BASEL

This pretty Swiss city where three countries meet has a rich cross-cultural cuisine. Rösti and bratwurst abound in its traditional restaurants, while exotic eats await those who venture into the buzzing riverside district of Kleinbasel

A food lover’s guide to the medieval Swiss city

When you arrive at Basel airport, you land on French soil. As you walk along the beautiful banks of the Rhine, you’re in Switzerland, but you don’t have to travel far before you’re in Germany. Basel’s restaurants are reflections of this multiple personality: menus swaggering around ravioli and rösti, bratwurst and chateaubriand without pausing for breath. I always try to get under the skin of a destination, but here it’s proving elusive: Basel shifts its demeanour as frequently as a reality TV star changes frocks. So, I head for the zünfte, the old guild houses (Basel is a rich city, founded on a long mercantile past), some of which now operate as restaurants. Imposing from the outside, the wood-panelled interiors speak of ancient commerce. In Restaurant Safran Zunft’s (safran-zunft.ch/en), muralled upstairs room, billionaire art collectors do their hustling over the legendary veal fondue and – of course – saffron risotto. The oldest guild house, Schlüsselzunft (schluessel-zunft. ch), with its extraordinary decorative stove has cuisine as solid as the surroundings. These are very much hipster-free zones. I adore the Kunsthalle (restaurant-kunsthalle.ch). Inside, past the kiosk for laundering your Hermès scarves (I said this was a rich city, didn’t I?), one side is all brown wood panelling, whitejacketed waiters and dessert trolleys, but on the other side of the muralled wall, all is light, white and chic. I’m becoming familiar with menus that feature salade Lyonnaise and pecorino & tomato ravioli, but I’m here for the rösti, insanely buttery and served with a veal sausage, mustard and onion sauce: the recherché joys of beige food.

SWISS CHEESE & HIPSTER HOPS

Despite a world-class public transport system (free if you’re a visitor!), I spend hours walking around – my Fitbit doesn’t know what’s hit it – so I feel justified in eating vats of bubbling cheese fondue in the likes of the tiny, Alpine-hut-like Elsbethen-stübli (elsbethenstuebli.ch). Allegedly one of the city’s finest, it’s made with two different kinds of Swiss cheese.

Rather than using wine or spirits, they do a beer fondue in Restaurant Linde (linde-basel.ch) – unsurprising as it is owned by the Ueli brewery next door (uelibier.ch). I’m shown round the ancient building in Kleinbasel (‘lesser Basel’), the former artisan and red-light district on the Rhine’s other bank, now a magnet for cool, urban Baselers. There’s a hidden garden, a basement crammed with the machinery of production and the art-rammed Fischerstübe restaurant. The beer is fresh-brewed daily: I try everything, from their sprightly lager to a fragrant wheat beer and an almost Guinness-dark brew with notes of toffee. I’m not usually a beer fan but I’m completely sold. My hotel, the lovely Krafft (krafftbasel.ch), is on the same street, the bar and restaurant-lined Rheingasse, and I never get tired of the view over the Rhine from my room. The hotel’s restaurant has the same tranquil views, too, the perfect spot to kick-off the day over pretzel rolls, homemade jams and – sure, why not? – more Swiss cheese. The hotel also runs the Consum wine bar (consumbasel.ch) across the road: tempting for nightcaps, charcuterie and a devastating selection of cheeses. Life here spills deliciously onto the streets and the banks of the river, so clean it bobs with swimmers when the sun comes out. So far, so Swiss: cheese, beer, rösti, sausages. What’s missing? Chocolate, obviously. Off to Confiserie Schiesser (confiserieschiesser.ch) for the city’s famous leckerli, a spiced almond and honey biscuit, and all manner of fine chocolates made on-site. Upstairs, in the tearoom, Baseler ladies sip champagne and eat creamy mushroom vol-au-vents with garden peas: bliss.

STREET FOOD & WORLD FLAVOURS

Enough of indulging my fetish for the past: time for a blast of modernity. And it doesn’t come more contemporary than the vibes at the newly-revived Markthalle (markthalle-basel.ch).

