Recently, I started sharing some of my fine dining adventures in Switzerland. Today I dined at my favourite restaurant and, despite it not having a Michelin star (yet), I decided it deserved a review.
Romy is the restaurant of Sina and Pascal Ralo, a married couple who opened one of the most distinctive restaurants in Bern around three years ago. The restaurant is named after the chef's grandmother from Austria and the kitchen draws inspiration from both of his grandmothers. You could call it a hybrid of Austrian and Portuguese cuisine, although "inspired by family, roots and heritage" probably captures it better.
I've been visiting Romy for quite some time now and try to experience every seasonal menu. Sometimes dishes return from previous years, sometimes they are reimagined and sometimes the menu features entirely new creations.
If I had to summarise the chef's style, I would say that he loves exploring a single ingredient in multiple forms within the same dish. His food is bold yet balanced, always delivers on texture and, above all, has a huge amount of personality.
Now, on to today's menu.
The five-course menu costs 128 Swiss francs (around 160 US dollars) for the meat and fish version, or 120 francs (around 150 dollars) for the vegetarian menu. I visited with friends: two of us chose the meat and fish menu, while one friend opted for the vegetarian version.
The amuse-bouches always begin with a playful sense of rusticity: a reinterpretation of the famous Maggi bouillon cube as a soup with bay leaf oil, a "cherry" filled with cream cheese, pickled beetroot with beet purée, a bolinho de bacalhau and a cheese-and-onion tartelette. Any of these could easily stand on its own, but together they already establish a balance of salt, fat, acidity and texture (Picture 1).
The first course was either a boiled beef salad made from brisket, served with pickled radish, beef broth and assorted pickles, or, in the vegetarian version, a fennel dish featuring confit fennel, sautéed fennel and fennel purée, flavoured with anise and accompanied by strawberries that had been pickled for over a year (Pictures 2–3).
Next came an asparagus course featuring both green and white asparagus. The green asparagus rested on a bed of pea purée and was accompanied by croutons and a creamy, slightly rich and sweet white asparagus soup. I have always interpreted this dish as a clever way of turning asparagus into its own version of hollandaise without actually serving hollandaise. After asking how he manages to avoid any bitterness in the white asparagus, the chef even shared the recipe with me—which I obviously won't be sharing here. The predecessor of this dish was also the moment I knew I had found the right restaurant when I wandered in spontaneously some years ago (Picture 4).
Now for what might genuinely be one of my favourite dishes of all time: cod on a bed of chorizo sauce and artichoke purée, topped with crispy artichoke chips. If I were ever invited onto "Last Meals", this is the dish I would ask them to recreate. The chorizo sauce alone takes three days to prepare in order to remove excess fat, and everything about this dish works. The gentle heat, the creaminess of the purée and, above all, the artichoke chips create something close to perfection. It is also the reason why I always order the five-course menu, since this is the additional course—even though it is arguably the restaurant's signature dish (Picture 5).
The vegetarian alternative was a highly flavourful potato dish, which the chef jokingly attributed to his German ancestry—another part of his family background (Picture 6).
The main course was flat iron steak served with cauliflower purée, pickled cauliflower and grilled scallion. The sauce and the purée complemented each other beautifully (Picture 7).
My vegetarian friend had told me before arriving that she hoped the celery course would once again be the restaurant's take on a Waldorf salad—and she got exactly what she wished for. Multiple preparations of celery served on house-baked, toasted brioche resulted in a very happy guest indeed (Picture 8).
I forgot to take a picture of the pre-dessert, which was a lemon-thyme sorbet with chocolate sauce, served on a bed of olive oil produced by the chef's father. Usually they simply describe it as lemon sorbet, but my boyfriend asked about the thyme component two years ago and now I can't stop noticing it (and it fits the flavor combination perfectly).
And finally, the reason why I convinced my friends to visit before rhubarb season ends: rhubarb in multiple forms, paired with vanilla, meringue and a Florentine biscuit. My personal highlight was the rhubarb "broth" flavoured with verbena, which tied the whole dessert together beautifully (Picture 9).
At Romy's, petit fours means pastel de nata. I love the fact that the meal begins with a savoury cheese-and-onion tartelette and ends with a sweet one, the most iconic Portuguese pastry (Picture 10).
Sina, the chef's wife and co-owner, guides guests through the evening with warmth, competence and genuine hospitality—exactly how I like service to be.
I usually visit Romy at least three times a year and as long as my budget allows it, I don't see that changing anytime soon.
Honestly, I would love to see the restaurant receive more recognition. In my opinion, it comfortably holds its own against several one-star restaurants I have visited and surpasses most of them when it comes to character and personality.
Then again, if it doesn't receive a Michelin star, I might still be able to afford visiting multiple times a year.
But it deserves one.
by IonRud
Dining and Cooking