Anyone who has experienced the orange chaos of the massive street party that is Queen’s Day will understand the joy I felt when I stumbled across Amsterdam restaurant Ristorante Teatro. Not only was it open, it was serving a full menu – almost impossible to find on April 30 – and there was no queue for the toilet.

Ristorante Teatro has an almost Moorish interior, with its bright red and yellow walls, tiled panels, a stone floor and dark wooden tables. The menu, as the Amsterdam restaurant’s name implies, is all Italian.

We started with antipasto misto for two that just kept going. Plate after plate arrived filled with vitello tonnato, omelette triangles with sundried tomatoes, creamy mozzarella with sun-blushed tomatoes, cured ham and wafer-thin slices of purple-edged octopus on a bed of crunchy celery sticks. It was a lovely, although slightly under-seasoned, beginning.

In comparison, the main dishes were small. My linguine with monkfish with more sun-blushed tomatoes was bursting with flavour, but would have benefited from more fish and less tomatoes. R.’s home-made ravioli filled with braised beef, served in rich tomato sauce with crumbled parmesan heaped on one side of the plate, however, was spot on.

Washed down with several glasses of good Montepulciano d’Abruzzo, the only red wine available by the glass, it was one of the best Queen’s Day meals I’ve had.

Service was slow, even though only three tables were occupied. But when you have been pounding crowded streets all day, just having somewhere to sit down takes higher priority.

I hope it was worthwhile for Ristorante Teatro to open on Queen’s Day. If it is open again next year, the Amsterdam restaurant can count on me being back.

Restaurant info

Opening hours:
Mon-Sat 17.30-23.00

Price indication:

Our rating:

Address: Kadijksplein 16
City: Amsterdam
Telephone: 020 623 6313
Web: go directly to homepage

eat amsterdam