NELIS’s second location in West

There has been a location of restaurant NELIS in Amsterdam Oost for a few years now. Now it’s time for a location in the west. FavorFlavs Emma stopped by for a taste.

Upon arrival, we are served a delicious vichyssoise (creamy leek soup) and popcorn with Moroccan spices as an amuse-bouche. The menu ranges from burgers to mussel pots to a board featuring all the small dishes on the menu to share.

Shrimp

As a starter, the shrimp stew was the absolute winner. The sauce the shrimp are served in is creamy, rich, very mildly spicy and sweet. A little lime to make it slightly fresher would make it perfect, but we still eagerly dip our bread into the sauce.

Less is more

One thing Nelis could still work on is the art of leaving things out. The veal roast beef is well seasoned, but a garnish of radish, capers, pine nuts, sun-dried tomatoes and beetroot is, in my opinion, unnecessary.

Perfectly cooked

The garnish also distracts from the main courses. The halibut fried in chorizo is wonderfully crisp and flavourful, and the pea sauce is delicious. The duck breast is perfectly cooked and the mayonnaise pleasantly sour.

The enormous quantity of vegetables (especially with the fish) is unnecessary and, frankly, not particularly flavourful either. There is even so much of it that we leave more than half of the dishes uneaten—and we are not light eaters. What a waste of ingredients.

Crème brûlée

In terms of texture, the crème brûlée is one of the best we have ever tasted, silky smooth and not too firm. I order it without the scoop of strawberry cheesecake ice cream that is normally served with the dish. When your product is good, you don’t need frills; just dare to serve it on its own in all its glory.

The wines we drink are good. We start with a Viognier and then move on to a Chardonnay from California. The latter has seen some oak aging, but is soft enough to pair well with the starters too. If NELIS were to make some adjustments, both to portion sizes and the number of ingredients, we would have a real gem in the Amsterdamse Baarsjes. And I’ll definitely be back for that shrimp stew.

NELIS West
Witte de Withplein 43
Amsterdam