Antoine Westermann - One Man's Passion
They say life moves like a pendulum: I believe that cooking is part of that motion. Tomorrow's new recipes are always based in some way on yesterday's classics. Human beings need reference points as they progress, otherwise they would surely be swept up by whatever comes along. There are very few true artists - I believe that perseverance, dedication and work play a bigger role in success than simple style or intelligence. We will never stop inventing, even if we need to stop every so often to take a breath. It's true that styles and tastes go through fads, but they are always based on what came before. These days, the fact that we are seeing a return to a more classical style of cooking can be explained by our need today to feel more secure, and so we turn to the past.

I have always loved slow-cooked recipes, "grandmother's cooking," convivial dishes. Yet let there be no mistake - the customers who come to my restaurant want to be surprised, to discover something new. Still, having one or two of these comforting old-fashioned dishes on the menu pleases me. I am now able to offer them thanks to new techniques (vacuum cooking, "cuisson sous vide," for example, which allows for long cooking, holding and reheating, while maintaining exceptional quality.) I couldn't do this ten years ago. I see this as progress: formerly a dish requiring long hours of cooking could not be put on a restaurant menu, since it would have to be reheated and would end up being of mediocre quality.

I view any innovation that is grounded in a respect for the product, the rhythm of the seasons and a concern for quality as something positive. It is our duty as cooks to encourage our suppliers of poultry, meat, vegetables, etc. to produce and to sell products of the highest quality. Finally, I believe that when we cease to advance, to search and to question, that we "die" to some extent. We also ensure boredom for both cooks and customers. Bravo, then, for creative cooking, cuisine in motion, that can thrill both the mind and the five senses!

A Restaurant in True Alsatian Tradition
When laying out its municipal park called the Orangerie, the city of Strasbourg searched for a typically Alsatian house to adorn it. They found it in Molsheim: a gabled, half-timbered house with magnificently carved beams, a little jewel constructed in 1607, which was moved, piece by piece, to this calm green haven in 1895. The harmonious decor of its rooms, its coffered ceilings, the soft tones of its lighting and windows, radiant glass prisms opening onto nature's exuberance - all these seem to blend dreams and reality and prove that one can progress without forgetting the past.

"We would be happy to welcome you here, to share with you this charm, these pleasures of life." Viviane and Antoine Westermann"

An Ever-Present Heritage
Here Antoine Westermann offers an intuitive and creative style of cooking which draws on his roots in the Alsatian countryside. He is a kitchen anarchist - by which I mean his flair and his inspiration are baffling, hard to comprehend. As the seasons progress, the menu changes. He invents, creates, clears his head during a 150 km bicycle trip and amuses himself on his return by assembling ingredients upside down, creating on the spot a new and electric kind of cooking.

But at the same time, Antoine Westermann includes some great regional classics on his menu, food to be savoured with eyes half-closed. Straight from the nursery in Wissembourg, his Schiedederspäetle (onion-filled ravioli) are a nod to Mamie Westermann. But at the Buerchiesel, this dish from Westermann's childhood is accompanied by frog's legs sautéed with chervil. Goose foie gras, with toasted pain de campagne and a fine Gewürztraimer jelly, quivering and hesitant like a toddler's first steps, is food that speaks straight to the heart. The classic Paris-Brest rubs shoulders with brioche caramelized in beer. The range is vast and multifaceted, but always deeply rooted in the soil of Alsace.

The greatest backers of Antoine Westermann's passion for the flavours of his native region are his producers, dependable Alsatian artisans: Madame Kieffer who sells tender young fowl, the baker Joseph Dorffer who produces good, real bread and flaky pastries, Andrien Vonarb, the perch and pike fisherman, Roger Andres, the king of aromatic herbs who also provides potatoes, raspberries and asparagus, Dominique Schmidt who became a pork producer after a good conversation with Antoine… Only products which have gained Antoine Westermann's passionate approval enter his kitchen, there to be embraced and transformed by his formidable talent.