Le Marais

The economic crisis has claimed another victim. Le Marais seems to have gone bankrupt and is no longer in business.

I have lived within a few hundred metres of French restaurant Le Marais for nearly three years and only got round to visiting last week. Despite its busy location between the hugely popular Amsterdam attractions Rembrandthuis and Waterlooplein Market, it seems to go largely unnoticed.

It was quiet in Le Marais when we arrived just after 7pm – not a good sign, was my first thought, even for a Tuesday evening. The interior lacked gezelligheid (roughly ‘cosiness’) – the grey tables, incongruous wicker wheels on the grey walls and enormous glass bowls filled with green apples on the windowsills looked like a page out of a home furnishings catalogue.

The restaurant’s chilly décor was compensated for by our attentive waitress who bathed us in the glow of her beaming smile, as she trotted back and forth all evening with our food and refills of the crisp Sauvignon Blanc house wine.

Image of French restaurant Le Marais main course
The menu is divided into à la carte (3 courses for €28.50), a weekly 3- or 4-course Chef’s Menu (€32.50) and a 2-course Theatre Menu (starter and main; or main and dessert + coffee/tea €25), served between 17.00-19.30.

R. opted for the 3-course Chef’s Menu, starting with a salad of duck confit, topped with a roll of creamy pink foie gras. I chose a slightly under-seasoned pasty (actually a small tureen covered with a ‘lid’ of puff pastry) from the à la carte menu, filled with monkfish, tender squid and fennel.

R.’s main of beef fillet – flown in from the US, according to the waitress – on a bed of asparagus was meltingly tender and drizzled in rich red wine sauce. My slab of sea bream was simply fried and accompanied by ragout, salty shards of pancetta and fragrant herb mashed potatoes, the latter the most unassuming but the most flavourful part of the dish.

Image of dessert at French restaurant Le Marais With bulging bellies, we dug into the desserts. We were paying for three courses, after all, and have fully embraced the Dutch mentality of getting value for money.

R. wrestled with another confit, this one of pineapple layered on yoghurt and sweet, sticky caramel. I picked at the lemon filling of a lemon tart (which could have had more zing), and a ball of fantastic sorbet bursting with red fruits.

On the very short stumble home, I concluded that I would go back to restaurant Le Marais for the food - and its proximity to my front door could make me overlook the interior.