Horváth

Rating: 19
Author: Gault&Millau

Paul-Lincke-Ufer 44A, 10999 Berlin, Germany

19/20
Exceptional Restaurant

BOOK

1 PHOTOS

Chef: Sebastian Frank
Cooking: Austrian | Gastronomic | Local | Vegan | Vegetarian
Services: Access for people with disabilities | Garden | Private Room | Terrace
Style: Casual | Elegant | Exceptional setting | Romantic | With family | With friends

Gault&Millau's review 2025

Let's start with the meat. Because there is no such thing. However, Sebastian Frank does not cook strictly vegetarian either. Because Frank does not use plant-based foods because he considers it politically or culturally necessary, but because the variety of aromas that he teases out of the vegetable raw materials comes closer to his ideal of imitating and reinterpreting the smells and tastes of his childhood. And this content-driven, undogmatic approach also allows for an emulsion of lard onions in the main course, for his "Suppengrün Seleskowitz" as a homage to an Austrian cookbook author in liquid meat-brine-aspic made of ox meat, soup chicken, game bones, ham and calf's feet, and for dessert his classic pig's blood praline is not missing. Meat, then, as a flavor carrier in the form of sauce and essence, not as a piece. Great. And when it comes to this taste, Sebastian Frank is not guided by anything or anyone, especially not by what you usually find on the plates in top gastronomy. He refines his completely independent interpretation of Austrian cuisine far away from Kaiserschmarrn year after year. That's why it's worth trying his signatures again and again, because every time they are a little different. Like this season his "Celery, old and young", a much-quoted and copied dish accompanied by a celery béchamel sauce that refines the combination of grated celery matured in salt dough for 12 months over steamed, fresh celery slices and roasted celery seeds. Two vintages of the tuber thus combine to create a taste turbo that could not be more intense and at the same time simpler. Frank consumes fifty tubers per year in this way, and so that the experience doesn't end at the restaurant door, there is a bag of celery seeds to take home with each course in addition to the small explanatory cards handed à la Steirereck. But Sebastian Frank also has something new to offer, which his easy-going, professional team serves under new management with Miko Klages in the historic parlour, the modern extension to the glass kitchen or in summer also on the beautiful terrace on Paul-Lincke-Ufer - if you can speak of "new" with him, because as rarely at this level, Sebastian Frank is concerned with a years-long, subtle development of his taste images, which he also likes to bring to the table himself. Then such beautiful sentences are uttered, such as "My goal is to apply culinary pressure with elegance - and to constantly develop myself, to ask myself, how do my dishes taste even better, what really convinces?" You can taste this intensity, and you take it from him. For him, the fact that he himself cleans up in the kitchen at the end is an expression of a team understanding that is also not found everywhere, and the effects of which can be felt in a form of lightness and good humor among the service team that blows around the evening. In addition to the "First Stitch", another classic that reminds us of the childlike joy of destroying the perfect surface of sour cream (simply and convincingly implemented with curdled cream, paprika reduction, mint infusion and an intense syrup of garlic caraway vinegar), this season is his "Kukuruz": a mushroom steamed in almond oil is cooked on a hot stone with corn cooking water, garlic and lots of butter, accompanied by dried and grilled mushrooms with a mushroom reduction: a dish that can only be served at Sebastian Frank. Just like the "Lätscherten Salat" – we all know this: Spooning away what has collapsed in the salad bowl and is dripping with sauce the next day is pretty much the opposite of upscale cuisine. Here, the salad from the previous day is deliberately marinated with a vinaigrette with camelina oil, croutons and some classic "salad leftovers" such as capers and lemon – and tastes heavenly. There's no question about it: Opinions differ on the kitchen at Horváth. Some find it unique, others strange. We find both – in the very best sense. The most independent kitchen style in the round dance of the greats is once again worth five toques to us.