to be busy - while the food was sitting in the kitchen counter ready to be served. There was a point where the kitchen had come out to serve the dishes as service was not doing its job. Quite unbelievable I would say for a restaurant at this price range.

The entire experience took almost 3 hours, which is quite frustrating when you consider that everything they ended up serving were mostly a dish with a few leaves, vegetables, fruits beautifully put together with very basic or almost no elaborations. Some things did not even have to be cut into smaller pieces. The only work intensive elaboration that took place in the making was the plating. They could have prepared the mise en place earlier in the day as they do not many things in the menu and they already knew how many reservations they had for the day. What is the point in spending 40€ per person to make the reservation, if there is no anticipation of guest numbers at all?

To end this review, we had to take our own jackets from their closet rack as no one in service seemed to care to come help us find them. We left happily with no intention of...

Nice restaurant with relaxed atmosphere, but tasteless food. We were warned from our Dutch friends that what restaurants in Amsterdam call “fine dining” can’t be compared to the rest of Europe.

Drinks: It started poorly with us receiving a recommended drink from the waitress, which can only be explained as juice with violet taste (Horrible). We asked if we could change to a normal beer instead and they were nice to do so, but the beer received was 1) wheat beer and 2) 12.5 centiliters. We don’t mind a wheat beer, or the "galopin" size, but that was not what we asked for. Based on this start we did not go all in with the pairing during the dinner, but the one pairing we did was also not good.

Atmosphere: It’s a cool restaurant with nice view, but they need to re-structure their way of working – for example: Don’t collect all used wine glasses from the tables on the bar, visible for everyone to see. Number of glasses just kept on growing. When the bar was full, they started to add them in a dishwasher which was visible for everyone. 1) A fine dine restaurant should not do this, 2) if you still think it’s a good idea to do so, please integrate your dishwasher so it blends into the room, 3) At this stage our frustration tipped over to comedy and when we started hearing the tumbling noise from the dishwasher we just broke out in laughter’s.

Food: I don’t agree with people saying it’s small dishes, because it’s fine dining and it’s the taste that matters. Unfortunately, the taste was not there at all. 1) Appetizers – Raw vegetables with a yoghurt sauce, like milk in the texture. Awful. 2) Some swirled vegetables with some kind of sauce, like milk in the texture. 3) Chopped vegetables with some strawberries in it… Here we changed our selection of 7 courses to 5… The main courses and dessert were also terrible and I’m getting tired of writing this review, so I won’t go into details. BUT, the presentation of all dishes were beautiful I must say!

In summary, the food didn’t taste anything, and this is by far the worse food experience we have had. The staff was very friendly though and easy to talk to. They actually withdraw parts of the bill so that was really nice of them. To be fair, this review is only based on this menu and since they change it, maybe we were just unlucky. We went to the restaurant Treuf the day after, which as great, so I guess it wasn’t something wrong with our taste at least.

So if you fix the dishwasher and spice up the food a bit, then I think this can be much better since the setting is very nice, but this time I will give the experience...

To start things off, I arrived nearly 40 minutes late because I went back to my hotel to take a nap and slept past my alarm. They were happy to have me sat under my initial reservation, and I didn’t need to put down another deposit.

Situated in the third floor of a repurposed warehouse (? I think), be sure to keep your eyes out for signs! Very cozy and intimate interior, with a full view of everything happening in the kitchen (think a lot of clean whites and earthy wood tones). Great view of the water. They change their menu bi-weekly/monthly, keeping the menu fresh, interesting and fun. I would say their cuisine was mostly French-based (don’t quote me on that), but they also had many international influences in both ingredients and preparation methods (fun).

Tenzin, my server, was very kind, accommodating, and willing to answer all/any questions I had (and I had many). Her wine recommendations were great. They had a tasting menu that I believe was ~65 euros. I wanted to stick with two and she recommended a Chardonnay (white) and an Albahra (red) that carried throughout the meal.

The meal itself was a range of textures, balance of tastes, and overall delightful! The menu was very veggie focused, with seafood as the star. I believe they have taken on meats recently, with a pigeon as an add on (which I did not opt for). As someone who loves their veggies, this is right up my alley. The ingredients are VERY fresh, locally sourced, and used to their fullest extent.

I took some time towards the end of my meal to speak with the chefs. Sadly, the head chef/owner was not there that night, as I would’ve loved to know their thoughts. At some point, I asked for their full ingredient list as well as the preparation, which they were happy to provide since it was already posted along the kitchen. As a huge foodie, someone in the food industry, and someone visiting from out of the country by themselves, I REALLY appreciated this; I also did not want to continue asking too many questions, as well as enjoy my meal without feeling the need to write things down in my notes.

PRICING: 9 courses (full menu): for 95 euros - worth every dollar ~ 2.5 hours: don’t come if you’re in a rush!

Overall, I had the most lovely time. I would recommend this spot to anyone, and hope they continue to grow and thrive. If I am visiting Amsterdam again, I will be coming here for my first dinner time and time...