NENI am Prater

Review

Here's to good neighborliness

At the beginning of June, another oversized Lego house opened on the edge of the Prater. This would not be remarkable for the time being if it did not house the first Viennese branch of the hipster hotel chain Superbude from Hamburg as well as the first Austrian branch of the young Amsterdam aparthotel concept Zoku. Both have a restaurant on the upper floor, Superbude a new Neni, Zoku a restaurant called Living Kitchen, both have a terrace with a view of the Prater and both offer Tel Aviv-inspired cuisine. If that is not a coincidence, then it is an extremely bold strategy. Let's start with the Living Kitchen, which was already open on Tuesday: You have to know that this place is really up there, the street-side signs are limited.On the seventh floor, however, there is a reception desk and a store for hotel guests in one room, a typical open food blogger kitchen, meeting rooms and a restaurant area with long tables.All in all, it looks like the Google or Amazon cafeteria. The staff are young, come from all over the world, look great and speak English. If you haven't made a reservation, you'll be graciously given a seat in the empty restaurant; the menu is inspired by Israeli-British mega chef Yotam Ottolenghi, they say.
The two burrata dumplings with pesto, small beetroot leaves, sesame seeds and, of course, preserved lemon are Insta-worthy and don't taste like too much (€ 10), the chicken leg with pesto, chimichurri, small beetroot leaves and sweet potato puree was good anyway (€ 10). I should have booked a terrace seat two days in advance, Insta had ensured full occupancy from day one. But it was too windy anyway, ugh. Thursday after that, east wing of the building, seventh floor again, this time at Neni's. The restaurant is huge and looks just like concept restaurants do today: Loft style, lots of wood, a few olive trees in rattan baskets for the Mediterranean, used-look carpets. And a beautiful, large terrace with a view of the Prater. Incidentally, you can't reserve a seat at Neni am Prater - whoever comes first gets to sit outside. But it was too hot anyway, too bad. The staff here are obviously from Berlin and are also young. The food is of reliable Neni quality, the advantage of system catering. At lunchtime we had corn falafel with lime-ginger-soy tahini, impeccable, unfortunately only four balls (€ 7.50), the "Jerusalem plate", a mixture of onion, chicken and chicken liver from the charcoal grill, tahini, amba and plenty of parsley was really good, but not cheap either (€ 18.00).
Incidentally, the Zoku terrace was empty when I looked over. To sum up: two restaurants in the same building, both with neo-Israeli cuisine and both with a terrace that you're only allowed onto if you're lucky.

More in Levantine
Food & Drink in Vienna