CUE

Michelin-starred wood-fire cooking upstairs, a vinyl listening bar in the basement, one very good evening total.

CUE is two ideas stacked on top of each other on the Utrechtsestraat, and both of them work. Upstairs, George Kataras (ex Vanderveen, where he and sommelier Mo Aous picked up a star in eighteen months) cooks everything over wood and coals: fermented, pickled, smoked, cured, then plated like it was no effort at all. The 2026 Michelin star says otherwise. Menus are called Volume 1 and Volume 2, because downstairs is the other idea: a Japanese-style listening bar where every record is vinyl, the sound system is custom built, and the dirty martini involves miso and seaweed water. It won an international cocktail award before most of the street had noticed it existed. The move is dinner upstairs, then drift down for a nightcap while someone drops a jazz record you will spend all week trying to identify. Book the restaurant well ahead; the bar is walk-in only, which feels almost generous.

No reservation? The basement bar is walk-in only and serves Kataras's bar food until midnight, which is the cheapest route to starred cooking in the city.

Photo: CUE