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Restaurants
- Neil A. Chef added a new meal Dinner at Restaurant Jordnær at Restaurant Jordnær
The Scandinavia tour rolled on last night with dinner at @restaurantjordnaer — and once again, it was an absolutely fantastic evening.
Tina ran the dining room with that brilliantly relaxed, friendly style of service that makes everything feel effortless, while still being completely on top of every tiny detail. Flawless without ever feeling... More
The Scandinavia tour rolled on last night with dinner at @restaurantjordnaer — and once again, it was an absolutely fantastic evening.
Tina ran the dining room with that brilliantly relaxed, friendly style of service that makes everything feel effortless, while still being completely on top of every tiny detail. Flawless without ever feeling formal or stiff.
And then, of course, there’s Eric’s cooking. Seafood has always been at the heart of Jordnær, and I honestly think the menu last night was as good as I’ve ever had there. Beautiful produce, incredibly precise cooking and dish after dish that reminded me exactly why this is such a special restaurant.
We all went for the wine pairing, everyone had a great time, and by the end of the evening there was two very happy tables.
Another seriously good dinner on what is turning into a hell of a Scandinavia tour.
Jordnær remains one of those places I’m always genuinely excited to return to — and I already can’t wait to go back.
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Michelin — ⭐️⭐️⭐️
The Best Chef Awards — 🔪🔪🔪
OAD Europe — No. 9 (2025)
World’s 50 Best — No. 56 (2025)
La Liste — 99/100 (2026)
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#Jordnær #CopenhagenFood #MichelinGuide #ScandinaviaTour #Achefabroad Less
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- Neil A. Chef added a new meal Dinner at Maaemo at Maaemo
Meal number two on the Best of Scandinavia tour last night, and after Frantzén the evening before, @maaemo had a pretty serious act to follow.
Chef-owner Esben Holmboe Bang opened Maaemo in Oslo in 2010. It gained two Michelin stars in 2012 and, in 2016, became the first restaurant in Norway to be awarded three. The restaurant moved to... More
Meal number two on the Best of Scandinavia tour last night, and after Frantzén the evening before, @maaemo had a pretty serious act to follow.
Chef-owner Esben Holmboe Bang opened Maaemo in Oslo in 2010. It gained two Michelin stars in 2012 and, in 2016, became the first restaurant in Norway to be awarded three. The restaurant moved to its current home in Bjørvika in 2020.
The dining room is stunning. Huge, dramatic, beautifully lit, with an open kitchen and artwork throughout. One of the most striking features is the wall of hanging wool at the back of the room, made from offcuts left over from the production of Norway’s traditional bunad folk costumes. A brilliant detail and very much in keeping with Maaemo’s identity.
Despite the scale of the room, the service was warm, friendly and completely relaxed from start to finish.
The food was exceptional. Esben’s cooking is deeply rooted in Norway and its produce, but never feels forced. The langoustine was probably my standout dish of the night — absolutely superb.
And a special mention for the wine list. We drank exceptionally well by the bottle, with some seriously good choices and very fair pricing for this level of restaurant.
After such a brilliant first night at Frantzén, I genuinely wondered whether anything could follow it.
Maaemo was right up there.
Two meals into the tour and the standard is incredibly.
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Michelin: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Best Chef Awards: 🔪🔪
OAD Europe: 33
World’s 50 Best: 35 previously
La Liste: 95.00
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#maaemo #oslofineding #norwaydining #Michelin #FineDining Less
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- Neil A. Chef added a new meal Dinner at Frantzén at Restaurant Frantzén
The Best of Scandinavia tour kicked off yesterday in Stockholm, on a perfect sunny day, with dinner at @restaurantfrantzen .
My first visit to Frantzén was more than ten years ago, back when it was still in its original Old Town location, and I’ve been going regularly ever since. I’ve been very lucky to watch it evolve over the years... More
The Best of Scandinavia tour kicked off yesterday in Stockholm, on a perfect sunny day, with dinner at @restaurantfrantzen .
My first visit to Frantzén was more than ten years ago, back when it was still in its original Old Town location, and I’ve been going regularly ever since. I’ve been very lucky to watch it evolve over the years into the genuinely world-class restaurant it is today, so it’s always special to come back — especially with a group.
This visit was a little different.
Our entire evening was spent in Frantzén’s Test Kitchen, a private area on a separate floor from the main restaurant. It consists of a lounge, where we started with Champagne, snacks and vinyl playing, and an adjoining dining room with its own open kitchen.
When it isn’t being used for private guests, this is where @bjornfrantzen , @charliebenitez and the rest of the team work on menu development, so it felt like a particularly special way to experience the restaurant.
