On a perched hill in Larrabetzu on the outskirts of Bilbao, Eneko Atxa, the Spanish chef of acclaimed restaurant Azurmendi is ‘cooking up the future’. Using Jaki, the basque term for meal and Jakin, the term for knowledge he is building an ecosystem that builds around knowledge and meals. With his idea he wants to foster a sustainable, healthy and a fair society through gastronomy. Those are the three elements that are the pillars of his work. Eneko has taken up running recently and he intends to run a full marathon this year. “Running has really helped me to think. It is a way of arriving at the restaurant refreshed or of leaving the restaurant to go home and be able to clear my mind,” he told Food and Wine Gazette. "I'm so convinced of the importance of sport that I insist with the members of my team that they should take up any sport they love," he said. The Spanish chef considers running to be an integral part of his creative process and the place where he can think and … [Read more...]
Errotabarri: the mill making corn flour incessantly for 350 years
At the age of 76, Luis Azzilona is not thinking of retirement. His side hustle while he was working in research and development for a multinational became his full time occupation when he quit his job some years ago. But he has been passionately making corn flour for 35 years. He operates the Errotabarri mill that has worked incessantly for 350 years making corn flour in Gamiz and supplies Michelin star restaurants in the Basque region in Spain. His quest for asking questions and for improvising means that he has been able to find the secret to keep the water mechanism functioning till today telling us he has had to use parts from an aeroplane in one case to keep the mechanism running. It is a chilly morning when we arrive at the mill and as we enter what we notice is the smell of the dry corn being grinded into flour. It is a smell that is both homely and welcoming. Today, the water mill is one of only a handful of mills that are still operating in the region. Luis knows all he … [Read more...]
Inside the txoko of Eneko Atxa, the Zelaieta Gane
It is nearly seven in the evening, the final guests are leaving Azurmendi, the 3 Michelin star restaurant in Larrabetzu and Eneko Atxa and his close collaborators are busy preparing food for the evening. He has invited a group of journalists to his txoko, the Txoko Zelaieta Gane, in Amorebieta-Etxano. It is one of the many closed gastronomic societies that are part and parcel of the Basque culinary culture. He phones his mother and she tells him that she is in the txoko and they are using it this evening. “But I am coming with a small group of journalists,” he tells her. He is a bit concerned because he knows his mother is not only an excellent cook but can also be critical like any loving mother can be. Sure enough when he arrives with the food that they have prepared she was not convinced. "Are you sure the journalists will like it. You need to add this and this," she tells him. It sounded worse than a Michelin guide inspection, Eneko tells us. To understand the Basque … [Read more...]
Noma reservations for seafood season open tomorrow
The first guests of the new noma will be welcomed on 15 February with the first menu celebrating Scandinavian seafood which is at its best during the cold winter months. Reservations for the first season of the new noma open tomorrow 16 November at 4pm CET time and guests will be able to book for the period from 15 February to 29 April 2018. The year has been divided into three seasons during which the menu will change dramatically to match the type of ingredients that are at their peak at any given time of the year. Each serving of the first menu will include some element from the ocean. Please keep this in mind when booking a table. If you have an aversion or allergy to any foods from the ocean, or adhere to a vegetarian or vegan diet, please join us during one of our other two seasons. The other two seasons are the vegetable season which will be served from early summer to early fall. This menu is perfect for vegetarians and vegans and will make full use of noma's urban … [Read more...]
2017: A very fine and abundant vintage for Austrian wine with winemakers describing it as a picture perfect year
Austria has reported a harvest that is good in terms of quality and volume. While worldwide 2017 saw the lowest level of wine production in years, Austria's yield of 2.6 million hl (according to October’s third harvest estimate) amounted to a quarter above the five-year average, which will go a long way to filling cellars that in many places have been rather empty. True, there were late frosts in 2017 as well as hailstorms, but both caused substantially less damage than in the previous year. Only the Weinviertel experienced a more modest harvest compared with the average, due to extremely arid conditions in one of the hottest summers in a long time. In general, this year was distinguished by constant fluctuations of temperature, setting meteorological records. 2017 began with the coldest January of the past thirty years, which in addition was also very dry – by contrast, February was extraordinarily warm. This was followed by the warmest month of March that had ever been recorded in … [Read more...]
