Domm, Stampfenbachstrasse, Zurich

Yeah I know – Zueritipp has been wiping my butt with the first reviews of new restaurants for the last couple of weeks, but there’s lots of fight left in your favorite and most trusted gastronomical advisor. DOMM a new italian place opened up on Stampfenbachplatz. The name is derived from the cathedral in Milano and it positions itself as a decisive north italian style restaurant.
First surprise was that the waiter apologizes for not speaking German. Since I am not a single lady looking for a mediterranean lover, this did not score many points with me. The first lovely little touch was the menu – it features lots of interesting dishes! Apparently the owner has a restaurant in Milano and decided to either expand or relocate to Zurich.
First was an amuse buche consisting of polenta, parmiggiano, lardo and sprouts. The sprouts were going to haunt us for the rest of the evening. The dish was too large for an amuse and the polenta too sweet, but it did feature strong flavours and had a lovely texture.
The vegetable carpaccio with porcini (or cepes as they called it) sounded like an interesting appetizer. It was done with lots of care, thinly sliced carrots and potatoes, zucchini, tomato peels and two types of sprouts. The porcini were slightly hidden, almost in a shameful way just like you place the black sheep of the family at a small table out of everybody’s sight. The dish was stronger in presentation and effort than in taste, it did excel at showcasing textures, but more porcini would have been appreciated. Also the porcini were transformed too heavily for my taste.
Things got very interesting with the next dish. The duck bigoli were served in a yellow bowl. Texture was perfect, the duck meat mildly seasoned but it felt slighlty too restrained. Towards the end I had a revelation the “yellow bowl” was actually made out of parmiggiano. So bits and pieces of the bowl added to the flavor of the pasta. But… the whole bowl was served on top of sprouts, olive oil and aceto balsamico. This felt like two dishes in one, with the parmigiano having a dual personality which either belonged to the pasta or to the sprout salad. Not sure this effect was intended, but certainly interesting.
Best dish of the night was the strozzapreti with salsiccia. Perfect texture, lovely flavor, nice rosemary touch and simple presentation. After all the “imaginative” things this was a nice, simple contrast. I’m not sure how DOMM is going to work out. The wine prices seem outrageously low, the difference between enoteca (take-away) and table-side served bottles is often only a few Swiss Francs. Either the take-away prices are too high or the tableside ones too low. The owner did claim that they import all of their wine directly themselves without using a distributor. The food isn’t bad but it would profit from fewer sprouts & simpler presentation. Bill: