Chef of the Month
Lieperts | Leutschach, Austria | lieperts.at
Restaurant Zimmerl
Waidhofen an der Thaya is not a place where one would expect a restaurant with four toques. Perhaps that is precisely the right starting point.
The Restaurant Zimmerl is located away from the culinary centres, and yet a cuisine is created here that does not try to belong anywhere. It follows no movement, no trend, no regional obligation. Instead, it asks a quieter question: What happens when one takes products seriously—without forcing a role upon them?
Bernhard Zimmerl cooks with this attitude.
His dishes initially appear restrained. Only on second thought do they reveal their tension. Combinations do not arise from provocation, but from curiosity—from the confidence that opposites can complement one another when handled with precision.
Anyone who watches him cook quickly realises: This is not about reinventing something. It is about rethinking things together. Zimmerl works like someone who seeks fewer answers and instead asks more precise questions. What temperature does a product truly need? When does aromatic expression end and when does exaggeration begin? And how much tension can a plate bear before it loses its calm?
A carp milk with oyster, caviar and champagne brings together freshwater and sea, down-to-earthness and luxury, the familiar and the unexpected. Nothing about it feels contrived. The idea does not explain itself immediately, but it holds. The creaminess of the carp milk merges with the salty clarity of the oyster; the caviar does not assert dominance, but sets the rhythm. Champagne functions here not as prestige, but as a structural element—acidity as architecture.
Carp milk with oyster, caviar, champagne and coriander cress
by Bernhard Zimmerl
Alpine prawn with togarashi
The Alpine prawn with togarashi also follows this principle. Warmth, spice and a delicate sweetness interlock without masking one another. Japanese aromatics meet an alpine product world, without turning it into a concept. The plate remains clear, almost calm, even though much is happening. Technique is perceptible, but never on display.
Zimmerl’s cuisine works with tension without dramatising it. Perfection here does not mean harmony at any price, but coherence. Every element has a function, every decision a direction. As a result, the menu develops less as a sequence of courses and more as a thought that takes shape step by step.
Perhaps that is also the special appeal of this place: In the Waldviertel, far from the great culinary stages, a cuisine emerges that defines itself not by origin, but by precision. Regionality is not a promise here, but raw material. Luxury is not a goal, but a tool.
At this point, his work intersects with Herbeus Greens. The greens and young leaf tips do not appear as a decorative finish, but as a precise intervention. A green note changes the balance, freshness and perspective of a dish. Often only minimally, but decisively. A leaf can extend acidity, structure fat, or suddenly give a dish direction.
Herbeus does not bring a romantic idea of nature to the plate, but precision. Freshness as structure, not as a symbol. A moment that focuses a dish instead of explaining it. In a cuisine that functions so strongly through balance, it is precisely this precision that becomes visible.
In the end, what remains is not a spectacular impression, but something more lasting: the feeling that work here is carried out very consciously. That every combination is tested, every reduction intentional. One does not leave the restaurant with a single favourite dish, but with the impression of a clear signature that only fully reveals itself in retrospect.
The Restaurant Zimmerl is not a place of grand gestures.
It is a place of clear decisions.
And perhaps it is precisely from this that that form of perfection arises—one that does not draw attention to itself, but endures.
That is precisely why Bernhard Zimmerl is on the stage of perfection this month.
