I have eaten so many Brettljausen in my life that while little things might still surprise me here and there, I was quite sure that nothing groundbreaking would ever occur in my personal Brettljause world. Well, this has just happened, and in a manner so simple and yet unanticipated that I feel like adding a couple of additional points to the rating for the originality alone.
Basically, this restaurant served me the Brettljause in two steps: meats first, followed by the cheeses. Logically, this makes a perfect sense: cheese is known to “shut the stomach,” so eating it early automatically makes the non-cheese ingredients less attractive. It is also nice to be able to try different cheese sorts one after the other in order to better identify the difference. Unfortunately, most Austrian Brettljausen contain just one, maximum two kinds of cheese, and even they are mostly rudimentary. La Bottega, however, is in Italy while being rather close to Switzerland, so it did not take the cheese part lightly.
But meats first. As you can see on the photo, they were extremely Italian: some ham, prosciutto, mortadella and salami. The quantity was not excessive, and greens or any other “side dishes” like eggs, so common in Austria, were completely missing. The bread was fresh, however, and the entire “meat board” served as a fine simple snack to go with the beer.
The second, cheese part was far more refined. I won’t try to name the cheeses you see on the picture, but you can see the variety, and believe me, they all had very distinct and rather strong taste. Having them thickly cut was an extremely good idea, and the spicy mostardo that I got later improved the experience even more.
The funny thing is, for the quality of the Brettljause it served, La Bottega is neither well-located nor looking particularly inviting. It is a tiny family-run pizzeria/restaurant in the small town of Baveno on the Lake Maggiore, which is not especially touristic, being more of an intermediate stop as tourists travel between Isola Madre and Isola Superiore. The restaurant has, however, a very high rating in Google (which encouraged me to visit it in the first place), and it is easy to see why. The service is efficient and friendly (the lady owner spoke fluent English and French), the beer is of an uncommon brand, and thanks to the restaurant’s back-street location, the atmosphere is extremely quiet and relaxing. Spending an hour and a half there was one of the highlights of my Italy vacation.
Leave a Reply