I’ve always been a terrible liar. I blush horrendously, apart from anything else. And the guilt eats me up. I can only remember telling one significant lie, and that’s when – aged 17 – I told my parents that the guy I was seeing was 19. He was 27. After a month, I cracked and confessed. The guilt I felt for that month was so much more significant than the wrath of my parents, who were more puzzled than wrathful in the end. Even the odd feigned dentist appointment when I really have a job interview leaves me feeling terrible for weeks.
So I felt truly shameful when I had to cancel on a good friend on her 30th birthday in the service of a surprise party that two of her friends were organising. What was worse, I had to do it by text: there was no way I could fake sudden illness over the phone. I was willing the day to go by, to get to 8 o’clock, so that I could cheer her up and see her in Saskia’s Huiskamer – the venue for the party. We arrived early to blow up balloons, swap cancellation stories and wait for the birthday girl to arrive. She did – with typical French fashionable lateness – on the pretext that her boyfriend had given her that she needed to pick up a key from a neighbour eating dinner there. She looked suitably surprised and (later, having got over the shock) happy to see us all there, and I finally felt able to relax and enjoy the meal…
The venue – which really does look like your grandmother’s living room, only bigger – serves four courses as a fixed menu that (I assume) changes with the seasons and whims of the chef. The people working there claim not to be professionals, but amateurs who love cooking, and their enthusiasm shows through. They also let you wander in and out of the kitchen and its walk-in fridge stocked with drinks; if this concept were on Facebook, I would Like it. Actually, it probably is.
We started with a salmon tartar, which was a combination of smoked and unsmoked raw salmon. It was ramekin shaped, with a little hat of rocket on top, and a slither of horseradish mayo round the edge. It was a bit heavy on the smoked and light on the raw, and could have used a hit of lemon as well as the faint horseradish kick. But on toast it would have made a cracking picnic dish.
I don’t think I’d realized beforehand that dinner was actually destined to be a four-course affair, but I figured as much when a small dish of shrimp, asparagus and mint risotto came out. The risotto was lemony and full of parmesan flavor – a classic combination but I’ll never get bored of it.
Our main course was beef fillet with a Bearnaise sauce, potato wedges and roasted vegetables. The Bearnaise looked like it had split slightly, but it was perfectly seasoned and fragrant with tarragon. I’m not usually a fan of fillet steak – I prefer something closer to the bone – but this was surprisingly flavoursome, despite being light on seasoning. The potato wedges were a little chewy, but the vegetables generally hit the spot.
Dessert – naturally – was birthday cake. It took the form of an enormous chocolate pavlova, which we cut ourselves at the table. I generally find meringue too sweet and sticky for my palate, but the addition of dark chocolate really lifted this dessert from mere egg white and sugar. To the point that I went back for seconds. Praise indeed from the girl who would choose cheese over sweet stuff nine times out of ten.
Our four courses, plus unlimited wine and including the birthday girl’s share, came to just €43 each, which I thought was nothing short of a bargain. The only thing I wouldn’t repeat about the evening’s experience was the surprise element, and only because of the requisite lying to make it happen. But that’s a good thing, right?
