Beroun may become a name among gourmets from all continents. The best chef in the world, Marc Veyrat, plans to open a gastronomic complex near the central Bohemian town that will bring perfect meals in harmony with nature
Property for the project, which will cost more than CZK 150 million, will be covered by a Czech investor. According to information available to HN, the investor is a developer.
The patron of the project is Veyrat, holder of three Michelin stars and of the highest evaluation in the history of the Gault & Millau restaurant guide.
Up in the trees
The author of the architectonic design is Petr Suske, the co-founder of Skupina ekologické architektury, which designs buildings that fit well with the surroundings.
The first visualisations are ready. Meals should be prepared in a slender house resembling a chapel, whose ivy-covered walls blend in with the surrounding trees.
Next to the slender house there will be smaller wooden houses forming the shape of a horseshoe, which will have floors about two metres above the ground and will be standing on a wooden construction. In these houses, guests will savour a menu based mainly on local ingredients.
Marc Veyrat has been a long-term advocate of natural ingredients and cuisine de terroir or cooking from local ingredients according to local recipes.
The chef is planning to grow some of the ingredients directly on the premises. “Besides herb patches, he would also like to build a pheasantry which once used to stand here,” said Jan Rajniš from Avantgarde Prague, which is participating in the preparation of the gastronomic project.
Marc Veyrat is known for his passion for unusual ingredients that are easy to obtain. For example, at his restaurant Auberge de l’Eridan he performs miracles with nettles.
He produces an irresistible soup from nettles, adds them to herb butter, pastry or salty French pies called quiches.
The 58-year-old native of Savoy, who calls the location of the future restaurant “a pub in a clearing”, or “auberge de la clairiere” in French, would prepare the menu from traditional Czech recipes
Veyrat is a proponent of a return to gastronomic roots and the Czech culinary centre should be no exception.
“A real revolution is not molecular cuisine, but a return to nature,” said the chef, who has been playing with molecular gastronomy for years. Refining meals based on their chemical composition represents only one of many culinary techniques for him.
Into hobbit holes
An education centre for professional and amateur cooks that will be part of the whole complex should help Veyrat in looking for Czech culinary roots. “He’s looking forward to examining and reinterpreting the traditional Czech recipes together with other chefs,” Rajniš said.
Marc Veyrat is planning that he himself will often cook in the centre’s kitchen.
He doesn’t want to follow in the footsteps of another famous chef, Gordon Ramsay, who opened a restaurant in Prague but never actually cooked in it himself (see the PDM’s article Gordon Ramsay leaves Prague).
Veyrat has completely fallen for the project. “When he was here, he was exploring the nature and thinking how he could interconnect every detail of the location with the gastronomic premises,” Rajniš said.
Bunkers, which have remained on the property, which was once used by the army, could function as wine cellars or smoking rooms for guests going in walks, Veyrat said.
The complex should be designed in such a way, so that people could spend more than just one evening there. They will be able to sleep in “hobbit holes” embedded in a hill or in cabins in the tops of trees.
The whole project is still just on paper. Some of the funding, as well as permission from authorities, is still needed for the project to be go ahead. If everything goes well, it could turn into reality within three years.
“This goes well with Veyrat’s other plans. He’s going to rent his current restaurants and open two new ones: the restaurant near Beroun and a similar project in the Savoy Alps,” Rajniš said.
