Van De Kaart

Prinsengracht 512
Amsterdam

Last week I went with a small group of family to Van de Kaart. I’d had my eye on this place for while but could never conjure up a good reason to actually go. On this occasion J and I were invited by his mother and her partner, who had been before for a business dinner. It’s easy to see why – the restaurant is near the Leidseplein, in the souterrain of a grachtenpand and there is an underground parking garage just a few steps away. The décor can only be described as ‘business Dutch minimal’ and I don’t recall hearing any music. On the Wednesday evening of our visit, the restaurant was entirely patronized by suits and almost everyone was male.

Upon descending the stairs to the restaurant, I was engulfed by the smell of lobster from a live tank adjacent to the door. I wondered what sort of tone the owners were trying to establish – or if such pungent smell could ever set the ‘right’ tone? Before I could finish this line of thought, our waiter offered to take our coats. I decided to forgive them and move on.

To start I ordered the couscous salad with octopus, avocado, a bitter bal of smoked white fish and green herb dressing. It was a last minute decision as I was also tempted by the creamy fish soup with sautéed codfish, tapenade, parmesan cheese and a crayfish brioche. I will pretty much always order a bouillabaisse if it’s on the menu, but ultimately I decided too much could go wrong with the soup – from "creamy fish" to fish bread, all mingling with tapenade (olive??), I decided the salad would be a refreshing choice.

It was a mess – the avocado looked like the paste you get at Taco Mundo, the octopus wasn't sliced diagonally, with suckers... it was long, white curly (like a pig-tail) and oddly phallic . The croquettes were delicious but the salad greens were over oiled. Then there was the one sun-dried tomato (from a jar) which somehow wandered into the train wreck. It all needed salt and I was relieved to receive a salt mill. I’ll give them a point for that.

The next course was roast Irish lamb rack with lamb sausage, black olive focaccia, violet artichoke and lamb gravy. I knew from the menu this would be problematic (gravy + meat + bread = no gravy, dry meat and soggy bread) so the first thing I did was to remove the focaccia layered between the cuts of lamb. Then I gazed suspiciously at the red-hued lamsworstje. It was a merguez sausage and for some strange reasons the chef felt that this detail wasn’t important enough to mention in the menu. One of the most disappointing experiences one can have in a restaurant involves being trapped by misleading menu descriptions... and after disappointment, follows anger, resignation and then acceptance of the fact that you will never regain full faith in the chef again. To his benefit, however, the gravy was well conceived.

And the front of house? Service began attentively but then dropped off to typical Dutch levels. In other words, utterly non-existent. Van de Kaart can be added to the pile of restaurants in this town which seem to operate successfully, but in reality care little for their patrons.