our story

Inspiro began as a sentence on the back of a menu, written in a different restaurant, by two friends who weren’t sure they wanted to keep doing things the way they were doing them. Kasper had been cooking in fine dining kitchens for fifteen years. Eline had run the floor of three of them. They wanted somewhere quieter — one menu, one room, fewer rules — with the garden close enough to walk to.

In the spring of 2019 they signed a lease on a former bookshop, kept the wooden floor, took down the partition, and put in a long oak table for thirty‑two. The kitchen is on display, but at the back, separated by an old curtain we found in Antwerp. There is no music after nine. The lights are real flames.

What we’re after

We are after dinners that feel like a long evening at a friend’s house, where the food has been thought about for weeks, but where nothing is precious. The menu is set so we can buy carefully and waste almost nothing. The wine list is short so Sara can know every bottle on it. The room is small so we can pour your second glass before you finish the first.

We don’t describe our food in long sentences. There is enough talking in restaurants already. We’d rather show you the asparagus before we cook it, and let you taste what changed.

The garden

The Inspiro garden sits on a former allotment in Westerpark, ten minutes by bike from the restaurant. Two thousand square metres, four growers, a polytunnel, a small orchard. From late March until first frost, around 60% of what reaches the table comes from there: leaves, herbs, soft fruit, edible flowers, beans, alliums. The other 40% comes from a small circle of farmers we’ve known for years — Hartog’s for grain, Remeker for dairy, Lindenhoff for meat, the IJmuiden auction for fish.

The garden also writes the menu. On a Monday morning Kasper bikes there and walks the beds with our gardener Mieke. They take notes; on the way back, the menu for the week begins to take shape. By Tuesday lunchtime it is on paper. By Tuesday evening it is on the table.