Grand Restaurant opens at Carlton Hotel St. Moritz

Carlton Hotel St. Moritz has announced the opening of Grand Restaurant, marking the return of Executive Chef Salvatore Frequente, who brings with him a new dining concept.

With unobstructed views of the Engadin mountains, forests and Lake St. Moritz, the restaurant’s newly developed menu gives pride of place not only to local produce but to wild products from the surrounding forests. Both the look and flavour of the dishes are inspired and enhanced by the outdoors, which are picked and collected seasonally.

In keeping with The Tschuggen Collection’s holistic Moving Mountains philosophy, plant-based dishes take centre stage. The food served is primarily intended to delight the palate but also seeks to re-energise the body through delicious produce such as local wild superfoods including sea buckthorn and juniper berries. Root vegetables, tubers and earthy pulses add character and heart to the winter offering. A wild herb salad with caramelised figs and walnut and fir-infused vinegar follows an appetiser of pickled pinecones and mushrooms. For the main event, winter vegetables such as Jerusalem artichokes and beetroot are lovingly paired with regional game. Concluding this culinary expedition through the Engadin are deliciously nourishing dessert ingredients like beetroot, cranberries and wood sorrel.

Executive Chef Salvatore Frequente gathers inspiration for his dishes while out and about in nature. For him, every long walk through Ticino or the Engadin forests represents a chance to learn more about the treasures of the earth. The vegetables, fruits, wild herbs, and mushrooms preserved from his summer foraging excursions, are now being skilfully incorporated into the winter menu.

It’s not merely the new dining concept that brings the Engadin outdoors in, but the interior styling, too. Conceived by noted Ticino interior designer Carlo Rampazzi, it is visibly inspired by the hues of the surrounding forests and mountains. Large windows framed by natural beige linen curtains invite nature into the large, open-plan space, while earthy, light colours subtly focus diners’ attention towards the masterfully prepared natural ingredients on the plate.