Yamazato is a traditional Japanese restaurant tucked on the ground floor of Amsterdam’s Hotel Okura. Zagat readers gave their nod to the restaurant as being one of the best Japanese restaurants in the whole of Europe– and being the Asian food snob that I am, I figured I had to find out for myself. It was Yamazato that introduced Kaiseki style cooking to Europe 30 years ago– and not far into our appetizers it was clear they knew exactly what they were doing. We enjoyed extremely fresh salmon sashimi, beautiful tofu dishes, exquisite sushi and some of the best rice I’ve had in months– it reminded me of the quality of food I experienced in my travel across Japan. The atmosphere was simple, the staff attentive and very knowledgeable. It’s no wonder Yamazato received a Michelin Star– and the property still remains the one and only traditional Japanese restaurant to receive this accolade across Europe. This place is not to be missed, delicious!

I touched down in Amsterdam late Saturday afternoon, welcomed by torrential downpours and incredibly overcast skies– just my luck! I used some of the evening catching up on emails in my hotel downtown before heading out to dinner at a fantastic world class restaurant called Beddingtons (review forthcoming). Of course as the evening progressed I was given the obligatory walking tour through the famous red light district, passed by dozens of coffee shops, casinos, sex shops, and so on. Earlier today to get out of the rain I made my way around the Vincent van Gogh Museum, awesome as expected. Some of this city (like most cities these days) are so over run with main-stream commercial properties it might as well have been Times Square in NYC–but the magical canals, winding streets and architecture I saw is what makes this place so special. It reminds me of Copenhagen, one of my favorite European cities. Word on the street is tomorrow is supposed to be beautiful– I sure hope so, I have a lot of exploring to do and this rain sucks!