Page 12 - HOH

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local Tuesday 6 december 2022

Culinary event review: Kulture Café

On December 3, 2022 Aruba Today was
present at the fine dining occasion or-
ganized by the proprietor Mr. Nicholas
Gordon of Nicolas Store, better known
as Kulture Café, an iconic café in the
middle of San Nicolas, the second larg-
est town in Aruba.

The host Chef for this evening was Roy
Engelen, a young entrepreneur of chef’s
table restaurant Royal at Wilhelmina-
traat 18, downtown Oranjestad. Chef
Roy has more than 25 years cooking ex-
perience in the Netherlands, including a
2 star Michelin restaurant and other re-
nowned international restaurants.

Upon arrival we were welcomed and
immediately seated at our table. The
setting was outside in the open air which
being in San Nicolas made it an amazing
event. The chef surprised us with amuse-
bouche of dark roasted cauliflower soup
topped with a chicken dumpling.

The restaurant offered a wine pairing
created together with Boma wines to
enhance your dinner, however they of-
fered wine by the glass as well. We did
not go for the wine pairing, but rather
ordered our own drinks. Service was ex-
cellent. Since I requested a glass of ice
to keep my water cold, the servers kept
on replacing the empty glass, which to
me is a big plus for my fine dining experi-
ence.

Our menu consisted of:
Amuse:
Dark roasted cauliflower soup with
smoked olive oil and a chicken dump-
ling

Course 1:
Peruvian causa - grouper ceviche -
sweet potato cream with aji amarillo
- cancha corn - blackened avocado -
cilantro micro greens

Course 2:
Japanse chicken salad - homemade
caramel cookie - pickled cucumber -
yuzu foam - mustard cress

Course 3:
Caramelized Brussel endive - puff pastry
- cooked shrimps - beurre blanc- fresh
basil - parmesan cheese

Course 4:
Tenderloin stuffed with beef shoulder
stew - pumpkin puree - grilled green as-
paragus - green pepper corn sauce

Course 5:
Key lime pie - meringue - lemon curd -
cookie crumble - frieze dry raspberry’s -
lemon coconut sorbet

All in all the setting, the food, cordiality
and especially the service made it a fine
dining experience.q