Restaurant in Amsterdam, Netherlands
Worth booking for occasions, not casual nights.
EN holds a Michelin Plate for 2024 and 2025 and scores 4.7 across nearly 500 Google reviews — making it one of Amsterdam's more credible Japanese addresses at the €€€ tier. Booking is easy compared to the city's starred rooms. The right call for a date dinner or celebration where you want recognised quality without the full fine-dining outlay.
EN at Dusartstraat 53 in Amsterdam's De Pijp neighbourhood holds a Michelin Plate for both 2024 and 2025, which signals consistent quality without the price ceiling of a starred room. At €€€ pricing, it sits in a sensible bracket for Japanese cuisine in the city — more serious than the midrange options around Leidseplein, less demanding than a full omakase commitment. If you are planning a date dinner or a small celebration and want Japanese cooking with some critical recognition behind it, EN is worth your time. If you are looking for the deepest omakase format in the Netherlands, you may need to look further afield.
EN occupies a ground-floor address in De Pijp, one of Amsterdam's denser residential districts, with a dining scene that skews neighbourhood-local rather than tourist-facing. That positioning matters: the room is not designed for passing trade, which tends to concentrate the guest list and keep the atmosphere more considered than venues closer to the canal belt.
Japanese cooking at the €€€ level in Amsterdam tends to fall into two camps: sushi-led operations with a broad menu, and tighter, more composed kitchens where the format drives the experience. EN's Michelin Plate recognition across two consecutive years suggests the kitchen is in the second camp , consistent, focused, and operating to a standard the Guide's inspectors found worth flagging without yet awarding a star. That gap between Plate and star is worth understanding: a Plate signals food quality above the average for the price point, but the full star criteria include service, room, and overall consistency at a higher threshold. EN clears the first bar comfortably.
For a special occasion, the €€€ price tier at a Michelin-recognised Japanese address in Amsterdam represents reasonable value. Comparable starred Japanese restaurants in major European cities routinely run €120–€180 per head before wine; EN's tier suggests you are likely spending meaningfully less while still eating food a Michelin inspector found noteworthy. That arithmetic makes it a practical choice for celebrations where the experience should feel special without requiring the full fine-dining outlay.
Japanese restaurants at this level face a consistent challenge with wine: the cuisine's preference for umami-forward, delicate flavours is not always well-served by the Bordeaux-and-Burgundy defaults of European fine dining. The better Japanese rooms in this price bracket tend to build wine lists around Champagne and grower Champagne (which bridges acidity and texture well with raw preparations), white Burgundy, Alsatian whites, and occasionally German Riesling. If EN's list follows this logic , and a kitchen serious enough to hold two consecutive Michelin Plates usually pairs with a list that has been thought through , then wine pairing here is likely a genuine addition to the meal rather than an afterthought.
For a date dinner or celebration, the pairing question is practical: a well-chosen bottle or a pairing menu can shift the evening from good to memorable. At the €€€ tier, pairing menus at Michelin Plate Japanese restaurants in Amsterdam typically run €40–€70 per person, though EN's specific pricing is not confirmed in our data. Asking the floor team for a glass-by-glass recommendation is worth doing if you are uncertain about the full pairing commitment.
What to look for: if the list includes grower Champagne or village-level white Burgundy, the program has been assembled with the food in mind. If it leans heavily on recognisable commercial labels, the wine is decorative rather than integrated. Either way, Japanese cuisine at this level is forgiving of guests who prefer sake or low-intervention wine, and a kitchen with two Michelin Plates is unlikely to have a floor team that cannot navigate that conversation.
EN's Google rating of 4.7 across 486 reviews is a strong signal for a neighbourhood Japanese restaurant in Amsterdam. That volume of reviews at that average suggests a consistent operation rather than a venue coasting on early press. Booking is rated Easy, which means you are unlikely to need to plan more than a week or two ahead for most dates , a meaningful advantage over Amsterdam's starred rooms, where waits of four to eight weeks are common.
