Crazy Khinkali

Review

Tel Aviv in the Hofmühlgasse

These pages are starting to look like a Gumpendorfer Strasse infomercial, but there are just so many great new things happening there: Kia's Kitchen with the great Brazilian stews and the really good bean salad, the X.O. Grill, where I did get a burger last week, which was actually world class.
In summer, the French Ma Belle and what is currently the best patisserie in the city, Peti Pari, and last but not least, Vienna's only cool champagne bar, Frau Bernhard, and Kuishimbo (both opened in Esterházygasse in 2018).
At the end of last year, something came along that wasn't expected because it wasn't at the top of the trend agenda: crêpes.
But actually, Royi Shwartz's little crêperie is as trendy as it gets: firstly, the likeable man comes from Tel Aviv, secondly, he makes his crêpes from sourdough that he has prepared himself and developed over years - 1417 trials - and thirdly, he ferments everything that is not up to scratch and uses every scrap of any leftovers to make something new.
What more can we say: the man has even tried to give the wilted flowers from his restaurant a new meaning by fermenting and pulverizing them. And that's not the end of Royi Shwartz's surprises.
For example, when he tells us that he has had a career in some of the best gourmet restaurants in Europe and the USA and has completed "stages" (unpaid work placements that chefs do with highly decorated chefs in order to learn something and refresh their CV) with no fewer than 27 of the really big names.
And that he then thought that direct contact with his guests, working in front of them, the immediate reaction to his creations was more his thing, which is why he started a food truck ten years ago and then ran a street food restaurant in Tel Aviv.
Last year, he came to Vienna, found a small restaurant and set up the cellar as a fermentation laboratory.
And he makes everything that can be made himself: the panettone and the pears poached in Moscato d'Asti for the crêpe with chestnuts (€ 9.50), the gianduja or the red bell pepper sauce, which he combines with (self-)grilled artichoke hearts, burrata and salad (€ 11.50).
Or the combination of home-dried, roasted, fermented and marinated mushrooms with (home) dried tomatoes, baby spinach, pesto and Gruyere on the best crêpe you could ever eat in Vienna (€ 11.50).
They stay warm in the special cardboard box and, if you transport them horizontally, they even stay nice.
Summary:
How could we do without crêpes like this? Great take-away food with Tel Aviv appeal.

Royi's Crêperie 6th, Hofmühlg. 18, Tel. 0655/65 46 62 73, Wed-Sat 11am-7pm, www.facebook.com/creperieil

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