June 2019
On my trip to Valais, Switzerland in June 2019, I stayed and dined at the Albrun Restaurant & Pension in the village of Binn in the Binntal valley, which is famous for its rich mineral deposits. It is no coincidence that the restaurant is mentioned first in the name of this inn. Chef Mario Inderschmitten is a master of his trade. He has made a name for himself as a member and patissier of the Swiss National Cooking Team at the World Cooking Championships in Luxembourg and the Erfurt, Germany Cooking Olympics. Gault Millau awards him 15 points.
As you would expect in Binntal, the restaurant is very cosy.
The Spring Tasting Menu (I am sorry, only in German)
The amouse bouche is a bear’s garlic cappuccino with planed dried venison meat.
The first course is a lukewarm Swiss Alpine salmon refined with hemp seeds, couscous pearl salad with apple and vanilla dressing, cress and cold asparagus soup with roasted rapeseed seeds with cream fraiche with cress oil.
The second course is a perch fillet, carrots saffron nage with spinach and kohlrabi spaghetti.
The third course is a wild garlic risotto with green asparagus and morels, refined with roasted onions, planed Belp ball (a cheese from the village of Belp) and fried nettles. After frying, the nettles no longer burn.
The fourth course consists of a low-cooked fillet of beef back, sel de bex, young potatoes and white grilled asparagus and radishes and parsley root purée and pepper sauce.
Then came a red Gommer Fairy soft cheese with walnuts, flambéed with Absinthe 53% Vol and Valais rye fruit bread. Unfortunately the nuts partially charred. It was the only mishap of the evening. But the waitress immediately handed in fresh walnuts.
The spring awakening was again at the highest level: Donut with rhubarb mousse and Felchlin chocolate, strawberry gel, butter crumbs with strawberry sorbet, poppy seed cake and fresh strawberry and aniseed cress and rhubarb compote.
The menu ended with traché Piedmont hazelnuts, peach-loly (inside liquid), coated with Ruby Rubina chocolate.
Mario Inderschmitten performed very well. It’s hard to believe that this small mountain village offers culinary delights of this standard. This menu is CHF 115. The restaurant and the guesthouse are definitely worth a visit. Also the half board, where the three-course dinner is CHF 39, is recommendable.
This text is an automatic English translation from the German original by deepl.com