Conan Luidens
Creative Holistic Cooking
I have been cooking with lots of pleasure and passion for twenty five years now. My first experience in a professional kitchen was at fourteen, as a dishwasher. When I was seventeen, I started working as a cook in a Cuban restaurant. Then I worked at several beach restaurants, where I learned to perform under highly stressful conditions. When I turned twenty, I decided to go on a trip around the world. At the end of my trip, I spent six months in Australia working at a restaurant in Sydney before starting to work as a freelance chef in the Netherlands.
As a freelance chef I got to cook at many different places under many different circumstances. I enjoyed the diversity and the unknown. I found work through a number of platforms. It was exciting to go to unfamiliar places with new people every time, and then get to work on the spot. Restaurants, catering companies, fairs and even food factories passed by.
I noticed that there was very little delicious and healthy food for sale at festivals. So I started a mobile restaurant with three friends. We traveled all over Europe, from festival to festival. Tired of lugging stuff around and the combination of partying and working, I sold all my stuff and started cooking at spiritual festivals and for retreats and communities. First in Sweden, later in the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal, Spain, India, Brazil and Costa Rica.
Vision: Holistic food
private chef
I love to cook for smaller groups as well and I enjoy direct contact with my clients.
I love to work with people and I enjoy having close contact with my suppliers.
I love being of service, and making people feel welcome and at ease.
And I just love bringing joy and pleasure through a wide variety of flavors.
I am specialized in preparing healthy and delicious food. I work with mainly local ingredients and I always travel with the most exquisite and rare spices.
Anything from vegan to meat and fish creations will be prepared to tease your taste buds.
My wife and I also provide food experiences with original tastes, textures and presentation. Experiences that involve all the senses.
consultancy
I’ve been working as a chef now for 25 years.
I’ve worked in over 70 different restaurants, catering companies and communities around the world. Mostly in the Netherlands, but also in: Spain, Belgium, Portugal, Australia, Sweden, Austria, Germany, France, Italy, Costa Rica, Panama, India and currently Brazil.
I set up a kitchen for a bistro in Alto Paraiso and I helped set up a vegan delivery service in New Delhi. At the end of my mobile restaurant adventures, I cooked and sold gourmet dishes at theatre festivals.
I have worked as a freelance chef for many years. As a freelance chef I often had to adjust to new places and teams real quick.
Having cooked in many different situations for different companies including my own, I have gained an enormous experience in how to make things more (cost)efficient and overall creating a better workflow. I am very good at optimizing the use of products and minimizing waste.
Training people is something I’m also very passionate about. I love making everything from scratch and I enjoy bringing (back) the passion to those who cook. I honor traditional flavors and methods of cooking, but sometimes recipes just beg to be improved. I like doing so and I love to make classical dishes with locally available/affordable ingredients.
These days the bigger events I cook for are around 400-500 people. I love team leading and supporting everybody to feel their importance in a team.
I love working with people and I did several therapeutic trainings, on how to work with people.
catering
My personal record leading a kitchen is 8000 meals in one day with a crew of around 70 people. This was for a great project; The Aid Delivery Mission. A group of volunteers cooking with, and for refugees in 2015 in Greece.
These days the bigger events I cook for are around 400-500 people. I love leading a team and making everybody feel their importance in a team.
For these events I cook mostly vegan and vegetarian and I take into account food allergies and dietary needs.
I also cook for a wide range of retreats. Yoga, meditation, detox, plant medicine, family constellation, (ecstatic) dance, etc.
workshops: What i teach people
- The basics and simplicity of cooking
- How less is often more
- Why it is important to eat as many organic products as possible
- How to allow oneself to be creative
- To honor traditional combinations.
- What is the wider perspective of our diet in relation to the needs of our environment
contact me