A mix of streetfooders, bars and permanent outlets where the foods of seemingly every country in the world are represented – it’s unmissable. I toy with the idea of arepas, fish and chips, Ethiopian injera, sushi or (of course) burgers; food from Abyssinia or the Persian Gulf or Argentina. But I go Kurdish. Why not? It’s splendid, a kind of spiced lamb, blistered dough pide studded with peppers, nigella seeds and chilli. Wherever I wander, I find charm and friendliness: I look round the Teufelhof Hotel (teufelhof.com) with owner Raphael Wyniger, which boasts constantly changing artist-designed rooms, destination restaurants and a wine store flanked by the ancient city walls. I walk along the river to the hotel’s new outpost, Ufer 7 ( facebook.com/ufer7/ ), for a hip approach to Swiss cuisine: fresh fish, salads of sausage and cheese (my kind of salad), crispy Swiss chicken wings and hand-cut chips, in a river-facing location just by the Mittler Brücke (middle bridge). I have nightcaps in the super-posh Les Trois Rois Hotel (lestroisrois.com); coffees and kirsch macarons in cafés, from the classic (Confiserie Bachmann; confiserie.ch), to the cool (almost anywhere on the Feldbergstrasse or Klybeckstrasse in Kleinbasel). I’m officially too old for the ravey scene that has sprung up around the old railroad tracks of grungey Uferstrasse, but none of its handsome, bearded and tattooed denizens is anything other than welcoming when I stop for a beer and contemplation of the river.

TALES FROM THE RIVER

But it’s hard to drag myself away from Kleinbasel, where life is a little less predictable than across the river. I’m avoiding the high-end Michelin suspects, the likes of multi-starred Cheval Blanc or local hero Tanya Graditz’s ‘edgy’ Stucki. Here in Kleinbasel there are cute little Thais, like Boo (boobasel.ch), and quirky handmade pasta restaurants such as the delicious Gabri’s (gabrispasta.ch). More upscale is Volkshaus (volkshausbasel.ch), a striking cultural centre, beer garden and restaurant. Here, Chef Benjamin Mohr mixes up the classical (a luscious Swiss meatloaf with morels and buttery mashed potato) with the edgy (pig carré with chickpea cream). Sometimes the edgy

I SPEND HOURS WALKING AROUND, SO I FEEL JUSTIFIED IN EATING VATS OF BUBBLING FONDUE

doesn’t quite come off: red pepper and prosecco cocktail, anyone? But it’s a fascinating reflection of real life in Basel, multicultural and sophisticated.

Locals and Tripgourmet bloggers Sarah and Tom (tripgourmets.com) introduce me to the Kaserne (kaserne-basel.ch), a repurposed barracks behind the river where Basel comes to play and picnic in the sunshine. Inside, Post Cuchis, an almost-restaurant made from doors and windows, has different chefs nightly, offering food from Syria or Laos or simply hefty Swiss sausages. If I lived in Basel, I’d basically just live here.

But the most interesting meal I have during my visit is at the newish Roter Bären (roterbaeren.ch). This would appear to be the first restaurant in Basel to get into the ‘small plates’ trend, and chef Roger von Büren does it with creative aplomb, serving guinea fowl with rösti, charred baby cos, anchovies and parmesan, like a celestial Caesar salad. My guest isn’t quite as up-to-speed with contemporary cooking tropes as I am, and marvels at the scallop and cauliflower dish: ‘but it’s all raw!’ Scratch Basel’s occasionally bourgeois surface and there are adventures to be found. Although I like its bourgeois side, too. Wood panelling and art, rösti and fondue: riches for everyone.

# Assistance for this trip was provided by Basel Tourism (basel.com) and easyjet (easyjet.com). easyjet flies to Basel from Bristol, Edinburgh, London Gatwick, London Luton and Manchester, from £19 per person one-way.

LIFE HERE SPILLS DELICIOUSLY ONTO THE STREETS AND RIVERBANK