As a Tyrolean pub kid, Hans Neuner grew up with Gröstl and Kässpatzen. Today, he is considered the best chef in Portugal. Not least because he cooks more typical dishes than many of the locals.
Hans Neuner takes a leisurely pull on his Camel Blue and gazes out at the glittering surface of the sea as the motorboat boards towards the setting sun. The fishermen he is accompanying toast him with a beer.
The fact that a star chef goes out fishing is quite unique. "I don't know where I feel freer," says the 48-year-old, "out here on the open sea or when I'm the first to glide down a freshly groomed ski slope early in the morning."At this moment, you can only imagine how much the Tyrolean-born skier has to overcome to make this confession.
Neuner's rise to become perhaps the most exciting chef in Portugal is remarkable. He actually wanted to return to Leutasch at some point, where he grew up, and take over his parents' inn. That was clear to him from an early age. His older brother Marco, on the other hand, reluctantly decided to do an apprenticeship as a chef. Nevertheless, the first-born runs the business today.
"We had an agreement as a family," says Neuner. "Whoever came home first when their father was no longer able to, would inherit the inn." When the time came, the siblings stuck to it: Neuner remained head chef at the Seven Seas in Hamburg after his father's stroke, while his brother, for whom it was only half the journey home from the Steirereck in Vienna, took over. That was almost 20 years ago.
Shortly afterwards, Neuner heard about a vacancy at the luxury hotel Vila Vita Parc in the Algarve. All he needed was a photo of the picturesque stretch of coastline and he accepted. His new workplace: the Ocean, a glass-fronted restaurant with a view of the Atlantic. His task: to cook up a Michelin star within four years. He achieved this in 18 months. Just two years later, he picked up his second star.
When the port of Albufeira can only be seen as a dot on the horizon, the boat stops. Neuner and the fishermen cast out their lures. It doesn't take long for the first one to hook an octopus. He stabs the squirming animal in the head with a metal skewer. In a fraction of a second, it changes colour from brown to blue. It is dead.
This method is called Ike-Jimi, explains Neuner. It is the gentlest way to kill a fish. He has made an agreement with many of his suppliers that they will kill their catch on board using this method. This allows him to guarantee the best quality fish for his restaurant.
Neuner used to have the majority of his produce flown in from France twice a week. "I had to work hard to build up the large network of regional grocers that I have today," he says. "And that's not so easy when you're chopping away in the kitchen for 15 hours a day."
He also played it safe back then; French classics, a bit of Spanish molecular cuisine, just like his Portuguese colleagues, who were really up for it. Home cooking was hardly valued in Portugal back then. It is thanks to Neuner that this has changed. And the coronavirus pandemic also has something to do with it.
A really cool beach bar, that's still a lifelong dream.
Instead of hoping for an early end to the lockdown in the closed restaurant, Neuner bought a tent and a sleeping bag and travelled through Portugal on his Harley. He helped the rice farmers with their field work, went out to sea with the fishermen before sunrise and lent a hand on a tea plantation.
The 12-course menu that he created in summer 2020 based on these experiences was a declaration of love to his new home. He not only won over the hotel guests, but also the locals. Since then, each of his menus has taken him to a different part of the world, which the seafaring nation of Portugal opened up for trade from the 15th century onwards.
"We sat down with historians who explained to us exactly how we should travel so that our route corresponds to that of the Portuguese explorers," he explains.
The most recent exploratory tour took Neuner and his team to Asia. "Early morning at the Toyosu fish market" is the name of a course for which Neuner combines tuna belly with porcini mushroom miso and Japanese mustard. Behind "Everything about rice" is langoustine with homemade koji and yuzu, while "Tokyo Drift" is a composition of sea bass, lobster gyoza, sugar kombu and a broccoli tartare. The names are all allusions to experiences.
One journey is still to come: the spice route that Portugal once used to import pepper, nutmeg, cloves and cinnamon from India; goods that were of immeasurable value in the Middle Ages. After that, it would be time to reinvent himself again, says Neuner. He might even turn his back on Michelin-starred cuisine completely at some point. "A really cool beach bar, that's still a lifelong dream."
On days off, Neuner sometimes gets on his motorcycle and rides 10 kilometres along the coast to Villa Joya on the edge of Albufeira. Another Austrian has been cooking there since 1990, and he also has two stars: Dieter Koschina.
When Neuner came to Portugal, the Platzhirsch eyed him critically at first, but they are now friends. They ride around together on their Harleys, chat about work and also about their homesickness for snow and the Alps.
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