Chef’s jacket XL. First, Peter Knogl sends me down to the laun­dry room in the base­ment to get a sui­ta­ble white che­f’s jacket and an apron; howe­ver, I am exempt from wea­ring a hat. „Size XL,“ says the woman at the coun­ter with a scru­ti­ni­zing, kno­wing glan­ce. I slip on the grey-brown apron with the green hor­se head and the „Cheval Blanc“ let­te­ring and inde­ed feel a cer­tain sen­se of pri­de. And even though the­re are two win­dows through which curious guests enjoy watching the hust­le and bust­le at and around the sto­ve – Knogl tells our pho­to­grapher a litt­le later that he actual­ly lets no one into his kit­chen. To be able to spend a day at the sto­ve in the small kit­chen of the gour­met restau­rant at the Swiss Deluxe Hotel Les Trois Rois in Basel is the­r­e­fo­re an expe­ri­ence as exclu­si­ve as it is extraordinary.

From Bavaria to Basel. For 18 years, 56-year-old Peter Knogl, who grew up on a farm in Bavaria, has been lea­ding „Cheval Blanc.“ According to the French „La Liste,“ it is among the ten best restau­rants in the world, award­ed 19 GaultMillau points and three Michelin stars. At this level, Knogl is one of tho­se chefs who do not just stand in the kit­chen for repre­sen­ta­tio­nal pur­po­ses but actively par­ti­ci­pa­te bet­ween the fish and meat sta­ti­ons. The rather taci­turn chef, who cer­tain­ly has a sen­se of humor, is also proud that he has not been sick a sin­gle day during all this time and has missed no more than two or three ser­vices due to important exter­nal appointments.

Fascinating Mechanics. My acti­ve par­ti­ci­pa­ti­on, it must be said for hone­sty­’s sake, is limi­t­ed to a few hel­ping hands that day and con­sists more of a role as an atten­ti­ve obser­ver. Of all 19-point restau­rants in Switzerland, Peter Knogl has the spa­ti­al­ly smal­lest kit­chen, and with nine employees, the team is almost modest­ly equip­ped for this level of culina­ry art. But the pro­ces­ses, this fasci­na­ting mecha­nics in the inter­play of human hands, appear so seam­less­ly rou­ti­ne that any exter­nal inter­ven­ti­on would disturb this almost artis­tic peak performance.

With Garde Manger Dimitriy. First, Peter Knogl sends me to Dimitriy Zabasin’s sta­ti­on. Dimitriy, who hails from Ukraine, is nick­na­med „Selensky.“ He works with extre­me speed and pre­cis­i­on, so it takes me some time to keep up. As Garde Manger, he is respon­si­ble for cold appe­ti­zers, inclu­ding the vibrant green jala­pe­ño espu­ma, one of the „signa­tu­re dis­hes,“ or the cured king macke­rel with radish vin­ai­gret­te and avo­ca­do. For the espu­ma, Dimitriy explains, you need egg white, desee­ded and blan­ched jala­pe­ños, a litt­le xan­than gum as a thic­ke­ner, gra­pe­seed oil, and as a „secret ingre­di­ent,“ some redu­ced Noilly Prat. „One bot­t­le con­cen­tra­ted to 200 mil­li­li­ters,“ Peter Knogl explains. That’s a good way to balan­ce out bit­ter notes.

