Destinations Archives - Page 3 of 3

Mauritshuis Museum, The Hague

It might seem a bit self-indulgent to fly all the way to Holland to go to a museum, but the Mauritshuis in The Hague (Den Haag in Dutch) is worth it.

It is home to some of the greatest masterpieces of Dutch painting in the world, including Vermeer’s Girl with a Pearl Earring and the View of Delft (which ripples with light and texture on canvas but defies reproduction). I loved the way that Vermeer’s girl catches your eye across the room. “Don’t look at that painting of a Goldfinch,” she says. “Look at me.” Michiel Sweert’s eyes down, demure painting of a young maid is the perfect companion.

When I visited there was also an exhibition of Dutch portraiture which had displaced much of the permanent collection. I was delighted to see it, however, because I had missed it in London, despite buying tickets in advance and generally intending to go for weeks on end. This exhibition ends on 13th January 2008 so I just caught it.

Besides the Vermeers, there are some world-famous paintings – some Rembrandt’s The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Tulp or Fabritius’s Goldfinch, for example – but the less familiar (but equally noteworthy) paintings are not ashamed in their company. I enjoyed them more because of the joy of discovering something beautiful for the first time. Who knew that paintings of church interiors or people skating on the ice could be so enchanting?

It is a compact museum. The basement contains the obligatory shop and cafe and there are just two floors of exhibitions. With so little space, every painting has to be a masterpiece and they don’t disappoint.

The museum doesn’t overwhelm. The modest scale of the rooms and the well-judged organisation of the paintings mean that you can go to the Mauritshuis and emerge a couple of hours later without feeling like you’ve run a cultural marathon (as at, say, the Louvre or the Met in New York). It’s art without the pain barrier.

Information

Website: www.mauritshuis.nl

Address: Korte Vijverberg 8, The Hague

Opening times: Tuesday to Saturday 10am-5pm, Sundays and holidays 11am-5pm

Admission: €9.50

Nearest airport: Rotterdam

Parkheuvel Restaurant

I fly from a small airfield, Denham, in Northwest London. Because it is sandwiched between Luton and Heathrow airspace, it is always a challenge to gain altitude and join airways quickly. On the day of our trip to Parkheuvel, I was lucky. A friendly controller let me begin the climb within minutes of take off and we quickly reached 8,000 feet over North London. The view over the city was crystal clear. The flight to Rotterdam was over quickly and we taxied up to KLM’s smart private aviation terminal. A taxi was already waiting and we went from the plane to the car in under five minutes.

I had been looking forward to visiting Parkheuvel for a long time. It is one of just three restaurants in Holland to have three Michelin stars. Unfortunately, the restaurant didn’t live up to the occasion or its reputation.

The food – lobster salad and sea bass for me – was well cooked. The location was charming: a modern building on the strand between a park and the river Maas. But Parkheuvel was badly let down by the service, which was slow and absent-minded. For example, the pre-starters were delivered without the cutlery to eat them and the coffees we ordered never appeared. We may have caught them on an off day as the place had changed hands a few weeks before our visit. However, if it wants to keep the three stars of a world-class restaurant, the new owner, Erik van Loo, will have to get a grip.

Contact information

Parkheuvel
Heuvellaan 21
Rotterdam
The Netherlands

Tel. +31 (0)10 436 0766

Fax. +31 (0)10 43 67 140

E-Mail: info@parkheuvel.nl

www.parkheuvel.nl

Important information

Lunch & dinner
Monday-Friday
12.00-14.30 and 18.30-22.00
Saturday
18.30-22.00
Closed on Sundays

Nearest Airport

Rotterdam (10km, 15 minutes by car)

Nearby Towns

Rotterdam
The Hague (Den Haag)

Rick Stein’s Seafood Restaurant

Welcome to Padstein

The view looks like it has come straight from a tourist brochure. Driving down the steep hill, the estuary shines in the sunlight and Padstow reveals itself as a working Cornish fishing village. Stepping out of the taxi onto the quay the salt smell of the sea, the cries of the gulls and the postcard-perfect vista form the backdrop for one of Britain’s best-known restaurants. Welcome to Rick Stein’s Seafood Restaurant.

Rick Stein came to Padstow 28 years ago, when he bought a rundown nightclub and turned it into waterside bistro. Initially the cooking used only the catch of the day from local fishermen but it soon began to benefit from Stein’s exotic travels for the BBC. He started to create new dishes that embodied cooking techniques and spices from around the world. Nowadays, he also casts a wider net for ingredients, using produce from many parts of the British Isles such as oysters from Colchester, wild smoked salmon from County Cork, and langoustine from Scotland.

