We’re celebrating the launch of Baut’s cookbook like this:

Although our beloved restaurants are still closed (apart from the new, cool crop of hotel restaurants), luckily many hospitality entrepreneurs aren’t sitting still. One of our heroes released a cookbook in these bizarre times, PLUS an accompanying dinner box! Michiel van der Eerde of the fantastic pop-ups Bar Baut and Restaurant Baut (we’re big fans) said that creating this book gave him a great deal of positive energy, especially at this time. And the result is simply fantastic:

Because with the ‘make-away dinner box’, you can serve a number of delicious dishes from the book at home yourself, with very little effort on your part. And believe us, you secretly feel a bit like a chef, because you simply do exactly what Michiel demonstrates in the accompanying instructional video. And everything is also explained in the book!

Baut the Book

The book itself is enough to make you greedy and ravenous: the distinctive logo in crisp black and white on the cover, with beautiful and amusing stories inside, alongside a colourful range of wonderfully photographed dishes. Pulpo with olives! Dashi popcorn! I want it all! Luckily, we can get started right away with a three-course menu. Van der Eerde calls these dishes true Baut classics, and refers to Armando as his culinary right-hand man, the late Lucas Rive as his greatest teacher, and Lindsay, his beloved. Sweet, and beautiful. And a fun detail: the page numbers count down rather than up, because when the first Baut opened (7 locations in 8 years!), they counted down every day until they would close…

Easy does it

The great thing about the menu is that you really can’t mess it up. Especially if you’ve watched that handy video, for which a QR code is included. Each course comes in its own container with coloured stickers, and neither the starter nor the dessert requires a cooker. You simply finish the main course on the stove, but it is also completely mise-en-placed in handy containers and bags. If you can put a pan on the heat, you can make this!

The menu

To start, we ate wonderful ceviche in tiger’s milk with coconut soup. It’s so nice to see that when the ingredients are absolutely perfect and you simply follow the steps properly, the result really is a beautiful little plate of food! And delicious too, oh my…

Then the main course: an incredibly tender veal entrecôte with red wine sauce, sautéed mushrooms and potato mousseline. By the way, we had already watched the entire video on the sofa before we started, with an IPA, because I’m the type who likes to be well prepared. So those steps too (cooking the meat, then the mushrooms, while the potatoes and gravy were heating) went incredibly smoothly, and before we knew it we were feasting on what we could only describe as “real restaurant flavours!”… I can hardly think of a better compliment!

The dessert once again required minimal effort, making it a relaxed yet festive finale. Chestnut mousse with coffee syrup and cinnamon cream and deliciously crispy sugared almonds, beautifully layered in a glass and done.

All we can say is that this was an incredibly fun and wonderfully delicious experience. The food is gone, but the book promises so much more. We recommend getting it quickly or giving it as a gift! Just like the menu, which you can order here (of course also with only fish or as a vegetarian option) under the Take Away heading on Baut’s website.

Title: BAUT
Author: Michiel van der Eerde
Price: €35,-
Publisher: Fontaine

Also read:

• Top chefs Michiel van der Eerde and Syrco Bakker** together in a new TV cooking show
• Q&A with Michiel van der Eerde
• I asked star chefs about their ultimate guilty pleasure