&samhoud places**, Amsterdam (July 2017)

Last week we had a farewell lunch of my former boss. Luckily, she also is a fine dining aficionado, so we celebrated in style at &samhoud places**.

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UPDATE: The name of the restaurant changed to &Moshik early 2018.

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About &samhoud 
It is a collaboration between chef Moshik Roth and entrepreneur Salem Samhoud based on their belief that good food is a way of making the world a better place. To reach and inspire ‘the world’ the fine dining restaurant &samhoud places also functions as a kind of food innovation lab from which &samhoud food was launched: a retail product line with vegetarian/vegetable-based products varying from microwave meals, flatbread sandwiches, the fabulous tomato-based burger ‘Tomeato’ and most recently vegetable/fruit-based ice popsicles. However, the &samhoud emporium also encompasses management consultancy, media, and game development.

About the Restaurant, &samhoud places
Located on the Oosterdokskade, close to Amsterdam Central Station, &samhoud places opened in the fall of 2012 and had a lounge/bar downstairs and the fine dining restaurant upstairs overlooking the city center. The restaurant immediately received 2 Michelin Stars, which initially “tagged along” with Moshik Roth, one of the leading molecular chefs in the Netherlands. This step was merited by the achievements in his former restaurant ‘t Brouwerskolkje** in Overveen – which closed in the spring of 2012 – as there was insufficient time for a thorough review of &samhoud places. However, its 2 Michelin Star status was continued in 2013 and has been maintained since.

Chantal and I had dinner there with friends in the summer of 2013, and we were really blown away by the ingenious, contrasting and sometimes seemingly clashing flavors (white chocolate and caviar, anyone?) and I frequented the international street food-inspired lounge downstairs that was launched in 2014 a few times, so &samhoud places was on the “to-revisit” list for some time. When I got there, the street food lounge turned out to be transformed into the world’s first Virtual Reality cinema last year, obviously also a concept by &samhoud.

Luckily no changes in the restaurant: still intricate, delicious, and picture-perfect food and excellent service. As said, experiments and bold flavors aren’t shied away from, so this restaurant may not be for everybody. However, if you keep an open mind, you will definitely enjoy the culinary journey that Moshik Roth and his team will take you on! And that journey will take you all across the globe as the chef’s inspirations come from his many travels, and he combines those new flavors with high-quality products primarily from the Netherlands.

About the menu:
Besides the à la carte menu, the restaurant offers a 3-course lunch menu on Friday and Sunday only (€64,50) and the choice between a Small 4-course or a Large 8-course tasting menu, both available in a vegetarian (“flora”) and regular (“fauna”) version (Small/Large: €105/129,50 – €/169,50). We went for the small Flora and Fauna inspiration menus.

The food and drinks:
While pondering the choices within the various menu, some small nibbles were served to kick everything off. A black olive madeleine, a small cube of spiced jelly made from vegetable and fruit juices as well as a refreshing cold tea infused with Asian flavors, like pandan leaf, rice, and coconut.

Those and below appetizers paired very well with the fabulous 100% pinot noir-based Silver Brut “zero dosage” champagne by André Clouet and an elderberry mocktail that was quite spectacular:

Their staple, yet ever-changing, starter “The Perfect Egg” was also present. A slowly cooked egg (at 62°C for 1 hour and 15 minutes) this time topped with Ginger and Nutmeg foam and served with a butter-baked baton of brioche topped with sea urchin and herbs (obviously minus the sea urchin for the vegetarian version):

After this great start of the lunch, we were quite pleased that the table was pretty big as the first seafood course contained 5 different plates and 3 of us had chosen it.

“Kaiseki” is the name of a traditional Japanese set menu of select food served on individual trays. It also refers to the collection of skills and techniques that allow the preparation and showcase such meals and therefore is considered the Japanese equivalent of ‘haute cuisine’. Kaiseki cooking prescribes that dinner has (at least) 5 dishes with different cooking styles: an appetizer, sashimi, a simmered dish, a grilled dish, and a steamed dish. Here at &samhoud, the kaiseki concept was combined in 1 seafood course: Crab as an appetizer, Langoustine sashimi, simmered Razor Clams, grilled Scallops, and the cloche covered steamed Lobster. Very impressive!!

The other two opted for the vegetarian dish which had 2 “only” plates:

This third course was inspired by the art of French impressionist/cubist artist George Braque who did many works with birds in the 1950s and 60s. One of the other dishes – which wasn’t chosen by any of us – was inspired by Damian Hirst’s (many) early works with butterflies.

About 4 hours later, we finished this memorable lunch with coffees and an assortment of yummy sweets (chocolate truffles, passionfruit bonbons, eclairs, yuzu marshmallows, and madeleines) and ended up as extras in a TV shoot about the restaurant for which Moshik Roth was interviewed. As we were assured that it was only to be aired abroad, we complied…