Sublime Alpine Cooking

A mythical garlic soup, a rustic hash and the fluffiest, eggiest pancake imaginable

When I was twelve years old, my family traveled to Austria for ten days of alpine adventure. It was during this trip that I realized my family was different from other families. Rather than hiking for fitness, we walked up a mountain to eat at a remote hut turning out exceptional Tyrolean cuisine; instead of snacking on healthful nuts and dried fruits during our treks, we feasted on apricot- and cream-filled danish from the local Bäckerei.

Of all the foundational culinary memories from that trip, the most profound was our lunch at the Weisses Rössl (Kiebachgasse 8) in the city of Innsbruck. My dad ordered the Knoblauchsuppe, garlic soup, as a starter. I couldn’t resist the aroma of roasted garlic wafting from the bowl. I greedily swiped my spoon through the soup, took a big gulp and…cue the singing angels…experienced a culinary awakening.

The soup was delicate and pure, in stark contrast to the chalky and chunky Campbell’s condensed soups we ate back home. It was gossamer-thin and yet full of flavor: a complex layering of sweet, mellow garlic and fresh cream enhanced by snipped chives bobbing on the ivory surface.

I was so enamored with the Knoblauchsuppe that I ordered it at every subsequent restaurant. None came close to the Weisses Rössl’s, and according to my mom, all the others left my father and me stinking of garlic for the remainder of the trip (sorry, Mom!).

When BB and I made plans to pass through Innsbruck this past October, I knew we had to have lunch at the Weisses Rössl. I didn’t expect to find Knoblauchsuppe on the menu, and even if it had been available (it wasn’t), it never would have lived up to my memory of that otherworldly soup.

Besides, we had another goal for this visit. With only 36 hours in Western Austria, we wanted to consume Tyrolean classics, specifically Tiroler Gröstl and Kaiserschmarrn.

Originally conceived as a way to use up leftovers, Tiroler Gröstl is the ultimate comfort food — a homespun hash made with roasted potatoes, sauteed onions and sliced beef, topped with a fried egg. The inclusion of caraway seeds and paprika, two hallmarks of the Austro-Hungarian kitchen, makes this otherwise commonplace dish irresistible.

Tiroler Gröstl is typically enjoyed in a mountaintop eatery after a day of vigorous activity. We may not have had the spectacular alpine views (those came later), and we certainly didn’t burn off many calories in the lead-up, but we were thrilled with the Weisses Rössl’s expertly-prepared version.

The locally-sourced beef was perfectly seasoned and seared, the potatoes were crisp and buttery, and the egg tasted like it had rolled out of the hen right into the pan. The fry-up came with a delicious cabbage salad, showered in caraway seeds and laced with tiny cubes of speck (a juniper-scented, cured pork that is typical of the region). Pungent with vinegar, it was a welcome contrast to the rich and salty skillet.

Alongside the hash and slaw we ordered my absolute favorite Austrian concoction, Kaiserschmarrn. A compound of the words Kaiser (emperor) and Schmarren (nonsense, jumble), it was first prepared for the Austrian leader Franz Joseph I who claimed it was his favorite dessert. I’m not that particular; I love this eggy, shredded pancake any time of day.

As expected, Weisses Rössl’s version was pitch-perfect. It arrived in the pan it had been cooked in, vapor rising off its snowy crests. Its edges were lacy from a hot sear in a pool of butter; the insides were steamy and spongy. The accompanying stewed plum compote was pleasingly tart and I couldn’t resist heaping spoonfuls onto each bite.

Dining inside the historic inn’s pine-paneled parlor, outfitted with a traditional green tile stove, stag antlers and christian iconography, I was thrilled to enjoy the wonders of the Weisses Rössl’s kitchen anew, 33 years after my first culinary epiphany.

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Postscript

Over the holidays BB and I visited my parents and we decided to dig out the purpose-built Tiroler Gröstl pans we had purchased from a local artisan on that initial family trip. Cooking up the hash was the ideal way of using-up leftover prime rib, and sharing our memories of traveling in Austria.

To our astonishment, our go-to Alps cookbook and travelogue, Meredith Erickson’s Alpine Cooking, features a Tiroler Gröstl recipe from, where else but the Weisses Rössl. As Erickson explains in the headnote:

It may seem strange that I’ve included this version from Innsbruck, a city (albeit the gateway to Tyrol) and not a mountain village, but hey, it’s the most delicious version I’ve tried.

We couldn’t agree more and with BB’s precision in the kitchen, it came together perfectly. We all look forward to our next trip to the Weisses Rössl to see what culinary revelations await.