For a special occasion, book a Friday or Saturday evening and request whatever the kitchen recommends as its current format. Japanese kitchens at this level often adjust menus seasonally, and visiting in the colder months typically means richer, more composed dishes than the lighter preparations of spring and summer. If you are celebrating something specific, mention it at booking , the floor team at a Michelin Plate room will usually accommodate small gestures.
| Detail | EN | De Kas | Wils |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cuisine | Japanese | Organic / Seasonal | World Cuisine |
| Price tier | €€€ | €€€ | €€€ |
| Michelin recognition | Plate (2024, 2025) | Check Pearl | Check Pearl |
| Booking difficulty | Easy | Moderate | Moderate |
| Leading for | Date, celebration | Group, garden setting | Adventurous pairing |
| Location | De Pijp | Frankendael Park | De Pijp-adjacent |
For Amsterdam Japanese dining specifically, EN's closest comparison point is not the European creative kitchens but the city's other serious Japanese addresses. Hanasato in Groningen and Japans Restaurant Shiro in Hertogenbosch show that Michelin-recognised Japanese cooking exists across the Netherlands at comparable price points, but Amsterdam's density means EN benefits from a more competitive dining culture around it.
Within Amsterdam's broader €€€ tier, BAK and De Kas are the natural comparisons for occasion dining at similar spend. De Kas wins on setting , a greenhouse in Frankendael Park is hard to match for a summer dinner , and BAK on views and the farm-to-table credential. EN's advantage is specificity: if Japanese cuisine is what you want, neither De Kas nor BAK will substitute. Wils is worth knowing about for world cuisine at €€€, but again the format differs enough that the choice is really about what kind of evening you want.
At the €€€€ tier, Ciel Bleu, Flore, Spectrum, and Vinkeles all carry Michelin stars and a meaningfully higher per-head cost. For a special occasion where budget is flexible, those rooms offer a different level of service architecture. EN is the call when you want Michelin-quality Japanese cooking without the full fine-dining price tag.
| Venue | Cuisine | Price | Awards | Booking Difficulty | Value |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| EN | €€€ · Japanese | €€€ | Michelin Plate (2025); Michelin Plate (2024) | Easy | — |
| Ciel Bleu | €€€€ · Creative | €€€€ | Michelin 2 Star | Unknown | — |
| Bolenius | Modern Dutch, Creative | €€€€ | Michelin 1 Star | Unknown | — |
| De Kas | €€€ · Organic | €€€ | Michelin 1 Star | Unknown | — |
| Wils | €€€ · World Cuisine | €€€ | Michelin 1 Star | Unknown | — |
| BAK | €€€ · Farm to table | €€€ | Unknown | — |
A quick look at how EN measures up.
EN is a ground-floor neighbourhood restaurant in De Pijp, not a large-format dining room. Groups of 4 to 6 are likely workable, but parties larger than that should check the venue's official channels before booking. This is a venue best suited to intimate dinners rather than big celebrations — if you need a private room or flexible group seating, look at venues with that infrastructure instead.
Specific menu items are not published in available records, so ordering advice based on dishes would be guesswork. What the Michelin Plate recognition for 2024 and 2025 does confirm is consistent kitchen quality at the €€€ tier. At Japanese restaurants in this range, tasting or set menus typically give you the best representation of what the kitchen does well — ask staff at booking whether a set format is available.
Bar seating details are not confirmed in available records for EN. Given the ground-floor neighbourhood format at Dusartstraat 53, the dining room is likely compact. If counter or bar dining matters to you, confirm directly with the restaurant before arriving — at €€€ price points, showing up without a plan is a risk not worth taking.
Yes — a Michelin Plate in both 2024 and 2025 at the €€€ tier makes EN a credible choice for a dinner that needs to land. It is better suited to a two-person occasion or a small group than a large celebration. For Amsterdam Japanese dining at this level, it is one of the more reliable options in a neighbourhood setting, without the formality or price pressure of a starred room.
EN holds a Michelin Plate and sits in the €€€ range, which typically signals a dress expectation above casual but short of formal. In De Pijp, Amsterdam's most residential dining neighbourhood, the crowd tends toward dressed-up casual rather than business attire. Neat, considered clothing is a safe call — trainers and streetwear are likely out of place, but a jacket is probably not required.
EN is a Michelin Plate restaurant in De Pijp, not a central tourist-district venue — Dusartstraat 53 is a residential address, so plan your route in advance. At €€€, this is a spend-up meal, not a casual drop-in. Book ahead, go with a small party, and treat it as a special occasion dinner rather than a quick weeknight option. Its 4.7 Google rating across nearly 500 reviews is a reliable signal that the kitchen delivers consistently.
Keep this venue in your Pearl passport, rate it after you visit, and track it alongside every other place you collect.
