4 Hand-picked Recipes From Egon Heiss
North italian Egon Heiss is Chef of the Year 2024 - a taste of his award-winning work can be found exclusively at Falstaff Travel.
September 27, 2024
Alpine artichoke mousse
With seasonal wild herbs
© Hannes Niederkofler
Ingredients for 4 people
• 100 g Bergartischocken, cleaned and cut into thin slices
• 2 shallots, peeled and cut into thin slices
• 1 garlic, peeled and cut into thin slices
• 1 twig of thyme
• 20 g olive oil
• 30 g white wine
• 150 g vegetable broth
• 200 g whipped cream
• some cut chervil
• salt
• white pepper
• 2 gelatine leaves placed in cold water
For the finishing touch
• Seasonal wild herbs: goutweed, yarrow, nettle, nettle seeds, wood sorrel, wild rocket, meadow radicchio
• Seasoned pecorino cheese flakes
• Chervil oil
Cooking
The fertile North italian soil of the Fragsburg Soul Garden prepares a wide field full of aromas and ingredients for our star cuisine. In the garden of Relais & Châteaux Castel Fragsburg, you'll find that genuine classics grow and mature naturally, without the use of chemicals, alongside finely selected specialties. For further variety and authenticity in gourmet cuisine, we work with producers and farmers from the region. These include the Schiefer family, who grow mountain artichokes in the Passeier Valley, just a few kilometers away.
Sauté the olive oil, shallots, garlic and thyme. Add the artichokes and deglaze with white wine. Deglaze with the vegetable stock and cook for about 8 minutes until the artichokes are soft. Puree the artichoke cream and pass through a sieve. Add the squeezed out gelatine, salt and pepper to the cream and leave to cool. Fold in the chopped chervil and the half-whipped cream. Pour the cream into the ramekins. Leave the mousse to rest in the fridge for two hours. Remove from the mold, serve and garnish with the feta cheese, wild herbs and chervil oil.
Beet cold dish
With crayfish and horseradish
© Hannes Niederkofler
Ingredients for 4 people
Cold bowl
• 150 g cooked and peeled beet
• 4 tomatoes
• 1 shallot, quartered
• ½ paprika
• ¼ peeled cucumber
• 1 piece of toast, debarked
• a bit of sherry vinegar
• 80 g beet juice
• basil
• tarragon
• salt
Cooking
• Mix all ingredients and marinate them for 12 hours. Then blend finely and strain.
Other ingredients
• 8 Ultner king crab
• fresh horseradish
• 8 Nasturtium flowers
• 120 g quartered and cooked beet
Cooking
• Lightly half-cook the crayfish with the Bunsen burner. Serve decoratively with the diced beet and flowers. Serve with the chilled soup.
Red mullet in saffron stock
With fennel and orange
© Hannes Niederkofler
Ingredients for 4 people
Fish
• 2 red mullets, each 140 g, filleted saffron stock
Saffron stock
• 35 g cane sugar
• 150 ml white balsamico
• 50 ml tarragon vinegar
• 500 ml mineral water
• 100 g celery, fennel, cut thin
• 25 g shallot cut thin
• 3 saffron strings
• 1 laurel leave
• 5 Coriander seeds
• 5 white pepper seeds
• some xanthan gum
Cooking
Boil the sugar to a light caramel. Deglaze with vinegar and water. Add the vegetables and spices. Allow everything to reduce by half. Strain. Thicken half of the saffron stock with a little xanthan gum. Heat the other half to 55 degrees. Gently cook the red mullet fillets in it.
Other ingredients
• some fennel salad
• 8 filets of orange
• 1 Piece of puffed white polenta
Cooking
Arrange the marinated fennel in a ring. Place the red mullet fillet on top. Serve decoratively with the thickened saffron stock, orange fillets, polenta chips and fennel greens.
Vineyard peach
In lavender crust with raspberry and champagne
© Hannes Niederkofler
Ingredients for 4 people
Peaches
• 2 vineyard peaches, blanched and peeled
• 1 kg loaf sugar
• 40 g cane sugar
• 100 g eggwhite
• 1 Msp. vanilla
• 5 g lavender flowers
Cooking
Mix the caster sugar, cane sugar and egg white with the vanilla and lavender. Cut the peaches in half and remove the stones. Spoon a heaped spoonful of the sugar mixture into each of 4 ring molds. Place half a peach on top and cover with the sugar mixture. Bake in a preheated oven at 190 degrees for 25 minutes. Leave to cool.
Raspberry gel
• 100 ml Champagne Rosé
• 100 ml raspberry juice
• 3 g Agar Agar
Cooking
Mix all the ingredients, bring to the boil, pour onto a tray and leave to cool. Then blend until smooth.
Raspberry-Champagne-Sorbet
• 150 ml raspberry juice
• 50 ml Champagne Rosé
• 30 g basic texture
• 5 g glucose
Cooking
• Mix all the ingredients together and pour into a Pacojet beaker. Freeze. Pacotize before use.
Other ingredients
• fresh raspberries
• Hip pastries
• caramelised chocolate ganache
Cooking
Arrange 4 plates decoratively with the chocolate ganache, raspberries, hips pastries and sorbet. Remove the peach halves from the crust and serve.
Read more: Chef of the year: Egon Heiss
This article appeared in the Falstaff TRAVEL issue South Tyrol Special 2024.