You never get too much enjoyment,” reads a line in Konstantin Wecker’s “When summer isn’t far away.” And so you finally want to do what you want to do, namely take a little trip back to your childhood the place that was so far away at the time and where a motherly voice warned not to come too close to the Iron Curtain, where the steel city boy fought his way through the forest on skis with cable bindings to get to the manageably long cable car in several winters to ruin the knitted gloves. Scoffers called the Mühlviertler Flecken, which was placed in no man’s land, “Afiesl am Frostaufbruch”.
enjoyment and love
The picture of the simple inn on the opposite slope can only be called up in a hazy and hazy way behind the veil of the past. Where this stop was, the descendant Eva-Maria Pürmayer and her life partner, the 2-toque chef Thomas Hofer, brought enjoyment to the Bergergut. And of course also love, to which couples can dedicate themselves in the most beautiful togetherness – stimulated by an ambience that fuels romantic feelings, from the wide cuddly loungers in the wellness paradise to the 36 rooms and suites, which have their names like “Sensuality” or ” Fire & Flame”. In the new nature play suites, you can bring the starry sky into your bedroom through a glass dome on the ceiling. Then the heart, leaping from the happiness of affection, rejoices.
Guests in the northern hill country need not fear the proverb “Without wine and bread, love suffers”. On the one hand, the wine list is well listed, on the other hand, chef de cuisine Thomas Hofer has dedicated himself to the art of bread baking. The variations from the wood-fired oven that are served for the gourmet breakfast or as the first of several preludes to the six-course gourmet dinner “Mund.Art” are the finest craftsmanship. Someone like him, who cannot be imagined as being idle, created a creative field in his bread workshop with a professional wood-fired oven during the first Corona lockdown. He enthusiastically passes on the knowledge he has absorbed and his passion for turning Mühlviertel flour from the Perger Mühle Dirneder and local water into a delicious form to guests. After all, man does not live by love alone.
In the afternoon, the baker trainees gather in the furthest corner of the Bergergut kitchen around the bowls in which the dough is being made for five different baked goods: the Ligurian flatbread focaccia, the guest favorite Afiesler farmer’s bread, the wholemeal rye bread that he’s been feeding in for ten years Sourdough works, the tasty potato bread and the Upper Austrian poppy seed bowls.
It quickly becomes apparent that baking bread is a bit of a science, which does not tolerate any deviations in the quantity of the recipes, requires experience-based tricks, a certain dexterity and a portion of patience. “It was a disaster the first few times,” Hofer admits. He explains what the source, brewing and cooking pieces are, that every wheat flour recipe can also be applied to spelled, how to bring water vapor into the oven with gravel in a hot pot, what has to mature and rest where and for how long. “Time is the baker’s most important ingredient,” says the award-winning chef, who openly shares every coveted recipe, “because the recipe is not the chef”.
Less Flesserl, more fat Venus
The following morning, the well-rested doughs are finished and shaped on the expansive wooden table in the bakery. Because the first braiding of the doughy noodle is a mess and the structure resembles less a flesserl and more like the Venus von Willendorf, the master slowly repeats each twist until even the clumsy one is beaming with joy. In the meantime, the focacce, one with yeast and one with sourdough, have developed splendidly in the wood-fired oven. After a few minutes at 400 degrees, the poppy seeds are ready. The tasters don’t know how to hold back, although – no one can be really hungry when you consider the culinary delights that were enjoyed the night before. The kitchen greeted us umpteen times before Gusental brook trout, crayfish dumplings, celery waffles with bone marrow, braised leg of rabbit with white corn and Perigord truffle, suckling veal with rhubarb, asparagus and sorrel and a coffee tart with Ofteringer physalis excited the taste buds.
Fortunately, the area, which still meant the end of the world for the steel city boy and has now become the middle of the world for Eva-Maria Pürmayer, offers plenty of exercise in a nature where couples can still find lonely places, and where next to wild boar and Fox also say good night to moose and wolf. The Nordwaldkammweg is wonderful for hiking, the Vltava reservoir is not far away, and with the e-mountain bike you can do cross-border laps on secluded paths.
But there must be one last meal, says Thomas Hofer. The loaves of bread are ready, with skillful hands the chef stretches original Neapolitan pizza dough, which briefly becomes crispy in the oven and, topped with sour cream, diced bacon, spring onions and cabbage, tastes like a Mühlviertler Feuerflecken. One can only say: Bergergut, everything is fine.
- Events for bread baking courses in the Bergergut: 9th-10th May | 6th-7th June | 8th-9th August | 12-13 August, bookable as a hotel accommodation package: 3 days/2 nights from Monday to Wednesday from € 505 p. P. incl. all Bergergut services + bread baking course.
- cooking class “Herb-Vegetable-Kitchen & Local Fish” on April 11 (without overnight stay 165 euros, 4 hours, recipes, four-course dinner with accompanying drinks during the course; from 505 euros with course and two nights including half-board) romantik.at
Source: Nachrichten
