The end of the year is upon us and that basically means we’ve arrived in the annual period of reflection and appreciation. Our loyal readers will acknowledge that for SUSAN BIJL that period never ends, happy as we are to share our loves and likes with you. And there’s so much to love! Like the neighborhood where we are located in Rotterdam. We are surrounded by inspiring and lovely enterprises that just like us offer high quality goods and services that are not focused on mass production for fast consumption, but rather on personal and sustainable care. We have awesome fashion boutiques like Wendela van Dijk and ANSH46 around the corner on Karel Doormanstraat and beautiful art galleries like ZERP and Cokkie Snoei. And just a few doors down the street from our shop there’s Kaapse Maria.
Kaapse Maria is a new bar that opened only this year and since then it’s been one of our favorite hangouts for work meetings and after-work relaxation. Affiliated to local craft brewery Kaapse Brouwers, they have a nice selection of craft beers, but their appeal stretches far beyond that. The beautiful location, the perfect ambiance, their really fine lemonades and especially the food, that’s why we keep coming back.
For a bar, their variety of very tasteful food is way above par. You really will not find bar food like this elsewhere in town. To give you a taste we asked chef Olmo van Duin to share one of his recipes from their menu with us, for you to try during these festive days or at any other time when you feel like enjoying a simple but very tasteful dish. Olmo said ‘yes’, so here we go (for the recipe in Dutch look further below):
Japanese miso eggplant (serves 4)
Ingredients:
2 eggplants
100 grams miso
50 ml mirin
1 clove of garlic
1/2 red pepper or a tea spoon of chili flakes
How to prepare:
Preheat the oven to 220°C.
Slice the eggplants in half lengthwise, place them in a dish and put this in the preheated oven for about 15 to 20 minutes, until they’re nicely browned and softened.
Take them out of the oven and switch the oven directly to grill mode.
Press or slice the garlic and red pepper as fine as possible.
Mix these with the miso and mirin into a smooth paste.
Brush the paste on top of the eggplants, not too thick.
Place the eggplants with miso paste under the grill for about 5 minutes till the paste starts to change colour.
If you like to put up a show at home, you could also do this last part with a kitchen torch.
And last but not least:
Enjoy!
—
Dutch recipe/Nederlandstalig recept:
Japanse aubergine met miso (voor 4 personen)
Ingrediënten:
2 aubergines
100 gram miso
50 ml mirin
1 teentje knoflook
Halve rode peper of 1 thee lepel chilivlokken
Bereiding:
Verwarm de heteluchtoven voor tot 220 graden.
Snijd de aubergines in de lengte door midden en leg ze in een ovenschaal. Stop deze in de voorverwarmde oven voor ongeveer 15 tot minuten, tot ze mooi bruin en zacht zijn.
Haal de aubergines uit de oven en zet gelijk de oven op grillstand.
Pers of hak de knoflook en rode peper zo fijn mogelijk en meng dit met de miso en mirin tot een glade pasta.
Smeer de pasta over de aubergines, niet te dik.
Schuif de aubergines met de miso-pasta onder de grill voor zo’n 5 minuten, tot de pasta een beetje begint te kleuren.
Als je die in huis hebt, kan je deze laatste stap ook doen met een gasbrander. Dat geeft een leuke show.
En dan:
Geniet ervan!
—
Kaapse Maria: website.