We then moved through to the dining room, where a dedicated team of Frantzén chefs cooked the entire meal right beside our table.
And the food was sensational.
I’ve always eaten incredibly well here, but I honestly think this may have been the best meal I’ve had at Frantzén. Dish after dish felt sharper, more exciting and more complete than on any of my previous visits. Properly spectacular cooking.
We skipped the full wine pairing and picked bottles from the list instead, including a 1958 Barolo that was in remarkably good condition. Opening something that old, still drinking beautifully, always feels pretty special.
It was about as strong a start to the tour as I could have hoped for.
Today we leave Stockholm and head to Oslo.
Tonight: Maaemo.
⭐ Michelin: 3 Stars
🔪 Best Chef Awards: Three Knives
🍽 OAD Europe: 2 (2025)
🌍 World’s 50 Best: 38 (2025)
🇫🇷 La Liste: 99/100
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- Neil A. Chef added a new meal Dinner at Blue Lagoon Iceland at Lava
A couple of weeks ago, after DILL and ÓX, I headed out of Reykjavík to Moss at The Retreat at Blue Lagoon.
The setting is ridiculous. The restaurant sits high above the resort, looking straight across the black lava fields, and visually it’s hard to think of many dining rooms that feel more Icelandic.
Unfortunately, for me, the restaurant itself... More
A couple of weeks ago, after DILL and ÓX, I headed out of Reykjavík to Moss at The Retreat at Blue Lagoon.
The setting is ridiculous. The restaurant sits high above the resort, looking straight across the black lava fields, and visually it’s hard to think of many dining rooms that feel more Icelandic.
Unfortunately, for me, the restaurant itself was a bit of an also-ran compared with the others I visited.
Moss is led by Icelandic chef Aggi Sverrisson, who previously ran the Michelin-starred Texture in London. And perhaps that explains why the word “texture” seemed to make an appearance at least twice during the introduction to almost every dish. After a while I started waiting for it.
The food was beautifully plated — precise, polished and technically accomplished — but I found it all a little safe. It felt very much like a luxury hotel restaurant: nothing particularly wrong with it, but very little that surprised or excited me either.
Service was perfectly pleasant but similarly polished to the point of feeling slightly robotic. Everything happened when it should, everything was explained, but there wasn’t much warmth or personality behind it.
Maybe Moss suffered from where it landed in my Iceland trip. Coming straight after DILL and ÓX, both of which had far more personality and a much stronger sense of identity, it had a hell of a job following them.
There’s no denying the beauty of the place, though. Moss sits inside one of the most extraordinary landscapes in Iceland, and the plates certainly looked the part. I just wanted the cooking to have a little more edge, individuality and excitement.
Very pretty. Very precise. Very “texture”.
Just not particularly memorable.
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Michelin - ⭐️
Best Chef Awards -
OAD - 518 (2025)
W50B -
La Liste -
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#Moss #BlueLagoon #Iceland #FineDining #MichelinStar Less
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- Neil A. Chef added a new meal Dinner at DILL Restaurant Reykjavik at Dill
Continuing my Iceland trip, next up was @dillrestaurant DILL in Reykjavík — probably the best-known name in Icelandic fine dining and certainly one of the restaurants that helped put the country on the Michelin map.
DILL opened in 2009 and made history in 2017 when it became the first restaurant in Iceland to receive a Michelin star.... More
Continuing my Iceland trip, next up was @dillrestaurant DILL in Reykjavík — probably the best-known name in Icelandic fine dining and certainly one of the restaurants that helped put the country on the Michelin map.
DILL opened in 2009 and made history in 2017 when it became the first restaurant in Iceland to receive a Michelin star. It holds one star today, and also held a Michelin Green Star until Michelin began phasing that distinction out this year.
I sat at the counter overlooking the open kitchen, which is always where I want to be if there’s a choice. DILL is a busy restaurant with plenty going on, but the service was warm, relaxed and genuinely friendly throughout.
The cooking is very much rooted in Iceland — local fish, meat, vegetables, preservation, fermentation and a real focus on using ingredients properly and wasting as little as possible.
I enjoyed the whole menu, and sitting at the counter made it even better being able to watch the kitchen work through service.
A really enjoyable dinner and an important restaurant in the story of modern Icelandic food. Very glad I finally made it there.
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Michelin - ⭐️
Best Chef Awards -
OAD - 492
W50B - Discovery
La Liste - 77.50
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#DILL #Reykjavik #Iceland #Achefabroad Less
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After Svalbard I flew back to Oslo, then on to Reykjavík, where I based myself for a week — partly to catch up on some admin, but mainly to visit a few restaurants.
