Chapter I
Where we dine and sleep in Groningen
Wide clay fields, villages on ancient mounds and moated manors. In Groningen the chefs cook what the land around them gives, and you sleep in a box bed, a windmill or the stadtholder's court.
In Groningen the book holds four addresses for now. When we come across more that belong here, they go in. If we had to pick one, it would be Piloersemaborg. If you are coming for a star, try Prinsenhof & Restaurant Nassau and Herberg Onder de Linden. The next place is still empty: that is the address we are trying next.
Manor farm with restaurant and rooms
A box bed, a garden room and the wine simply included: this is where we keep coming back.
This is where we have been most often, and every time it all comes together: the house, the box bed and the garden room, the kitchen, the people and above all the price, with wine, water and coffee simply included. That is why the borg is number one.
Boutique hotel in a historic city palace with Michelin-starred restaurant
Dinner in a prince's old bedchambers. You couldn't make it up.
A city palace with roots in the fifteenth century, right beside the Prinsentuin. It's where we go when we want a night in town that doesn't end with hunting for a taxi.
Michelin-starred restaurant with rooms and suites in an 18th-century inn
No cream and no beef, which is exactly why we're curious.
An inn from 1735 in Aduard, with a kitchen that simply does without dairy, beef and pork. We're going for that stubborn streak, and for the suite with the sauna.
Restaurant with rooms in a historic corn mill
Dinner downstairs in a windmill, bed upstairs. That will do nicely.
You eat at the foot of an 1855 corn mill by the water and sleep in the old grain store above. No menu to choose from, only surprise menus, which we find rather relaxing.
Our book lists four addresses in Groningen: Piloersemaborg in Den Ham, Prinsenhof & Restaurant Nassau in Groningen, Herberg Onder de Linden in Aduard and Restaurant de Molenaar in Onderdendam.
Piloersemaborg in Den Ham. This is where we have been most often, and every time it all comes together: the house, the box bed and the garden room, the kitchen, the people and above all the price, with wine, water and coffee simply included. That is why the borg is number one. If it is full, we ring Prinsenhof & Restaurant Nassau.
For two, count on € 295 at Restaurant de Molenaar up to € 410 at Piloersemaborg, for dinner, one night and breakfast. Amounts come from their own booking systems, for a weeknight in November 2026.
Yes: at Prinsenhof & Restaurant Nassau in Groningen and Herberg Onder de Linden in Aduard. After dessert you just walk upstairs.
