Noma Review – Prix Fixe Heaven Worth Planning a Trip For

Getting a Reservation at Noma

Scoring a reservation at Noma is notoriously difficult- we tried and failed to get one for a previous season, but were successful on our second attempt. The process currently involves signing up to get on their newsletter, which will announce the date they’ll release reservations and provide a special link to access the reservation system on that date. Even then, you’ll have to be extremely quick, making your reservation within seconds.

• Note: We quickly realized that the link in the email used a 301 redirect to switch to a new destination once bookings are live. So if you open that up in your browser and then refresh, it may not reload the right page- so click the link from your email when the time is right. Similarly, you can get rate-limited and be locked out if you click too much.

If you’re a party of two, our best tip is to try for the shared table as individual tables for two are nearly impossible to score. We dined at the shared table with 18 other people, and we couldn’t have had a better experience. Nearly everyone there had some connection to the hospitality industry, including restaurant and coffee shop owners, pastry chefs from high-end restaurants, and people in the wine industry.

Our shared love of food, travel, and wine permeated the whole atmosphere, and we made instant friends with our seatmates.

A Dinner at Noma is an Experience

Our evening’s experience started with taking a seat in one of the greenhouses outside of the restaurant, where we sipped on a hot herbal tea. Once everyone at the shared table had arrived, we were taken inside as a group. We visited during seafood season, and the garden beds were full of mussel shells, and the famous large wooden doors were covered in seashells.

After our coats were taken and we walked through the service kitchen, all the staff looked up from their tasks and welcomed us. We were led into the communal dining room which was simply stunning – a single, long table dominated the Scandi-designed room with lots of wood and natural materials and colors. On top of the table were plates displaying all of the seafood that was going to be served throughout the meal: king crab, mussels, squid, and more!

The meal started with a bang – the first dish was king crab. The staff explained that they have large tanks in the restaurant where the keep the king crabs and dispatch them immediately before service. The juicy, decadent crab was poached and served with a rich rose-infused mayo that we brushed on the crab at the table. It was served with a warm, delicious sake from Koriyama, Japan, that was presented in a shell. There was something so gratifying about picking a crab leg clean with our hands at such a fancy place!

The next two courses continued the crab theme and used other parts of the crab. The first was a jellied crab head served in a crab shell, topped with walnuts for everyone else and sunflower seeds for me. It had a mild flavor but still had the essence of crab with a nutty, salty crunch. The next crab dish was one of my favorites: a rich crab broth served in a crab shell. The presentation of this dish was insane – two shells were glued together to create a vessel with a hole at the top. To eat it, you picked up the shell and drank directly out of the spout.

It was during this course we learned Noma has an entire staff of people who do these sorts of arts and crafts projects (among other tasks) for the presentation of their dishes – insane! But this dish was not just style without substance: the flavor was so intensely seafood flavored but also rich and almost miso-like. These two crab courses were served with a 2017 Chardonnay Les Lumachelles from Cramans, Jura.

The crab theme continued with the next course, a crab-shaped fried cracker made with a nutty, whole wheat dough that was stuffed with crab and topped with even more crab. It was as playful as it was delicious!

A mussel dish followed with a raw mussel served in its shell with a barely-set soft cheese and rose oil drizzled on top. The mussel was silky, buttery smooth and rich, and the rose oil brought a delightful floral note.

The third course in this set was another favorite: a just-kissed-with-heat scallop served in a rich seaweed-based sauce that was so umami, savory, and thick. It was also served with scallop roe (a little funky, in a good way) and the muscle that it uses to attach to its shell, and it was all topped off with fresh horseradish. The drink pairing for the previous three courses was a 2016 Chiarofiore from Arezzo, Tuscany.

The drink pairing for the next two courses was a funky saison, a collab with the Danish brewery Kolster located in Humlebaek. It played nicely with the next bite, a wasabi leaf wrapped around a buckwheat cracker with nasturtium and horseradish, which was crunchy with a fresh zing.

Next was a super interesting plate of three different kinds of seaweeds with an array of colors ranging from green to brown to bright purple, all resting on a creamy sauce bursting with shrimp flavor.

The next wine was one of our favorites, an orange wine made from Zibibbo grapes from Pantelleria (2023 Tanca Nica, “Soki”); it was floral but also a little medicinal, a good pairing for the next two courses. The first was yuzu-topped raw squid slices which were utterly creamy and delicious in their own right, but of course it was taken up a notch with the presentation.

It was served with a dried poppy head full of poppy seeds, which we shook over the squid to sprinkle on the seeds- whimsical and fun!

A beet sashimi came next in this course pairing, with squid underneath and chili oil on top. The most impressive thing about this course was how thinly the golden beets were sliced: they were nearly transparent!

A palate cleanser of sorts came next. This one was a take on a fruit rollup, with a berry fruit leather that we peeled off of a strip of seaweed to eat. It was flavored with a Madagascar long pepper, which gave a tingling sensation similar to a Szechuan pepper! The wine for this palate cleanser and the subsequent main course was a 2017 Brutal from Illmitz, Austria.

Finally, just when we thought the presentation couldn’t get any more spectacular or the dishes any more mind-bending, the main course arrived in supreme splendor. A beautiful wooden box was packed with sea salt that had been raked, and a number of seafood components rested on different dishes in the box.

A beautiful piece of grilled burbot that was so meaty and rich with a perfect barbecued flavor stole the show. Along side it was a mussel broth for sipping, a creamy butter sauce for dipping, grilled ramsons, and a pickle plate (including pickled baby pine cones that tasted like olives!). A hush came over the room as we all sat entranced in the wild flavors we were tasting. This course was truly special.

The dessert courses followed, starting with an amazake mousse with pickled and preserved fruits like strawberries, sweet baby pine cones, pine shoots, and cold hardly kiwis.

Next, one of the best courses of the evening – an ice cream with candied chanterelles on top and a sweet, salty, savory kelp sauce. The sweet-salty combination was on point and the mushrooms were lightly floral with a deliciously chewy texture.

The final dessert was a showstopper: a chewy caramel shaped and hand-painted to like a starfish, spiced with cardamom and saffron. The spices were prominent but balanced and the texture of the caramel was unctuous. The wine pairing for dessert was a 2022 Racines Blanc from Soings-en-Sologne in Loire, France.

It was one member of our table’s birthday, and at this point the staff brought out a birthday treat for the entire table! It was a tart with a crisp shell and chestnut mousse, topped with chocolate. They even made me my own nut-free version due to my allergy! Mine had their nut-free pumpkin praline inside which was fluffy, light, and nutty. We were offered schnapps or cocktails to end the meal. Jeremy got an amazing cocktail with rhubarb-infused vodka with tonka bean, and I opted for plum schnapps.

Soon we were offered a tour of the kitchen and prep spaces which was awe-inspiring due to the attention to detail in every space and process. We saw the prep kitchen, the grill area, the staff cantina, and the koji prep area which was particularly amazing to me as I grow koji at home. When we told the staff about my koji practice they even let me peak into one of their extra aging/storage areas for their ferments.

Dining at Noma is an experience unlike any other fine dining experience we’ve had anywhere in the world. The level of creativity in the techniques used was unparalleled, and the presentation of each and every dish was a true work of art. On top of that, the service was so caring with extra personalized touches. Our meal here is something we still reminisce about often, and something we’ll cherish forever.

Now to get back for another meal!

Noma is located at Refshalevej 96 1432 Copenhagen K in Denmark. We dined at Noma in early 2025.