Ad hoc gourmet cuisine in a hotel with every comfort: at the Quellenhof Luxury Resort Passeier all this is possible. Leading the restaurant is Chef Mayr, who worked in various Austrian fine dining and 5-star hotels for years before returning to South Tyrol. His goal? To combine selected local products to impress his guests.
The facility
The Passeier Valley is one of the most beautiful valleys in South Tyrol: wide open, bright, with the immortal charm of the mountains that surround it. At the Quellenhof Luxury Resort Passeier, a handsome five-star hotel complex the size of a citadel, you can get there in a little more than twenty by car from Merano.
It all started when, a century and a year ago, the Dorfer family acquired an old inn, established in the late 19th century. The Quellenhof, which has recently been joined by a very elegant state-of-the-art facility as the Seelodge, developed on the water, has more than two hundred rooms spread over several buildings on different levels, has an immense wellness area measuring more than 10,500 square meters in size, and a major medical center.
The numbers are quite impressive: 25 saunas, massage and beauty treatments of all kinds, 12 indoor and outdoor pools, including a spectacular sky-infinity-pool, two natural swimming ponds and a saltwater pool.
It is also the largest sports activity hotel in the entire Alpine region. In terms of gastronomy, there is plenty to indulge in, because the in-house restaurants, some of which are open to the public, are many, and all of them are of high quality. These include South Tyrol's first Teppanyaki restaurant, the Atmosphera bistro, bar and cigar-lounge, and in summer also a poolbar.
The Chef
But the restaurant that absolutely must be tried is Quellenhof Gourmetstube 1897, where the historic original stone entrance to the inn, from which it all began, is located. The two professionals at the helm of the restaurant and of a bevy of women and men who employ at least 150 people between kitchens and rooms are Michael Mayr, class of 1980, executive chef, and Matteo Lattanzi Maître d'Hotel and Sommelier, class of 1987.
Of the latter, we have already recounted his passion for dining and great expertise in wines, with a stupendous cellar with more than 1,200 labels going back as far as the 1940s. The former, on the other hand, is a longtime chef, devoted to cooking since childhood.
At Quellenhof since 2002, he began his career in Achenkirch, Austria, where he worked for several years between major restaurants and luxury hotels. His experience with Walter Eselböck at Taubenkobel (2 Michelin stars) is worth mentioning. An executive since 2017, leading the kitchens with his right-hand man Klaus Burgstaller, he never stopped training during Quellenhof's winter closures: it happened with Helfrich Michael, sous chef at the Schwarzwaldstube with 3 Michelin stars, at Trofana Ischgl and with Martin Sieberer.
And speaking of training, in addition to his own personal training, Mayr also focuses a lot on training apprentices, so much so that the people he works with often rank among the best in South Tyrol, with an Italian champion in 2019. He himself was "Trainer of the Year 2020" for the regional association of chefs and the Quellenhof Resort Passeier "Training Company of 2020."
The cuisine
Mayr has modernized the gastronomic style of the entire restaurant "which was very good but old-fashioned," introducing the systematic use of typical regional products and establishing close relationships with local suppliers, including about 20 farmers in the valley and several producers of goodness, such as Schiefer, a fish farm in San Martino in Val Passiria with 120 years of history and tradition, which we had the opportunity to visit and from which comes an excellent Arctic char. According to Mayr, his cooking is "honest, precise and heartfelt, understandable by all."
We might add that although he moves in search of ingredients around the world, at the heart of each of the chef's dishes pulses at least one element from Alto Adige, and there is certainly no shortage of taste, technique and lightness, starting with the amuse bouche: the fresh asparagus sorbet, mustard grains and salmon cubes in a citrus, passion fruit and grapefruit pearl soup.
Again, the Mangalica pork, served with its jus, wild herbs and pioppini mushrooms or the Sicilian red shrimp with buttermilk from a nearby dairy farm and Kaluga caviar. A separate description deserves the excellent bread service, whose flours come from a mill in the Venosta Valley.
There are three types, from 100 percent spelt and rye, to the Val Passiria loaf with various seeds, to Vinschgerle, served with various butters, including wild herb butter, as Matteo Lattanzi tells us "from Rosi, the valley witch who grows more than six hundred different species of herbs and brings them to us fresh." Here then is the walk in the woods, in which one can taste, depending on the season, alpine basil, oxalis, mushroom herb and many others, refreshing and excellent for digestion.
The Breton turbot, served with local Jerusalem artichoke, salted lemon, Gilardeau oyster and lobster bisque, is succulent and tasty. Emblematic of the trend of bringing Alto Adige together with the rest of the world is the use of the rare Carnaroli rice produced in Tramin, in a risotto with salted lemon and spring herbs in its successful harmony.
The Schiefer char (mentioned earlier) with coconut heart, coconut buttermilk oil, wild herbs and sea asparagus was very good. Also notable is the tartlet with tomato tartare from the Quellenhof garden with goat cheese, as well as the macaron with beet, cream cheese and the chickpea cracker with pulled pork and red sauerkraut cream; a local specialty with heart and lung, scorzonera cream and corn is to die for.
It ends with an excellent dessert of Opalys white chocolate, coconut almond and Val Venosta apricot. Well worth a stop.
Contacts
Quellenhof Luxury Resort Passeier
Via Passiria 47, 39010 S. Martino in Passiria presso Merano
Phone: +39 0473 645474
info@quellenhof.it
