Victor’s Fine Dining has had Chef Christian Bau in charge of the kitchen since 1998, when it was called Victor’s Gourmet Restaurant Schloss Berg.  It was awarded a Michelin star that first year and 7 years later he became Germany’s youngest 3-Michelin star chef.  Bau studied French cuisine but after trips to Asia combined in some Japanese influences.  The restaurant is located in the Schloss Berg castle which is part of Victor’s Residenz-Hotel Schloss Berg.  The Renaissance castle was bombed in WWII but later rebuilt into a 5-star hotel with the restaurant on the first floor.  A more modern hotel is next door, just a short walk, and they have a lot more rooms available.   The small elegant dining room had 9 large round tables widely spaced and draped with fine white linens.  The ornate wood ceiling was opposite wide a floor of wide wood planks and stone.  A good-sized wine and liquor display cabinet is in the center of the room.  They serve a tasting menu only but you can opt to have no cheese course as well as the crab course, the evening we were there.  If you want more there were a number of supplemental courses you could add to the menu, some needing to be ordered by everyone and some individual.  We chose the “Full Experience” and declined additional courses as well as selected our own wines rather than pairings.  This was a wonderful dinner, but I think I would prefer to try his cooking without the Asian influence.

Set Up

 

Food

Two bowls started the menu with variations on carrots.  One was a soup with coriander and was light enough to drink rather than spoon.  The carrot skins were cooked with Gambero Rosso, calpico and Madras curry in a more textured composition.    The curry flavors were lovely and I enjoyed the temperature and texture contrasts.

 

Next was a series of one-bite snacks.  Salmon belly with char roe, katsuobushi and myoga was on a white ball.  The mix also had edamame.  Lots of texture and a strong flavor of salmon.

 

Lobster croustade with cauliflower, tosazu and yuzu was the taller ‘cups’.   Lots of crunch from the thin shell and some custard inside as well as many other ingredients.  Very nice.

 

Tuna tartlet with shoyu, radish and wasabi was a work of art with the radish forming a round of circles.  It was tasty but hard to eat as pieces wanted to fall off.  Such an intricate design.

 

Saba Mackerel with buttermilk, yuzu kosho and chives was on a Japanese waffle.  The crispy tasty waffle made a beautiful presentation of another delicious treat.  After these, they brought the menu and optional supplements to choose from.

 

Gillardeau oyster was lightly cooked and served with garden cucumber and champagne espuma.  The oyster was cut into pieces which made it easier to eat it in combination with the other ingredients, two of which were ice cream-like.  This was a very refreshing dish.

 

Japanese Sea 2.0 was Kampachi (amberjack) sashimi topped with iodized sea herbs and caviar.    Some razor clams were in between, topped with sea urchin and oyster.  A crisp of seaweed was on the side.  All the flavors combined well here.

 

A round loaf of sourdough bread was served sliced with soy sauce butter and salted butter.  The bread had a nice thick crisp crust with a light yeasty interior.  The soy sauce butter had a deep flavor and was less firm than the plain salted one to spread on the warm bread.  Very good.

 

Coquille Saint Jacques was with Jerusalem artichoke, trevisiano, and Périgord black truffle in a vin Jaune sauce.  Some of the Jerusalem artichoke was fried and used to top the huge scallop.  The sauce was delicious and the scallop was cooked perfectly.  A great dish here.

 

Red Gamberoni, from Portugal, was steamed then grilled and combined with green Thai curry flavors, jasmine rice and jus from the heads.   The Gamberoni were poached with cabbage that was in the dish with rice underneath to soak up some of the delicious sauce.

 

Turbot from the Vendee with Pommes Boulangére, kombu foam and broth of roasted turbot heads was next.  Some spinach purée and seabeans were also in the mix.  The perfectly cooked fish benefitted from the light brine flavor in the broth.

 

The first dessert was made with green shiso, wild strawberry stock and sake gel.  The green strawberries were made into ice cream and surrounded by ripe ones.  There was a crispy decoration on top.  It was a beautiful plate but even though the ripe strawberries were good it would overall only rate okay by me.

 

The second dessert was made with Champagne ice cream, rhubarb compote, white chocolate ganache and almond.  A crisp something was beneath the ice cream which added some texture along with the cutout on top.  It was a mildly sweet dish and better than the first dessert.

 

The last course was a variety of chocolate and sweets.  The bowl was snicker ice cream with crumble.  Some sweet lovely melon balls were the orange rounds.  Three candies on a plate were peanut butter and yuzu, ganache of olive oil and white chocolate.  A tartlet of apple and peach was scrumptious.  The macaron was made with red bean cocoa and filled with sake bean cream.  It was quite sweet.  A slice of marshmallow was topped with Japanese mandarin.