NESO Bistrot

NESO Bistrot sits a few blocks north of Plaça d'Espanya, in the north of Palma, where the streets behind the Avingudes grow quieter and the city turns residential again. From outside it barely stands out. What sets it apart from most places in town is not written above the door either, but on a single sheet of paper: a menu rewritten every week — and no other. Because there is no à la carte list here. You choose between two starters, two mains and two desserts, the same selection at midday as in the evening. Water, sourdough bread and salted butter come with it. You can take the full run of courses or stop at two, starter and main or main and dessert. Behind the house are two owners, one Ecuadorian, one French. They came to Mallorca from French-speaking Switzerland and pooled what each of them brought with him — plus whatever the island provides. Ecuador and France on one plate It is a pairing you rarely come across on Mallorca. Ecuadorian, in this kitchen, means green plantain, yuca, peanut, ají, sofrito, a potato stew in the manner of a locro. French means duck magret, velouté, creams and purées, sourdough with salted butter, a coulant at the end. The Mediterranean share comes from the island — sobrasada, allioli, olives, almond. Together this makes a kitchen that does not need much explaining. Most dishes take one side as the base and the other as the accent. A duck magret gets no classic French sauce but one made from tamarind, with something creamy from parsnip alongside. Patacones — in Ecuador an everyday dish of twice-fried slices of green plantain — arrive with sobrasada and honey. An almond ajoblanco, Andalusian by origin, is seasoned with passion fruit and poured over watermelon and tomato. And yuca, which in South America does the work the potato does here, comes to the table fried with ají sauce. What goes on the weekly menu at NESO Bistrot Because the menu changes every week, no single dish can be pinned down as the house classic. The repertoire behind it can be described well enough, though. Among the starters you find things like a green plantain patty with sofrito meat and peanut sauce, a carrot velouté with orange segments and cumin, or a potato roll with tuna, guacamole and lime mayonnaise. Among the mains, fish and meat alternate. Tuna comes with a yuca fritter and pickled onions, corvina with creamy polenta, sea bass with celeriac purée, white beans and chorizo. Alongside them stand dishes that come straight out of Ecuador, such as a chicken stew with red rice and fried plantain. Among the desserts a mint panna cotta keeps reappearing, sometimes with green apple, sometimes with mango coulis. Then there are things like a coconut cream with praline and mango sorbet, a cheesecake served as a foam with banana sponge and peanut praline, or a dark chocolate coulant with vanilla ice cream, which the house makes itself. The room: narrow at the door, wide at the back The dining room is cut like a funnel, narrow at the front and noticeably wider towards the back. That makes it more usable for groups than the entrance suggests; for larger tables the house puts together a group menu of its own. Often one of the two owners waits on you himself, which gives the evening a closeness that has become rare at this scale. Who NESO Bistrot suits If you like choosing for yourself from a long list, this is the wrong address — the selection is deliberately small. If instead you are happy to let the kitchen decide for you, and you fancy combinations you will hardly meet elsewhere on the island, then this is exactly the right house. Booking is worth it; NESO Bistrot takes tables directly through its own channels.