Nothing for you

Lotje Deelman was editor-in-chief of ELLE Eten, has been working for Allerhande for almost 15 years and worked behind the scenes on television programmes such as MasterChef, de Worsten van Babel On Tour and De Nieuwe Lekkerbek. She ate pig’s trotters with Anthony Bourdain and flirted with Gordon Ramsay in his Aston Martin. Lotje is the (co-)author of more than ten cookbooks and, in her kitchen in the Drenthe countryside, is never too timid to set something on fire. On FavorFlav, Lotje vents weekly about what occupies her. This time: Lotje gets laughed at mercilessly, but who actually has the last laugh?

Spoiler alert: absolutely nothing happens in this column. Yes, I buy a few pans, towards the end.

I have never been laughed at in my entire life. Somehow, I never invited people to laugh at me. Until I moved to Drenthe. Most people seem to find it hilarious that someone would voluntarily live in Drenthe. Drenthe apparently is the funniest province to live in. No idea why. So funny that many people can’t resist making sarcastic remarks about it. And laughing at me.

Prosecco caterpillar

Idiots, I think, but I say nothing. You don’t understand anything. Do you hear the birds singing when you wake up, and nothing but silence behind them? Every single day? Do you smell freshly mown grass in summer, and porcini mushrooms in autumn? Are you never stuck in traffic anymore? Does your house feel like a holiday home you never have to leave? Do you go for a walk on Saturday mornings in the shade of ancient oaks through a flea market where everyone says hello to one another (despite the prosecco caterpillar) and coffee with lots and lots of apple pie and whipped cream costs only three euros?

They are the first thing I see that morning. On the street corner, on the ground. At the very first stall. The sun falls right on them and they shine towards me. They look like jewellery. My heart skips a beat, but as a seasoned flea-market visitor, I keep my emotions under control. First I casually pick up a few utterly idiotic objects standing nearby, and then I ask offhandedly: “How much is that copper pan set?”

Fabrication Française

The woman at the stall hurries over to me and apologetically says that the pans are rather expensive. Well, expensive, she says, it’s all a matter of perspective. She explains that copper pans are very special, for people who love cooking. Real chefs often cook in them, especially in France, where these pans are made. Look, it says so right there. Fabrication Française. That means Made in France, but in French.

Koffietijd

In a flash, I see the other copper from my life. The three pans I pocketed after working very hard at Koffietijd, one for each season. The insanely expensive copper frying pan I gave my son because I was so happy that he wanted to become a chef. The cannelé moulds I bought after TV recordings in France, in a kitchen with around two hundred copper pans hanging there. Little consolation prizes, those tiny moulds. Copper is gold, man. And almost just as expensive.

Martens and kilims

I’ll take them, I say, and laughingly pay sixty-five euros. For five pans. Pack them up for me, please, and I’ll come and collect them later. I continue browsing the market. I skip the stuffed martens, butterflies and antlers this time. That completely polished Berkel scale, perhaps, for twenty euros? The kilim (really)? That vintage leather pommel horse from a gym, for a tenth of the Amsterdam price? More suited to a loft. I think about my pans the whole time, and everything I’m going to cook in them, and all the money I didn’t pay for them. Go ahead and laugh at me, all of you. Stay away if you like. Nothing for you, Drenthe.

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