Tabú — Restaurant in Leiden

Quick summary: stick to the bites (like chorizo croquettes) and drinks. Avoid the Dorade!

Tabu in Leiden is a bit of a mixed bag. Some dishes were really enjoyable, while others fell completely flat. The chorizo croquettes were the highlight of the evening. They were crispy, rich, and full of flavour. I could’ve easily ordered another round of those. Unfortunately, the tacos al pastor didn’t live up to expectations. They were bland, overly wet, and lacked the punch you’d hope for, especially from a dish that should be vibrant and full of spice (not spicy at all). I even had to add salt to them.

The dorade was the biggest disappointment. Serving the fish with the head still on just didn’t work... it came across as unappetizing, and the sweet pico de gallo on the side only made things stranger. A simple fillet would have been so much better. On the other hand, the flat iron steak was easily the best main dish. The flavors and the sides were spot on, but the meat itself was far too chewy, which is frustrating when you’re paying almost €30 for a dish.

What does help elevate the experience is the service, which was friendly and attentive throughout the night. But what really stands out is the ambiance: Tabu has a laid-back vibe in a beautiful spot in the city, by the water and great greenery, making it a great place to hang out even if the food doesn’t always...

Dinner box during 2nd lock down took too much effort to make and wasted so much plastic packing materials.

First, its web site asked you to specify a delivery time which the box came at 4pm anyway. So if you are not at home, you will miss it.

Then it came as pages of manuals of how you need to combine the dishes. There were 7 dishes with a lot of plastic packing for each of the ingredients (chess, oil, green paste, dipping... god dame crazily A LOT). You will need to read those manuals to figure it out what items go with which dish ad what you need to do. Basically you almost have to cook everything yourself. So if you plan to make a party and put an effort to make it nice, then it could be a good choice. but a reminder is that it takes you same effort but gives you more quantity if you shop from a supermarket. After a tired day of working, it ends up that we have to do so much (understanding the manual, grouping all ingredients, using the oven, reheating some packages, heating the taco). It is totally crazy.

A dinner box costs 20 euro. with so little effort from the restaurant and so much effort from the customer to make it as a dinner, it is worth only 10 euro.

And do protect the environment. It used crazily a lot of plastic boxes to pack each individual ingredients.

We will NEVER order...

We came to the restaurant and sat outside. After maybe 10 minutes i went to use the toilet and noticed the “wait to be seated” sign inside,we had no way of knowing this policy. We went to wait to be seated sign and the server just told us that we can sit wherever we want so we just went back. We waited for the server to give us a menu,then when she came she just asked what we want to drink. When we said that we dont even have a menu she grabbed one and stood above us and waited for us to pick something asap which felt rushed. We couldnt understand the menu so we asked for a english version. She looked in her phone and just said that she cant get the english version now and that we can read the standard one and if we had a question we could ask and left. After another solid 10 minutes of waiting trying to translate the menu via google a different server came and asked for the order. I saw on the site that they have churros so i ordered that. When the server asked which ones i asked if she could tell me what types there are because i couldnt understand the menu. Then she just said that acctually they dont have churros. After that we left because no food is worth this much struggle. I give 2 starts just because the suroudings looked beautiful and the food...