Kevin Graf

The Climb

At De Bakermat, the work of chef and uitbater has been Kevin Graf’s since 2014, and that pairing tells you as much about the craft as the title does. Cooking and running the house ask for different tempos, but the same habits hold: repetition, control, and a clear read on what the kitchen is meant to deliver. Graf’s position there has been built through consistency rather than display, with a method that keeps the food precise and the room moving at the same pace. The result is a role that joins discipline to day-to-day operation, with neither left to drift.

Today

At De Bakermat, Kevin Graf’s work is defined by restraint and clarity. The style favors composure over noise and coherence over complication, which means the kitchen is built around decisions that can be read plainly on the plate. That kind of cooking depends on discipline, but also on judgment: knowing when to stop, what to hold back, and how to let each element settle into place. As chef and uitbater, Graf works at the point where creative intent meets the practical running of the restaurant, and the authority in that position comes from focus, not volume.

In Their Words “We bring a cuisine that is as pure as possible.” Purity, in that line, reads as a working standard rather than a slogan. Under Kevin Graf’s name, it points to a kitchen that keeps flavor legible and avoids adding what the dish does not need. The value here is clarity: a plate shaped so the intent stays visible, with the essential parts kept in view. For a trade audience, that is not an abstract ideal but a method of control, one that asks the cooking to stay direct.

Recognition

Jonge Chef van het Jaar sits in Kevin Graf’s record as a mark of early distinction. Linked to Graf’s ongoing role at De Bakermat since 2014, it reads less like a finish line than a point of recognition within a longer practice. In that sense, Jonge Chef van het Jaar identifies a chef whose approach was already legible: clear in intent, measured in execution, and consistent enough to be noticed.