Went to Noma recently last week. Unfortunately the food was a letdown and by the end we were left confused. Service was spectacular.
I'm curious on your opinions on our experience.
First 4 courses were crab, first raw, then with jelly, then a crab head with unspectacular juice inside, then "soft shell" (I joked that we must have accidentally arrived at Joe's crab shack). The vast majority of the 14 dishes were underwhelming. After the crab, the next three or so consisted of seaweed which felt very repetitive. The flavors of rose, horseradish, and yuzu kept coming back multiple times. If you’re not a fan of one of those flavors, you’d already dislike 3-4 dishes.
The scallop dish and the cooked cod were incredible, though, nothing I've haven't had before.
I've heard the food here is more about "philosophy" than the taste but, none of the dishes when presented had an explanation around this or their inspiration (or even about how perhaps the food came from the garden etc.). Since Noma is known for its creative approach, it would have been nice to get more context beyond just the ingredients. Some storytelling would have made the experience more engaging.
Wines were great individually but I'm not sure that they elevated they majority of the flavors.
As stated, service was impeccable. We felt relaxed and had an excellent time thanks to this and the great environment but, the food was simply a disappointment.
We were quite surprised after our dozens of Michelin star restaurant experiences among us. Two of us still hungry after. There was unfortunately zero flavor combinations that I felt were memorable.
Have shared some pictures (not all courses shown).
Would be great to hear your thoughts!
by Potential_Plum_6681
12 Comments
That looks very underwhelming compared to when we went last year.
Thanks for the review. That makes me feel better about not getting a reservation.
We dined at Noma in February 2024. While the service was impeccable, the food itself didn’t live up to our expectations. Visiting felt like a pilgrimage of sorts due to Noma’s contribution to New Nordic cuisine. However, we’ve enjoyed more impressive dining experiences elsewhere. For us, Noma doesn’t rank among our top ten restaurants.
The starfish does not look happy… Lord Farquaad is about to eat him!
Everything I’ve seen on here recently about Noma looks quite…sad. It really does feel like it’s become a bit Emperor’s New Clothes.
He says, having never been.
Those pictures don’t look great. I’m surprised. I went to Ocean season last year. I guess it’s good that there doesn’t appear to be any repeat dishes, but I felt ours were all visually and technically stunning. The food all tasted good, though definitely more experimental than comfort oriented.
What is the second to last picture? Can’t tell if it’s spoiled and saggy shirako or the sloppiest Mont Blanc I’ve ever seen. Surprised to see no oyster dessert figured that was a sort of signature at this point
The people who routinely criticise the likes of Le Bernardin for ‘boring’ or ‘unappealing’ plating should check out pictures 4 and 9, amongst others. The latter looks genuinely gross to me.
‘rose, horseradish, and yuzu’…not exactly the most appealing trio, IMO.
There was someone asking before if Noma was worth it on a thread here; $700+ for this? I wouldn’t pay half that, personally, especially with the rigmarole of snagging a reservation.
I think that when you try to evolve constantly there’s gonna be some hit and some misses, they just came back from Tokyo, they are trying stuff, wouldn’t say it’s that unexpected that sometimes the meal is not on point.
My two cents about the philosophy, its not always straightforward, sometimes you’re the one supposed to learn about the restaurant, the chef, the etiquette and so on, it’s part of the fun. Follow couple of their socials, get in the email list, if you want watch their documentary or read a book. You’ll see for example that one of their ideas is to produce a cuisine that is to a certain extent possible to replicate at home (that’s why every season they develop condiments like the yuzu or rose one, the mushroom garum etc, that you can buy and use).
Also I’d like to add that ugly looking, weird textured food is definitely a trend in their world (look at Mugaritz).
I agree the experience could be weird or underwhelming, but I think is just a about your expectations. If you go informed, if you’ll definitely be able to enjoy it more. I disagree it’s a temple to Nordic Cuisine and you go just because it meant something. Redzepi is still a role model for so so many young chefs, and also not so young anymor. Check the documentary of Muñoz and in the episode he goes to eat in Tokyo at Noma you can see how he looks at Redzepi and how jealous he is of his freedom and joy in what he does. He is one of a little few in the world that follow literally his own project without caring about prizes or accolades and that offers an experience that changes continuously.
We went during vegetable season and were warned by friends it will be a let down taste wise and its not normal food. Like OP said service was impeccable and it was amazing to get the tour. Some dishes were amazing and some were just just okay and it felt more like an experiment in food than fine dining. Happy we went but definitely enjoyed many restaurants more than Noma.
Disappointing but unsurprising. Went to the vegetable season last year, and it just feels like noma are dialling it in now, when what they really want to do is tour the world doing pop-ups.
What in tarnation is pic # 9????