My targets were DILL, @ox.reykjavik ÓX and Moss at the Blue Lagoon, and ÓX was comfortably the highlight.
The evening starts in Amma Don, a wonderfully cosy retro lounge... More
After Svalbard I flew back to Oslo, then on to Reykjavík, where I based myself for a week — partly to catch up on some admin, but mainly to visit a few restaurants.
My targets were DILL, @ox.reykjavik ÓX and Moss at the Blue Lagoon, and ÓX was comfortably the highlight.
The evening starts in Amma Don, a wonderfully cosy retro lounge inspired by the homes of chef Thráinn Freyr Vigfússon’s grandmothers. I was dining alone, but you’re immediately brought together with the other guests around various communal tables for Champagne and the first snacks.
Then you move through a hidden doorway into the restaurant itself: a horseshoe-shaped counter wrapped around the finishing kitchen.
What impressed me most was the style of service. The whole team were incredibly knowledgeable and professional, but also completely relaxed, confident and genuinely funny. Nothing felt rehearsed or stiff. It just flowed.
And the food was delicious.
ÓX currently holds one Michelin star and did hold a Michelin Green Star, with the menu rooted heavily in Icelandic ingredients and traditions, but presented in a very modern way.
I enjoyed it so much that I actually tried to book again for the following night. They were full, which was probably for the best for my bank balance.
But this is genuinely one of those restaurants I would fly back to Iceland just to eat at again.
Of everything I ate during that week in Reykjavík, ÓX was the one that really stayed with me.
Highly recommended.
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Michelin - ⭐️
Best Chef Awards -
OAD -
W50B -
La Liste -
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#OX #Reykjavik #Iceland #MichelinStar #FineDining Less
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- Neil A. Chef added a new meal Dinner at Huset Restaurant at Huset
A few weeks ago I flew from Oslo to Svalbard to visit Huset, often described as the world’s northernmost fine-dining restaurant.
Svalbard itself is extraordinary. At this time of year there’s 24-hour daylight, which does strange things to your brain. Walking home after dinner around midnight in broad daylight felt completely wrong. Beautiful, but... More
A few weeks ago I flew from Oslo to Svalbard to visit Huset, often described as the world’s northernmost fine-dining restaurant.
Svalbard itself is extraordinary. At this time of year there’s 24-hour daylight, which does strange things to your brain. Walking home after dinner around midnight in broad daylight felt completely wrong. Beautiful, but weird. I’m not sure I could ever get used to it.
I’d love to return in winter. Summer is stark and barren, but I can imagine the polar night, snow and getting around by snowmobile making the whole experience even more surreal.
Huset sits just outside Longyearbyen, a town named after American businessman John Munro Longyear, whose Arctic Coal Company established mining operations here in the early 1900s.
The building dates from 1951 and was originally created by Store Norske as a communal meeting place for miners and company officials. Over the years it has had all sorts of uses — including a café, school, church and cinema — before becoming what it is today.
As for dinner? I’m glad I went, although the restaurant itself wasn’t really the highlight.
There were some genuinely interesting tastes to begin with — cured meats, seal and local seabirds among them — things I’d never eaten before and exactly the sort of flavours you hope to encounter somewhere this remote.
The main tasting menu was more underwhelming and the service wasn’t particularly polished. In fairness, running a serious restaurant at 78° North must bring challenges most restaurants never have to think about.
The real revelation was downstairs.
Huset has an incredible wine cellar, with some surprisingly good-value bottles hidden away. Friends had told me to go down and look properly rather than just order from the list, and they were right. I managed to find a real bargain.
Would I fly to Svalbard purely for dinner at Huset? Probably not.
Would I recommend Svalbard itself — one of the strangest settlements on Earth, unusual local ingredients and a great bottle from a ridiculous cellar at 78° North?
Absolutely. I’m very glad I went.
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- Neil A. Chef added a new meal Dinner at Restaurante Elkano at Elkano
Back in May, I brought 14 guests to @elkano_jatetxea in Getaria, just along the coast from San Sebastián, as part of my Basque Country tour.
Elkano is world-famous for its whole grilled turbot, and rightly so. It’s one of those restaurants where the apparent simplicity of the cooking hides an extraordinary depth of knowledge. The restaurant... More
Back in May, I brought 14 guests to @elkano_jatetxea in Getaria, just along the coast from San Sebastián, as part of my Basque Country tour.
Elkano is world-famous for its whole grilled turbot, and rightly so. It’s one of those restaurants where the apparent simplicity of the cooking hides an extraordinary depth of knowledge. The restaurant has been in the Arregi family since 1964, and today it is run by Aitor Arregi, who is very much part of the theatre of eating here. He’s not simply serving you a fish; he’s teaching you about it.
