Dick Middelweerd (59) is called the ‘dearest chef’ in the Netherlands. The chef and owner of star restaurant De Treeswijkhoeve in Waalre does not like arguments. “It bothered me for days.” He also thinks that his staff suffer the most when they make a mistake. “Actually, I prefer to comfort them.” He talks about it on Wednesday evening in the TV program ‘KRAAK asks door’ of Omroep Brabant.
Middelweerd combines his softness with perfectionism and ambition. The proof that it works hangs at the front door of his restaurant: two Michelin stars. They’ve been there for ten years now. He is proud of it and doesn’t think it’s strange at all for someone who didn’t really feel at home in the school desks as an adolescent and didn’t know what he wanted in life.
“From the first day I felt: this is it.”
He had such a vague idea that he wanted to be a radio DJ, but a career choice test pointed to the kitchen: cook or baker. And then his life suddenly took on direction. “From the first day I felt: this is it.” That feeling became even stronger when he started working in a star restaurant. “I loved the ambition and discovered how good food could be.”
Dick Middelweerd’s life got even more direction when he met his wife Anne-Laura. Her parents owned a restaurant in Waalre. There lay their future. More than 20 years ago, Dick and Anne-Laura took over the restaurant.
In 2006 they received the first star. The second in 2012 came, strangely enough, when Dick took it easy after a mild heart attack. “My wife then said: ‘We are going to work one day less’.” But that gave the room to further improve the restaurant.
It is a lesson that Dick also used when the restaurant suffered heavy damage in a kitchen fire a year and a half ago. They had to close for three months. A disaster. “But that’s not how we experienced it,” says Dick.
“We took all the cookbooks from the attic.”
His wait staff went on internships in other restaurants and came back with new insights. And new ideas were tried out in the kitchen. Dick: “We got all the cookbooks from the attic and we went through them all together”.
So they have become better again, he thinks. And that naturally leads to a frequently asked question: is there a third star for the Treeswijkhoeve? “My life is not a failure if I don’t get it, but I always say: you have to strive for a third star or you lose the second.”
He turns 60 this year and he looks back a bit more often, but also forward. How are things going with the Treeswijkhoeve? The answer to that question lies in Copenhagen. His son Mats (25) now works there in a two-star restaurant. He is the dream successor. In fact, the only question is when.
‘KRAAK asks through’ will be broadcast on Wednesday evening at 5.15 pm and then repeated. The program can also be viewed online and via Brabant+.