The Restaurant at The Dolder Grand

Two Stars on the Hill

4 of 5

The Dolder Grand sits up the hill in Hottingen, far enough from Paradeplatz that you stop thinking about banks. The Restaurant is its fine dining room, and Heiko Nieder runs the kitchen. It carries two Michelin stars and 19 GaultMillau points, and Nieder was named Chef of the Year in 2019. Those are the facts. The plates are the argument.

Here is the schedule, because it tells you something. Dinner runs Wednesday to Saturday, and the kitchen takes bookings until 7:45 in the evening. Lunch exists only on Thursday and Friday, as an amuse-bouche menu. A kitchen that opens five sessions a week is a kitchen that wants to do each one properly. The vegetarian menu is a real alternative, not a plate of sides with an apology attached.

The cellar is reported at around 1,500 bottles, so bring a patient sommelier and a flexible budget. The most interesting seat is the chef's table, a seven-course experience inside the kitchen for four or five guests. You watch the line work and nobody can hide behind the pass. If you only get one hotel dining room in this city, the Dolder is the one where the cooking, not the chandelier, carries the evening. Dress like you mean it, and book well ahead.

Order this: The dinner menu, with the vegetarian version if you want it, The Thursday or Friday amuse-bouche lunch, The chef's table, if you can gather four or five people
The damage: $$$$
Go: A Thursday or Friday lunch, if dinner feels like a second mortgage
Find it: Kurhausstrasse 65, 8032 Zürich