Culinarium @ Julius Baer, Morgartenstrasse, Zurich

I like special places and there are actually some company cateres running canteens which are pretty imaginative. The venerable patron at the Culinarium in the Julius Baer building at Morgartenstrasse has decided to try running a chef’s table directly in the professional kitchen. Not something you’d expect in a canteen, but certainly an interesting idea. Lunch service is in full swing and we sit down in the middle of it.

First up is small amuse bouche, consisting of a serrano ham tartare. It continued with a plate of scallop, salmon and shrimp which where hickory smoked in the kitchen’s own on-premise smoker on-premise. Pretty cool – liked the deep smokey flavor, would have liked some more oomph on the horseradish mousse and maybe a spritz of acid on the fish. Also a nice touch was the home-made brioche. Homemade it continued with some nice noodles, a dash of cream, truffles and some surprisingly well-placed sprouts. Normally I grimace at sprouts but the slight tang nicely contrasted the cream. Main dish was slightly over the top with a veal steak being covered in bread crumbs and flambéed! Now there was a slightly dangerous touch to the whole act and some slight charring occured in the process but everyone pulled through.

The meal ended on a nice note with a lime coconut panna cotta, some pineapple salad and berries. As you can tell, while there might be one or two tweaks left foodwise, I liked the idea of having a chef’s table at a canteen and thought this is a good way to position itself. I liked the buzz, food and at 70 CHF / head incl. water and coffee… it’s a pretty great deal.