Caduff’s Wineloft, Kanzleistrasse, Zurich

Linsen mit Entenbrust

Getrüffelte Rehterinne

Ravioli mit Wildessenz

Capuns

Moorhuhn mit Steinpilzrisotto

Rehrücken mit klassischen Wildbeilagen

Caduff has a sort of a pre-subprime crisis feel to it. The large bar area, the high walls and the name wineloft all sort of imply Yuppie place. But like good looking women in certain baltic cities, looks can be deceiving. Currently Caduff is doing their yearly game special and that gave me the final push to actually drop by. The menu consists of two pages, one with food items and the other page explaining the high prices. For the unsuspecting diner this might be a necessity, Caduff simply isn’t cheap. But if you’ve ever bought an original 5 dollar Polo shirt in Vietnam and wondered why it fell apart in the washing machine you understand. We opted for the 5 course tasting menu. Since I also saw Capuns on the menu, which is a pivotal dish for south-east swiss cuisine (Graubünden), being the frugal diner I am, we turned our 5 course into a 6 course dinner. Amuse-bouche was a simple lentil-salad accompanied by a confit tomato and a piece of duck breast. Nothing special here, except a lovely tomato. It was a nice sweet and sour combination and a great start into the meal. The highlight of the meal was the doe terrine which came next. It was truffled, topped with a port gelee and accompanied by shallots, a fig and an apple. Except for the fig, which was bleak compared to the other components, the terrine was hands-down the best I’ve ever had. Truffle is superbly dominant but it was well balanced by the terrine. Supreme satisfaction, pure bliss was the feeling of eating this dish and it was fun to see how the flavors melted and interacted by adding pieces of the surrounding shallots and fruits. A Ravioli was served in a game essence with some brunoise vegetables. The essence was made from red wine, which was interesting to experience since such a light broth having such a strong taste. The capuns which followed were good, especially the dough was silkier than your rustic variant and the bacon was of very high quality. But compared to capuns my mother makes they weren’t that much better to justify the price of 26 CHF for two pieces. I wasn’t too fond of the grouse (Moorhuhn) which was accompanied by porcini risotto. Grouse is extremly gamy in taste and reminds me more of an acquired taste. The porcini in the risotto were good, but I’ll stay away from grouse in the future. The doe back (Rehrücken) with spatzle and rotkraut with a creamy sauce again showed the very high quality of ingredients and handiwork Caduff offers. Especially the marron (marroni) riding on the rotkraut was perfect, still a bit juicy and a caramelized coating around it, a refreshing change from the usual dry fare you get elsewhere. We closed it off with some cheese, coffee, spirits and cigarettes. We felt great after the meal. What really needs to be singled out is the quality of the service. Most places are friendly and will fill up your glasses at the right time, the waiter we had here also knew everything about the food he served and was able to answer all the obscure questions we directed at him. I really like this place, it’s fun going down to Mr. Caduff’s wine cellar to have him recommend a bottle of wine and having him show you the other room where he has an air rifle target range. Unlike the other big southeast swiss cook in Zurich (named Jacky…… ), Caduff can be recommended highly for the quality of the food and the ambiance. Bill

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