As his fame has grown, thanks in part to the success of his restaurants and in part because of his TV appearances, so his Padstow empire has grown. Some locals joke that the place should now be called Padstein. There are three restaurants, a patisserie, a deli, accommodation in four separate buildings and even a fish and chip shop but the Seafood Restaurant is the flagship and the best.

The white-painted dining room is light and airy. Like white bone china it provides the perfect backdrop for the varied colours, textures and flavours on Stein’s bold menu.

Is there another restaurant in Britain that would serve monkfish vindaloo? We doubt it. Luckily, it’s not fiery like a curry house vindaloo and the spot-on spicing makes it work. Stuart’s favourite. Likewise, the stir-fried mussels with black beans, garlic, ginger, coriander and spring onions expose a different inspiration but the same finesse. His signature dish is grilled scallops with hazelnut and coriander butter. Just the thing to reanimate a palate jaded by too much airport coffee and too many in-flight mints.

Alternatively, there’s a five-course tasting menu. This is an aquatic adventure currently involving grilled scallops, Loch Duart gravadlax, fish and shellfish soup, fillet of hake with sauce verte and Spanish butter beans, followed by passion fruit pavlova.

In this temple of seafood, carnivorous blasphemers can choose a steak and there are usually veggie starters on the menu that can be supersized for a main course. The restaurant advises habitual vegetarians to phone ahead; presumably so that the chef can take a mogadon and prepare something suitable.

The wine list is small but well chosen to fit most tastes. A three-course meal for two people and a bottle of house wine will set you back about £100.

The Seafood Restaurant does exactly what it says on the tin. Good fish, well-cooked, with enough imagination and flavour to set it apart from your neighbourhood joint (and justify the price). All circumstance and no pomp, it’s worth the air miles.

Still wondering “Where can I get the best king crab near me?” Check out ilovecrabs.com.

La Rive

When it’s spring again…

la_rive2 The best restaurants are like an orchestra. When all the sections are working together harmoniously, something transcendent happens. La Rive with its two Michelin stars, in Amsterdam, is just such a place.

Take, for example, the coffee service. In most restaurants this is a chance for the staff to kick back and relax. Not here. The maitre d’ who looked like a conductor in a perfectly-fitting white tie and tails brought our bill and asked, innocently, if we would like another coffee. One nod from us and another waiter instantly appeared with a second tray of coffees, as if carrying a Stradivarius. "I had these ready for you, sir, just in case you wanted them".

la_rive1 The light, wood panelled dining room overlooks the Amstel River, with ducks diving in and out of the water a few feet from our table, the whole scene making a relaxed and elegant frame for a great dining experience.

But service and setting are nothing if the food is poor. The amuse bouche consisted of four different delicacies. Our favourite: the tiny ‘pizza’ served on a crisp, very thin biscuit that had been sautéed in butter, topped with sun-dried tomato, capers and herbs.

la_rive3 To start, Stuart had a cream of Belle de Fontenay potato soup with a guinea fowl oyster, truffle and poultry jus. Superb. Mathew’s palette of pureed vegetables with a beautifully sculpted, tiny goat cheese club sandwich with tomato and quail’s egg was equally sublime.

For the main course, we both chose brill poached on the bone and served with green asparagus, Belon oysters, dried tomato and champagne beurre blanc. The fish was cooked to perfection, flaky and moist, the flavour blending with the sauce.

The restaurant was quiet. Two or three other tables were occupied. We heard appreciative mutterings in French, Spanish, English and Dutch. The entire staff seemed unfazed by the polyglot dining room and switched languages seamlessly as they glided from table to table.

It’s tempting to think that the Dutch speak such fluent English as a special favour to us. They don’t. They’re just really good at languages. Matthew’s father, a Dutchman, spoke five languages to interpreter level. Matthew, thanks to the finest English education, can read Latin inscriptions and, in an emergency, can find a French aunt’s pen.

la_rive4 The flight to Amsterdam Schiphol was an exciting low-level run across the channel and the Dunkirk Beaches and northwards across Belgium and Holland at 1500 feet to keep out of controlled airspace. For light aircraft pilots, flying into a major international airport like Schiphol is a rare challenge. However, the visual approach is a hair-raising lunge across hangers at about 500 feet followed by a semi-aerobatic turn onto the runway at the very last moment. (“A perfect threshold arrival,” said the laconic tower controller as Matthew pulled it off, but he didn’t see me sweating). Just what you need to work up an appetite. It’s just as well that they don’t hit you with the £140+ landing fee until you get back from lunch.

On the flight back to reality, or Denham Aerodrome as it is also known, Stuart told us a story. After a meal at one of his favourite haunts, Dieter the headwaiter trumped his parting jest with a line fit for a monument: “Doctor, you have just had a glimpse of perfection in an imperfect world.” So it was, and is, at La Rive.