Something that my in-laws really wanted to do during their European vacation was go to a Michelin Star restaurant. Up until only recently (last year I believe) Canada didn't have any Michelin Star restaurants at all. Now there are a few in the Toronto area I believe. But up until then, the only way of seeing what all of the Michelin fuss was about was to travel abroad. My wife set up a reservation at a one star restaurants for all of us on night two of our time in Salzburg.
This was after our day long tour in Berchtesgaden, so it really was a jam packed day. That is how it goes on vacation though, I suppose. You have things you want to do and see and only a limited amount of time to do them, so you have to cram it all together. It wasn't an issue for us though. We had plenty of time between the tour and the dinner, enough for a quick nap and a shower before heading out and making our way to the restaurant.
The place was called Hotel Schloss Mönchstein and it was located about a 20-30 minute walk from our hotel.
It was on the other side of the river that flows through the city and on top of a pretty decent sized hill.
The walk was a bit long and a little tiring and hot in the humidity of the evening, but it was also a good way to build up our appetites before dinner. My wife and I always walk in the evenings on vacation. I don't think that we have ever taken a cab or Uber while traveling other than a few times that I could probably count on one hand.
Besides, we got to see some nice views of the city during the walk, from a height overlooking parts of the city.
Eventually we arrived at the restaurant, quite hungry and probably a little sweaty.
The grounds out front were nice, with tailored landscaping and some flower gardens and a large fountain out front.
The restaurant was located in a hotel, as the name suggests, and the building was this large beautiful peachy-orange colored mansion. It could have been a mini castle back in its day by the looks of it. Schloss also translates to castle, but I don't know the subtleties of the language to know if it means what it says it means...if you know what I mean...ha
As always I wish I would have take more photos, specifically of the restaurant interior. It just seems so uncouth to me to walk around with my camera phone out in a fancy restaurant, snapping photos of everything. One must pretend that they are unimpressed so as to fit in...right? Really though, I wouldn't judge anyone else for doing it, I'm just too embarrassed to do it myself.
I did take a photo of the large Chihuly glass center piece though. I impressed everyone at the table with how cultured I am when I pointed out the piece and named the artist, which the waiter confirmed. It's amazing what you learn on Hive isn't it? I wouldn't have known it was a Chihuly if another Hiver hadn't posted about the artist's work previously.
The waiter brought out bread accompanied by an assortment of fancy butters while we perused the menu.
There was the option to order à la carte or to do a 3 or 5 course tasting menu. With the 3 course meal you got to pick your options and with the 5 course meal you just got everything being offered on the menu. My mother in law ordered a fish dish à la carte while the rest of us did the 3 course menu.
One of the fun things about Michelin Star restaurant, or many fancy restaurant in Europe, is that they bring you a lot of extra little amuse buches that the chef created for the night.
So a 3 course meal really end up being more like 5 to 7 courses really, or even more if you count every little thing. They just keep bringing you food all night really. In the end, it was probably more like 3 courses and 5-7 extra little tasters.
The extras were small but they were always a serious punch of flavor. I don't know how they can get so much flavor in such a small bite. I can't remember what everything was but I believe the tart was a beef tar tar with green pea something or other on top. The truffle was a caramelized onion bite of heaven. I do remember that very distinctly.
This was another dish that just sort of came with the meal. It was a fish dish served with a very small cup of tomato soup, not seen in the photo.
The next dish (below) was technically the the first course even though we had already tried a lot of different bit sized portions at that point.
It was a fish course. Salmon (or maybe steelhead trout) tar tar served with red peppers and mussels.
It was quite good. Here is another photo of it zoomed in and off center for an artistic touch...
Next came the meat course. In my case I ordered the lamb and it was phenomenal. I can't remember what my wife and her dad ordered but it was something different. She took photos but since she has an IPhone and I have an Android they came through blurry when transferred so I didn't bother posting them. We both agreed that my dish was better anyway. Funny enough, my father in-law wasn't thrilled by the meal. All he wanted to eat the entire trip was Weiner schitzel which he ordered for every dinner except this one. It was actually on the menu that night but he happened to go for the tasting course instead. For the remainder of the trip all he talked about was how disappointed he was that he didn't order the schnitzel that night. I guess you can't please everyone.
Next we got into the dessert course, which was another series of small tasty treats before our actual dessert came.
I cant remember what everything was or the order in which they came, but I want to say that it started with a strawberry sorbet with crunchy bits, then mini lemon cakes, and then a single cream puff.
It was nice that they brought these little extras out for everyone at the table too, even for my mother in-law who ordered à la carte.
For dessert I ordered the chocolate mousse with pistachios gelato and it was excellent.
Someone at our table order the Crepes Suzette flambé.
A big part of a Michelin Star restaurant is that they often have some sort of table side theatrics to add to the dining experience. When we went to the 2 Star Michelin restaurant in Paris a few years back the restaurant made gravy table-side for those that ordered the duck dish. I won't get into it here but that was pretty neat to see and very memorable as well.
At Hotel Schloss Mönchstein the crepes flambé served the same effect. It was a great conclusion to an excellent dinner.
The meal took a few hours, as you might imagine and it was dark out by the time we left.
We saw some nice views of the city again, this time lit up in the darkness.
We ended up walking back to the hotel through a park trail that was basically the woods. In North America I would have felt unsafe doing that but I never felt unsafe anywhere we went in Europe. Maybe that is me being naive? Nonetheless, it was quite dark in there with only a few lamps lit every so often to light the trail. It did start to feel a little scary after a while so we popped out at the first location that we could, which happened to be a museum. We went down the mountain there and continued to walk back to our hotel through the city.
The dinner in my opinion ended up being amazing and it was an experience I won't soon forget. There were a lot of highlights on the trip but as far as food went this was by far the best meal that we ate during the vacation.