Winzerhof Stahl

“Our restaurant serves menus with six or seven courses and tries to find the perfect match to the wines of the winery. The menu changes every two weeks and relies on the produce available in our garden. We are growing our own products and have some farmers who produce for us as well. We serve our own wine, juice, and water, bake our own bread, and butcher pigs from our neighbour. We plan to start fish breeding as well. Food waste is reduced because the Winzerhof only accepts longterm reservations, allowing us to prepare the exact amount we need.”

Home-made salted ham with home-made butter and home-made bread; Franconian ramen soup with homemade pasta, chicken broth, chicken meat, steamed veggies; and crudo of rhubarb, apple, perennial celery juice, and chervil sorbet.

Only by reservation – that’s the policy of this extraordinary restaurant. Because Auernhofen is very rural, most people plan their visit weeks in advance. Christian Stahl is a winemaker by profession but turns into a gifted chef on the regular. His ancestors were farmers and there was no interest in wine before 1984 when his parents planted the first vineyard. Now the Winzerhof is famous for its modern, quality wines and for food produced with its own ingredients. In winter, the main restaurant is closed and replaced by a small pop-up restaurant which can be heated with wood from the surrounding forest.