From the owner: Het elfde gebod is: Gij zult genieten! Ongedwongen genieten: dat doet u bij Grand Café 't Elfde…read moreGebod. Elke dag een High Tea at Sea, heerlijke nieuwe gerechten op onze vernieuwde menukaart en niet te vergeten: een terras met spectaculair zeezicht.

Great experience. Stopped by there w/o reservations one evening after spending the day at the…read moreTulip Gardens and walking on the beach. Our server was excellent and spoke great English (luckily for me and my wife!). Would definetily recommned and go back if in the area again!

Lovely restaurant close to the water. Service was amazing. After a long day, we were treated by a…read morefriendly and knowledgeable server who made the meal special. Our table had wine and beer with dinner. I had the seafood Lenten special and ot was delicious. A nice mix of seafood with a wonderful cream sauce. Definitely would order again. The table shared a piece of cheesecake for dessert. Also delicious. A great spot for a cozy meal in comfortable surroundings.

Well worth a try - Service was very nice (thank you Peter),…read morecourteous, attentive and not over bearing - and with good recommendations. Atmosphere was also very nice for local restaurant in a small town - cozy and very comfortable with nice decor. The food was equally good - I only tried the salmon on crostini (they were out of the tar tar) which was nice - could possibly benefit from a light sauce but it was fine. The fish of the day was a flaky white fish (don't remember the local name) similar to sea perch or small sea bass. Nice presentation and was complimented with the house Chardonnay (from Chile). Would recommend the restaurant and would not hesitate to eat there again.

My mom (a very picky eater with a sensitive gastrointestinal track) and I walked in here for a late…read morelunch on the day we arrived in Amsterdam. And despite ALL of our meals in Amsterdam being excellent, this one may have been the best. We wanted to try Dutch food, not totally knowing what to expect and were blown away by the combination of flavors and textures we consumed. We started with the pickled herring which was served with onions and pickles- fresh yet bold! I'm still thinking about those little fishies weeks later. Then we each had the sampler-ish plates (I forget what it was called). Hers was the vegetarian version and mine was with sausage. There were 3 kinds of essentially mashed potatoes with veggies mixed in: 1 with spinach I think, 1 with carrots, and 1 with sauerkraut. Mine came with a delightfully rich gravy and my moms came with some kind of lighter yellow sauce (I think mustard based). We tried these same dishes at other Dutch restaurants during our stay, but nothing beat The Pantry. The service in this quaint and cozy spot was also excellent!

Traditional Dutch foods, served in a charming/cozy dining room - what's not to love? We enjoyed…read moreevery dish that we ordered; even our pickiest (child) member of our party ate well (the meatball and hutspot disappeared from the plate :). Portions are substantial and a very good value in a neighborhood where tourist-markups are the norm. They have a/c, but in order to feel it you'll need to sit closer to the back of the restaurant/near the kitchen, as there is only one wall unit back there, and they leave the front of the restaurant open to the elements (even in 98+ degree heat).

Adorable, handsome unique tower on the water; there is a pier behind the tower to view the…read moreentirety. There is a bar in the first floor that serves "The Heinekenbier" among others, and the restaurant on the 3rd floor descends back to the 2nd and is totally medieval in design, reached by tight winding brick staircase in the monkey tower.

My wife and I visited De Hoofdtoren mainly because of the novelty of eating inside a 1600s gate…read morehouse that used to be on the south sea (now on a lake). Turns out the food is really excellent and the service is friendly. They had just launched a new menu when we paid a visit and the sandwiches for lunch were delicious, though not exactly filling. Probably an appropriate serving size. The view from the small windows isn't too expansive, but the atmosphere is still very nice. We'd definitely skip the street level restaurants to dine here again.

I taught this was the best restaurant of 'Hotel van Oranje' but maybe we had our expectations up…read moretoo high after restaurant Oriento. We took a four course Asparagus menu. Unfortunately they completely messed up the first course, the second course was not really our taste, the main course and desert were really good luckily. I should say I give them credit for admitting that they forgot some of the ingredients in the first course but still they did nothing to make it good. I have enjoyed better menus for 150€ (for 2 inclusive wine and apero). We left the restaurant slightly disappointed. Service here was good as well but not as good as in Oriento. Fun thing about this restaurant is that many dishes seem to be prepared next to your table, unfortunately none of the asparagus menu.

From the owner: 'Vernieuwend, fris en toch vertrouwd.' Onze chef-kok geeft een speelse 'Touch of Dutch' aan de…read moreduurzame, dagverse streekproducten. U krijgt verrassende gerechten voor een vriendelijke prijs. En het allerleukste: door de open keuken kunt u zelf meekijken hoe er elke dag een ander Menu du Chef wordt gemaakt.

For the quality of restaurants normally found in Leiden, this one is rather excellent. All the food…read moreis fresh, well-prepared, and full of flavour. The restaurant itself has a nice welcoming atmosphere, even though the waiters and plate settings would indicate that it's rather stiff-upper-lip, the clientelle is relaxed and everyone is welcome. I would only give a few dings for the following things: (1) The service - yes, I know I should not complain of the service in the Netherlands, but I can't help myself. The waitress told us that as per the concept, they recommend ordering one 'small' bite, two 'medium' ones and one 'large' one. Setting aside the fact that this is actually an outrageous amount of food for one person, when our group of 4 proceeded to not follow the 'recommendation' and order haphazard amounts of everything from different parts of the menu, the waitress clearly panicked and started asking us about the order in which things should we served. We told her to essentially figure it out herself and were rewarded with fairly haphazard serving order in return. (2) Odd flavour combinations - while some dishes were absolutely delicious (like the classic Asperges a la flamande), others where they clearly tried to experiment were frighteningly bad. In particular the 'food shot' (served in a shot glass) of diced cervelat salami served with chunks of vodka jelly on top of a bed of sliced onions - this dish was not appealing in any way, shape or form. There were a few other similar clearly failed experiments and I'm not sure why they've chosen to keep them around on the menu. Other than this though, it's definitely an interesting place and worth checking out if in Leiden.