KOCHI: Sara Lisa met Vibin Varghese while she was working as a chef on a ship. The Dutch pastry chef fell in love with the Malayali boy and the rest is history! The couple, now married, is settled in Kochi and is running a Dutch bakery, Zera Noya, out of their apartment.
While Sara bakes authentic desserts that she grew up eating in the Netherlands, Vibin manages the operations. With strawberry sloffen and Dutch apple pies, Zera Noya has satisfied the sweet tooth of Kochiites for two years now.
“I studied culinary arts in the Netherlands when I was 16. During the three-year course, I worked as an intern under professional chefs and tried to perfect my skills. After completing my studies, I left home when I was 19. Since then, I have been roaming around,” says the young chef. She started working on the ship soon after that. After two years, she set out to China, where she worked for three years and helped set up two cafes.
“I started baking again a year after getting married. We started baking from home and our business picked up during the lockdown. I decided to stick to Dutch recipes so as to offer something new to people here. There are so many good bakers in Kochi,” says Sara.
It took her some time to perfect the dishes using ingredients sourced locally. “From butter to cheese, everything tastes different here. So, it took many trials to make it perfect. Truffles were especially difficult,” she adds.
Even then, Zera Noya’s desserts use natural fresh berries and natural food colours. The menu, which started with just cheesecakes, has now expanded to many varieties of desserts from her home country. “The all-time favourite has been our cheesecakes with homemade cream cheese. But for almost half a year, chocolate cream truffles and strawberry sloffen have been selling well,” she says.
With a cake-like cookie covered in almond paste and topped with fresh strawberries and vanilla glaze, sloffen is scrumptious even to look at. Almond covered boterkoek (a kind of butter cake) is another Dutch dessert that stole the hearts of Kochiites. Sara recently included her favourite dessert into the menu — traditional Dutch apple pies! Unlike the usual American or English versions, Dutch pies are made yummier with cookie cream dough. Sara says the sweet pie with fresh apples is slowly gaining popularity among the customers.
“We are currently baking as per orders. And as we don’t have an outlet yet. Customers either pick up the desserts from our home or we deliver it,” she says. Now, Sara and Vibin are anticipating their baby’s arrival. Then they will work on their dream — start a bakery offering Dutch goods in Kochi.