A turbulent week is coming to an end for star chef Bobby Bräuer. On Monday, the restaurant guide Gault & Millau distributed its chef’s toques, from which Bräuer got four black ones for the two-star restaurant ” Dining Room” in the BMW world. At the same time, his culinary cooperation with a colleague from Mauritius begins one floor down in the “Bavarie” brasserie.
Paramasudhan Murday is Executive Chef at Trou aux Biches, a five-star hotel in the north of the island. For two weeks he will be cooking a three-course Mauritian lunch menu (39 euros) in the “Bavarie”, which he developed together with Bräuer and “Bavarie” chef de cuisine Henning Aldag. On Saturdays there are also Mauritius-inspired barbecue evenings on the sun terrace (68 euros per person). And Murday even contributes an appetizer from his homeland to the “dining room”.
On Thursday, the cooking trio will present selected dishes from the daily changing lunch menu in the “Bavarie”. The reception on the terrace is served with an aperitif of passion fruit, vanilla and rum, accompanied by octopus carpaccio and music by a band from Mauritius. The smell of barbecue, coconuts, Mauritian flags, hotel brochures and information screens – the evening rolls on like a beach club animation program. However, not as quickly as the storm, which promptly forces the workforce to change plans.
While advertising banners and oleander trees bend in the wind outside, three things are served for the first course in the glass-walled restaurant. The fine brown trout ceviche with avocado and chili is the clear winner of this three-way battle; the rather random combination of roast beef with hearts of palm and beetroot couscous would not have been needed. The second starter, on the other hand, convinces with meaty, nutty prawns and a fruity tomato chutney.
The grilled chicken in the main course was also successful, with a slight dryness covered by the yellow curry foam, for which Murday produced a complex curry powder and imported it along with other spices. His Baba Ganoush, flowery and fruity thanks to preserved lemons, is an exciting companion. The dessert made of pineapple, passion fruit and vanilla, citrus-fresh instead of solero-sweet, easily outperforms meat and fish.
A catchy idea of the Mauritian cuisine has not set itself through this menu. Anyway, after all, regional cuisine means that you can’t cook in Bavaria like you can in Mauritius. When “Chef Bobby”, as Murday calls him, makes his return visit in spring 2024, he will also use local ingredients for his Bavarian menu. At least he won’t have to travel with forty kilos of luggage like Murday for the German range of spices.