Lukas Nagl: “You have to love what you do”
Food writer and GELINAZ! co-curator Andrea Petrini calls Austria the new Slovenia and he is definitely on to something. To date, Austria has been shy to present itself on the podium of world cuisine and present its chefs. But that is set to change after GELINAZ! does upper Austria Leading the revival in Austria is Heinz Reitbauer, chef of the amazing Steirereck in Vienna. But behind him is a growing number of young talented chefs who are pushing the boundaries, using local produce to create magic. One such talent is 28-year-old Lukas Nagl, a young Austrian chef who you are likely to hear much more about in future. He is the executive chef of the restaurant Bootshaus at the Das Traunsee in the idyllic Lake Traunsee. After working in the kitchens of Steirereck and Per Se among others, he decided to go back to his roots in Traunseehis first son was born in 2012. “This is the region I belong to. So when the opportunity arose to work there an to be able to work in the restaurant whose … [Read more...]
“Winters are getting shorter. I don’t know how this will impact food but it is not good” – Magnus Nilsson
Magnus Nilsson is a very busy man. His day job involves running one of the world’s most sought after destination dining restaurants, Fäviken. He has been featured in television series like Chef's Table and the Mind of a Chef but that’s not all. He has also written what some would consider to be the bible of Nordic cuisine called the Nordic Cookbook. It has taken him around all of Scandinavia, meeting people, researching old recipes and taking over 8,000 photographs during the three years it took him to work on the cookbook. He did all this in his free time writing over 700 recipes in the process. Some might wonder how he manages to do all this in a world where time seems to be so precious but as Magnus tells Food and Wine Gazette, “for me, it is important to do a lot of different things because like that you do not get tired of doing just one thing. It is a way to keep feeling motivated really," he said when I caught up with him during the GELINAZ! DOES UPPER AUSTRIA. As one of … [Read more...]
Magnus Ek: ‘The pace of innovation in food is incredible and is becoming faster’
Swedish chef Magnus Ek is a pioneer in many ways. He started using edible plants and foraging for food more than 20 years ago when it was still unheard of at the time. He did it without much fanfare and you could say that he is one of the early pioneers of the new Nordic cuisine. He is conscious of the fact that the ecosystem surrounding food is set to change but he cannot tell the direction it will go. "If I look at the kitchen of 20 years ago to how it looks now, it is completely different. The pace of invention and innovation has been incredible. And the curve is building really fast," he says. Magnus Ek opened his restaurant Oaxen Krog in Sweden more than 20 years ago at a time when foraging what not what restaurants did. Today, he still forages almost every day. He actually says he has more time for it now than in the past because things have become easier. “It used to be very difficult to find the vegetables I needed in summer. I used to have to go to different farms and … [Read more...]
The GELINAZ! welcome dinner at Steirereck
The red carpets were out at Steirereck for the GELINAZ! welcome dinner on Wednesday 16th August. Chefs from all corners of the world and journalists had travelled here to take part in the GELINAZ! DOES UPPER AUSTRIA event that was taking place on 20th August at the Muhltahof in Neufelden. But a visit as guests of Heinz Reitbauer was also on the cards because he is the most representative Austrian chef and the one who is leading a quiet revolution in Austria that could see the country ride the wave of culinary tourism that is rising in importance each year. Think about Austria and you think about Vienna, mountains, idyllic lakes, Alpine skiing and the Sound of Music. You might know about the Wiener Schnitzel or the Sacher Torte but Austria's food remains its best kept secret. But that could soon change. Love lists or hate lists there is a reason why Heinz Reitbauer of Vienna restaurant Steirereck in Stadtpark has been quietly rising in the World's 50 Best Restaurants list. His … [Read more...]
Heinz Reitbauer: GELINAZ! was a great opportunity to show the world what Austria has to offer
A quiet revolution has been going on in Austria in the world of food and that is being led by chef Heinz Reitbauer who has slowly but surely climbed up the rankings of the World's 5o Best Restaurants list to reach 10th place with his Vienna restaurant Steirereck which is housed in a monolithic glass cube. "We cannot imagine how important for Austria it is that GELINAZ! came to our country. It gives us a chance to show to a lot of people, to chefs and the whole world the products we have, the current state of gastronomy in Austria and what we are thinking about Austrian food. We have been working with our producers to build something for many years and now we have the chance to showcase it," Reitbauer told Food and Wine Gazette in an interview. "The quality of the products and the standard of cooking is very high wherever you go," says the most representative chef of Austria at the moment. "Maybe our wines are known better than our cuisine because you can nearly always find … [Read more...]