Noor Restaurant review

5 min readApr 26, 2022

Noor is the best restaurant in the beautiful city of Córdoba, Spain, and has 2 Michelin stars.

Opened in 2016, Noor’s first few years were dedicated to the Islamic cuisine of the Emirate of Córdoba.

For the 2021-2022 season, the menu moves forward in time to the Spanish colonization of the New World and incorporates foods from the Americas such as avocado, chocolate, chili, and tomato.

The dining room was designed by architecture firm GGLab, modeled on the geometric motifs of Islamic Spain. Noor is Arabic for “light,” and the windowless space is sumptuously lit.

The restaurant only has eight tables, yet I was able to get a reservation for one person just a week in advance in February 2022.

Noor offers 3 different tasting menus, from €95 to €190. I went with the middle one, called “Rihla”, for €130.

HABANERO CHILI BREAD, cured meats, pickled onion and ALBAQDUNIS. ACHIOTE DRESSING with HIBISCUS and anise. FRIED PEPPER, sardine and velvet of its spines with caviar

PERUVIAN LAYERED POTATOES, iberian pork and shrimps al natural. ALMOND CURD with 100% Venezuelan Araguani cocoa mass

I usually only drink natural wine, and they only had one orange wine on the bottle list, so instead I asked the sommelier to pair a few sherry wines for the meal. They have over 20 sherries available by the glass, many rare bottles, and most are actually DOP Montilla-Moriles from Córdoba province, not D.O.P. Jerez-Xérès-Sherry from Jerez.

The glasses were all €7–8, which is insanely cheap for how rare and old these bottles were. That might even have been close to their wholesale price.

TOMATES anchovies with pickled mandarin, monkfish in brine and TAMARIND

KARIM OF PISTACHIO, smoked herring caviar and green apple with black bread

The caviar is excellent, very savory with a long finish. Black cubes are green apple which I guess are dusted with black bread.

SPINACH JELLY, avocado, yoghurt and tender and PUMPKIN SEEDS

You’re instructed to eat it like a salad, after mixing it up and squirting lime on top. Spinach jelly is more like a dressing, interesting, vegetal.

White PRAWN marinated in carob and CASCABEL chili

This was my second favorite dish. I love raw shrimp, so savory. But the cascabel chili is the star of this dish, so complex and with a long finish. It tasted smoked like chipotle, while also sweet and caramelized. The carob marinade tasted like a chocolate mole.

VEGETABLE stew, corn spread and BLACK MOLE

The black mole are small little balls, and are delicious, tasting of chocolate and other spices.

MARINATED SHELLFISH in CUCUMBER dressing, chickpea hummus, kefir snow and SQUID

The shellfish here is raw oyster, exquisite. There are also white ribbons of squid. The hummus is savory, so it all sort of goes together. I couldn’t taste any kefir.

GRILLED SEA BASS with emulsion of peppers and toasted lemon

Masterful grilling with the skin fully charred while the meat remained rare. The pepper is similar to a red pepper but with a hint of chocolate.

ROASTED and rested SQUAB, 70% cocoa and recado negro. Black truffle shaved on top.

This was my favorite dish. The squab was perfectly rare, and was as rich as beef. It paired exquisitely with the chocolate.

This 20-year-old oloroso sherry was super complex, nutty with a long finish, and was perfect with the squab.

CEUTAN LEMON with mint sponge cake, coriander snow and black pepper

Black pepper is excellent. The coriander was subtle.

Carob, when handled well, tastes just like chocolate.

I had a taste of their moscatel dessert wine, made especially for Noor.

Summary

I loved my meal at Noor; it’s certainly in my top ten. I strongly prefer restaurants with a cohesive theme (New Spain and Old Spain fusion, for this season) rather than something nebulous like French Laundry or Joël Robuchon. All the dishes ranged from good to excellent, and the exotic flavors and ingredients from New Spain were novel and exciting.

The €130 price for the menu was a bargain, and the wines even more so.