We made it to our mid-week dinner date last night, albeit rather late. None-the-less my hunger was well-satiated. French Boy surprised me by taking me to a restaurant we had never been to before. A place, as it turns out, that we’d walked past many times but had never seen. And it was very, very good.

It’s called de witteuijl, or ‘the white owl’ in english, and it’s in one of my favourite streets in De Pijp. They cook with organic ingredients and have a wonderful wine selection – as well as champagne, which is not so easy to find here (well, not as easy as it is in Paris). For entree French Boy had wontons filled with mushrooms and gorgonzola, served with a sauce of spinach and a poached egg, and I had an avocado and shrimp puree with home-smoked mozzarella – I could taste the delicious smoke infused in the mozzarella as though I were sitting by a campfire, the flavour took me straight there.

French Boy and I have a rule that we visit a restaurant that we like 3 times before we decide if it gets a shot at our top 5 restaurants around the world. We will be back to de witteuijl to taste the other dishes on the menu soon. So far, if you are in Amsterdam, we do recommend this place – the service was excellent, the ambience was perfect, and the menu fabulous. Click here for location details.

Oh and I must add, to end the meal the hostess served me a slate plate filled with a selection of milk, dark and white chocolate chunks to choose from and eat at my leisure. Heaven.

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images courtesy of de witteuijl.

Available in postcard and magnet form here.

If French Boy hadn’t promised to sneak me out for a mid-week dinner date ce soir, I would stay home and bake this:

The one above is prepared by Aran of course, you can get the full recipe here. And don’t forget, some of my favourite recipes of Aran’s are in le (blog)house kitchen at this very moment, click here to check’em out.

It’s with absolutely pleasure that I am able to show you a sneak peek of Holland’s hottest new magazine called Maria, out on shelves now. Inside it, you will find a story on how to use this season’s fruits, produced by Dutch food stylist sensation & restaurateur, Yvette Van Boven, photographed by Jeroen Van Der Spek, and styled by me, Pia Jane Bijkerk. Notice how nicely my last name fits in here – I feel like goldilocks, having found the porridge that suits her just right. Yes, as a part-Dutchie, I’m as proud as punch…

And do you remember me mentioning the other day how I am drawn to recipe writer’s who are pastry chefs, like our (blog)house guest chef Aran? Well Ms Yvette is one of them too – a pastry chef by trade, her culinary creations continue to inspire and amaze me every time we work together. I will be telling you lots more about Yvette soon, but for now, these…

Yep, that fig tart was to-die-for – I devoured that slice right after we shot it. And it was super fun filling the cupboard with all those jars. Don’t you love that cupboard? I will tell you where I got it from in a post to come – its my little shopping secret that I can’t wait to take you through on a personal, exclusive tour. But for now, these…

Yvette baked all these different little shortbread-like twists, twirls and shapes to choose for the pear and vanilla marscapone recipe, and we selected this one you see, it just sat so beautifully with the pear that it seemed meant to be.

I had such a blast working on this story, and I look forward to showing you more of my work with Jeroen and Yvette in the future. Thanks Maria!

yep, my favourite vegetable is back to being a part of the weekly menu chez nous because 1. the price is normal (99c per ‘stuk’ instead of 3.99€ each!) and 2. they are in their prime and packed with deliciousness! They featured in last night’s meal as the obligatory entrée followed by baked salmon fillets glazed with a mustardy dressing, pan-fried asparagus and steamed rice. And since our dining table is covered with my papers and props these days, our meals are devoured from the comfort of the sofa. So the photograph above is my exact view of our meal as it arrived on the coffee table. Can you tell I’m slumped from exhaustion? What better way to relax and spend a summer’s evening than chilling back with a glass of wine and an artichoke? I have no idea. Nothing, in my opinion. Did I cook this meal, you might ask? No, but I did ‘design’ it, if that counts for anything. French Boy does all the cooking lately as my workload has grown to ‘barely manageable’. He assures me he loves to cook after his long day at work. And since he can’t lie to save his life, I believe him, his eyes do tell all. It does seem I’ve found the ideal man, n’est-ce pas.

This is the song I am loving right now, and perfectly accompanies the image above. Thank you Itsasne.