Rotterdam cafes & restaurants

One of 66 Rotterdam Cafe & Restaurant reviews.

Recommendation: pop in for coffee, or try the Mockamore on Korte Hoogstraat.

In the summer, Staal is mostly about its large sun-trap terrace, which is popular despite the awful service we had on our first visit. This was something of a contrast to our next visit later in the year, when we sat inside. The interior is from the same dark wood, beige and cream school of design as Lloyds, but this time as a small cafe bar. On a quiet Tuesday afternoon there were few customers inside downstairs, good service and funky music that provided a rather pleasant backdrop to the window-table views of shoppers dashing across Beursplein.

By the end of October we had almost forgotten the terrible service on the huge terrace in the middle of the summer, which rather spoilt Rotterdam's best sun-trap. So, it was time to have a look inside. The interior is from the same dark wood, beige and cream school of design as Lloyds, but this time as a small cafe bar. There is a separate restaurant upstairs, which you cannot help but be curious about with so many of the staff coming and going between the two, via the cafe's front door.

On a quiet Tuesday afternoon there were few customers, good service and funky music that provided a rather pleasant backdrop to the window-table views of shoppers dashing across Beursplein.

This time around, then, Staal turns out to be a good place for afternoon coffee, so perhaps it is worth coming back to investigate lunch, or the live music at 3 p.m. on Sundays.

On our last visit, the downstairs cafe was closed, so we went upstairs for a coffee in the much larger first-floor cafe-restaurant, which opens on to the foyer of the World Trade Center. At the end of a Saturday afternoon this was a varied mix of chattering shoppers and couples, instead of the WTC suits that inhabit the place on weekday early evenings.

The decor is not as nice upstairs; too many clashing light-brown colours and too little contrast, combined with the random furniture layout, conflict with the otherwise strict modern style. The end result is a strange atmosphere that does not feel quite right. The area around the bar is better, though, making this a good place for after-work drinks.