Total Package at Noa Chef’s Hall in Tallinn, Estonia

AI Deep Dive¹

On a recent trip to Finland, I did an overnight side trip to Tallinn, Estonia. It was an amazing city, and country, which I will post more about later, and definitely want to come back to explore more. For my first, and only dinner, in Tallinn, I was pleasantly surprised to find places in the Michelin Guide and World’s 50 Best list. I decided to book Noa at Chef’s Hall. The restaurant has a Michelin Star, and is in the World’s 50 Best Discovery.

We arrived just in time to catch the sunset, and the location could not be more perfect. The restaurant is on the water and has the perfect sunset view.

We were seated in a staging area with an amazing view of the water and sunset. This is where the meal started with some amuse bouche and apertifs.

For the amuse, they had one with crab, one with beef, and a truffle choux. Everything was delicious.

After a while sitting in the staging area, which I felt was a tad too long, they moved us to the main dining room. The first stop was a counter where we would watch a chef prepare the next bite. A tomato. But not just any tomato. The preparation was impressive. It involved melting what I believe was pork fat in a super hot oven, then pouring it over the tomato, and then plating it nicely.

After this, we were shown to our seats. To my pleasant surprise, and excitement, they sat us at the chef’s counter. If you go, I highly recommend you request this seat. You will be able to interact with the chef’s and watch them prepare dishes with precision. Here was the menu that evening. We also did the tea pairing which was good except for one tea which was extremely bitter.

The meal started with some rye bread which was amazing. The rye bread in this part of the world, I found in general, to be very good.

The first savory course was the scallop which was good except I felt that the radish was an excessive amount:

Next the fish which we added the supplementary caviar to:

This was followed by some morels which they served with a brioche:

I should note that equally impressive and entertaining to watching the chef’s plate food, was the preparation of each tea.

Before the main meat dish, they served a palate cleanser:

…and then we were given a choice of knives to select for the beef:

The beef served was wagyu with XO:

For dessert, they served blueberries and sour cream. I found this on many menus in Estonia and Finland. I was told by the chefs here that this dessert reminds them of their childhood as berries and cream is a popular dessert in the region.

The meal ended with some petit fours:

Overall, service was good, and the experience was amazing. From the location, to the sunset, to being able to watch and interact with the chefs, to the food, it was a perfect total package. I would recommend this place.

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