You walk down Witte de Withstraat and stumble upon a business that doesn't scream about it from the outside. White walls, wooden furniture, an open kitchen. Space for about fifty people. That's all Mister White Has Hunger needs to impress, because the press has been doing it for them for years. A 9 from NRC, an 8 from Het Parool, a 13 at Gault Millau. Those are not marks for a nice neighborhood restaurant. Those are marks for a place that is taken seriously.
Behind the stove is Simo Bouabgha, chef-patron and the brains behind everything that comes to the table here. His cuisine is Mediterranean, but the Moroccan background is nowhere far away. You can tell by the spices, the combinations, the way vegetables are treated here. Because vegetables are not a side dish at Bouabgha. Eggplant, beet, hummus: they are on equal footing with fish and meat. Not as a statement, but simply because that's how he cooks it.
The interior keeps a low profile. White walls with no distracting art, wooden furniture that doesn't have to match, and an open kitchen so you can see what's going on. It's understated in the right way: attention is focused on the plate, not the space around it. At 50 covers, it's small enough that it doesn't feel anonymous.
Vegetables are not a side dish at Bouabgha: eggplant, beet and hummus are on equal footing with fish and meat.
The Baarsjes has long since ceased to be a forgotten corner of the city, but Witte de Withstraat has always kept it quieter than Kinkerstraat down the road. That suits this business. Mister White Has Hunger has been around since 2015 and has never felt like it's trying to prove anything. Bouabgha simply cooks, shares his menu, and lets guests and critics judge. Vegetables are not a side dish at Bouabgha: eggplant, beet and hummus are on equal footing with fish and meat. That approach evidently works.