Rotterdam cafes & restaurants

One of 66 Rotterdam Cafe & Restaurant reviews.

Recommendation: go for dinner and order fish, with port and cheese to follow.

Good for: food - traditional Dutch dinners

De Pijp is a small restaurant that opened in 1898. As well as being old, it is relatively quiet, and has a pleasant atmosphere. The blackboard menu has a surprisingly large selection of traditional fare, which almost makes up for Heineken being the only beer. Still, the house red wine is pretty good.

The food is excellent - quite refined in fact. The menu has lots of choice of traditional Dutch dishes, with a good selection of fish. We prefer the meat dishes, though, which seem to go better with the rich sauces and sautéed potatoes: favourites are the duck in port sauce and the wild boar stew.

The service is slightly French in the sense that sometimes you get what you are given, rather than what you actually wanted, and you order when the staff are ready, not when you are. This generally is not too much of a problem, as long as you know what to expect, but it did spoil one previous visit with a group. You could try complaining, but it will turn out to be all your fault.

Peculiarity: this place is Very Old, and has an extensive tie collection from its student fraternity connection.