When the turbot arrives at the table, Aitor takes it apart piece by piece. First the beautiful fillets, then the belly, collar and cheek, before he starts working his way into the head and around the spine, showing you all these tiny pockets of meat, fat and collagen that most people would never even know existed. Some of the smallest morsels are among the most intensely flavoured parts of the entire fish.
Then comes one of my favourite bits. He removes a tiny bone they call the “hueso de la virgen”, holds it over the light from an iPhone and shows you the rings running through it. Much like the rings of a tree, they give clues to the life of the fish and how well it has been feeding. It’s a brilliant little demonstration of just how obsessive the knowledge is here.
We deliberately visited at this time of year because the turbot is in superb condition, feeding heavily in the Cantabrian waters, and the fish we ate were sensational.
And it isn’t only about turbot. The Txuleta coming off the grill is seriously good too, and throughout lunch our guests could head outside and stand beside the famous grills, watching the team work over the coals as turbots, steaks and other ingredients from the day’s catch were cooked in front of them.
Add some very good bottles of wine and 16 extremely happy guests, and it was exactly the sort of lunch I love putting into these tours.
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Michelin - ⭐️
Best Chef Awards - 🔪
OAD - 4 (casual list)
W50B - 24
La Liste - 92.00
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#Elkano #Getaria #BasqueCountry #SanSebastian #Turbot Less
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- Neil A. Chef added a new meal Dinner at Meta Restaurant at Meta
@metasingapore Singapore 🇸🇬
Another restaurant I’d wanted to get to for a while, and it absolutely delivered.
Meta is the restaurant of Korean chef @sunkimchi Sun Kim, whose cooking takes the flavours and memories of Korea and presents them in a very polished, contemporary way. There’s plenty of technique in there, but... More
@metasingapore Singapore 🇸🇬
Another restaurant I’d wanted to get to for a while, and it absolutely delivered.
Meta is the restaurant of Korean chef @sunkimchi Sun Kim, whose cooking takes the flavours and memories of Korea and presents them in a very polished, contemporary way. There’s plenty of technique in there, but nothing ever felt overworked. The food was clean, precise and beautifully balanced, with some seriously deep flavours running through the menu.
Sun Kim grew up around his mother’s gamja-tang restaurant in Korea before eventually training with Tetsuya Wakuda in Sydney and later at Waku Ghin in Singapore. You can see that mix of influences in the food, but Meta still feels very much like his own thing.
I really enjoyed the restraint of it. Beautiful produce, particularly the seafood, subtle Korean flavours and a menu that felt coherent from start to finish rather than just a succession of technically impressive plates.
Singapore has an absurdly strong restaurant and bar scene, and Meta is another very good reason to keep coming back.
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Michelin - ⭐️⭐️
Best Chef Awards - 🔪🔪
OAD - 43 (Asia list)
Asia’s 50 Best - 77
La Liste - 91.00
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#MetaSingapore #MetaRestaurant #SunKim #SingaporeFood #Achefabroad Less
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- Neil A. Chef added a new meal Dinner at Pangium at Pangium
Lunch at @pangiumsg Pangium, Singapore 🇸🇬
One of those restaurants where the setting grabs you before you’ve even eaten anything.
Pangium sits within The Orangery in the Gallop Extension of the Singapore Botanic Gardens, surrounded by lush tropical gardens and some beautiful old colonial architecture. Just next door are the historic... More
Lunch at @pangiumsg Pangium, Singapore 🇸🇬
One of those restaurants where the setting grabs you before you’ve even eaten anything.
Pangium sits within The Orangery in the Gallop Extension of the Singapore Botanic Gardens, surrounded by lush tropical gardens and some beautiful old colonial architecture. Just next door are the historic Atbara and Inverturret houses, which were once the French Embassy and the French ambassador’s residence — so I wasn’t imagining the French connection after all.
The restaurant itself has sweeping views across the gardens, and for lunch it’s a particularly lovely place to spend a few hours.
Chef-owner Malcolm Lee explores Straits and Peranakan cuisine through a contemporary lens, digging into old recipes, traditions and flavours from across the region rather than simply trying to modernise things for the sake of it.
And most importantly, the food was excellent.
There’s a real sense of place to the cooking — deep, familiar Southeast Asian flavours, plenty of complexity, but still dishes you actually want to eat rather than just admire.
Pangium currently holds one Michelin star, and for me it was one of those lunches where the whole thing worked: the journey through the gardens, the extraordinary location, the room, and some seriously good food.
Definitely somewhere I’d return to.
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Michelin - ⭐️
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#Pangium #Singapore #SingaporeFood #SingaporeRestaurants #MichelinStar Less