Neurotic Rigor. While Dimitriy cuts radis­hes into the finest bru­n­oi­se and mari­na­tes avo­ca­do sli­ces with oil, a dis­cus­sion with his chef about the qua­li­ty of the fat­ty green fruits ari­ses. One of the secrets of the Knogl kit­chen, it soon beco­mes clear, is an almost neu­ro­ti­cal­ly rigo­rous sel­ec­tion of pro­ducts. The two chefs dis­cuss for minu­tes about avo­ca­dos that must not be too ripe, not too hard, but must have fla­vor – and get­ting all of this in a satis­fac­to­ry way is dif­fi­cult. In the end, they agree that Dimitriy will stop by the Turkish „Lädeli“ in the after­noon, whe­re excel­lent vege­ta­bles and beau­tiful fruits are often found. „Getting good pro­ducts has beco­me one of the har­dest things,“ says Peter Knogl. Recently, he had to return seve­ral thou­sand francs worth of lamb loin due to insuf­fi­ci­ent qua­li­ty. However, he is deligh­ted with a thick tur­bot fil­let sup­plied by fish­mon­ger Bianchi. Knogl shows me iri­de­s­cent spots as a sign of the fish’s excep­tio­nal quality.

Empty pla­tes. The first guests have arri­ved, and the Knogl system inclu­des an equal­ly well-coor­di­na­ted ser­vice team. The inter­face bet­ween the kit­chen and the restau­rant is Ahmad Sultani. The for­mer dish­wa­sher and mana­ger of a brick fac­to­ry in his old home Afghanistan keeps a clo­se eye on the dining room and reports ever­ything rele­vant to Chef Knogl. A sin­gle guest sits at one of the tables. Because this could be an anony­mous tester, Ahmad shows his chef every emp­ty pla­te: if not­hing is left but a few sau­ce traces, tha­t’s a good sign.

The sau­ces, in par­ti­cu­lar. In the mor­ning, Peter Knogl coo­ked, sea­so­ned, and refi­ned all the sau­ces. He pays par­ti­cu­lar atten­ti­on to the light fish stock, which forms the base for various deri­va­tions of the clas­sic „Beurre blanc.“ The stock is fil­te­red through seve­ral lay­ers of Kleenex tis­sues to remo­ve any clou­di­ness. Knogl, a tall man with a some­ti­mes some­what angu­lar deme­an­or and hands the size of gar­den sho­vels, shows a sur­pri­sin­gly deli­ca­te side during the­se tasks. Without del­ving too deep­ly into lite­ral kit­chen-table psy­cho­lo­gy here: if one assu­mes that a superb che­f’s per­so­na­li­ty can be reco­gni­zed in their dis­hes, then Peter Knogl is someone with an excep­tio­nal­ly fine sen­se for subt­le­ty and harm­o­ny, as well as an enorm­ous love for his craft. The brief­ly pan-fried lan­gou­sti­ne, for exam­p­le, which I am allo­wed to brief­ly toss in but­ter, is sim­ply com­bi­ned with a cur­ry sau­ce and apple gel. From just a few com­pon­ents, a fla­vor pro­fi­le emer­ges that is both impres­si­ve­ly rich and asto­nis­hin­gly subt­le. „I use two dif­fe­rent cur­ries to make the blend more balan­ced,“ says Knogl.

Chocolate in the Cellar. After the break, work resu­mes at 5 PM. In the lar­ge kit­chen in the sub­ter­ra­ne­an cat­a­combs, I get to coat some pra­li­nes with Pastry Chef Thomas Sporrer. While I try not to ruin too many cho­co­la­te pie­ces, the expert explains the four dif­fe­rent cry­stal­lizati­on points of liquid cho­co­la­te, and that for the yogurt and straw­ber­ry des­sert, he spe­ci­fi­cal­ly bought Gariguette straw­ber­ries from France in the deli­ca­tes­sen sec­tion of a near­by depart­ment store that after­noon, becau­se the qua­li­ty of the deli­ver­ed goods was not suf­fi­ci­ent the­re either.

Finger test for lob­ster. Upstairs in the kit­chen, the trai­ning in pro­duct per­fec­tion con­ti­nues imme­dia­te­ly. Peter Knogl checks each pie­ce of coo­ked lob­ster with an almost ten­der fin­ger pres­su­re: tha­t’s how you imme­dia­te­ly know if it’s good or not. The atten­ti­on to every detail is impres­si­ve any­way. The radish vin­ai­gret­te for the king­fi­sh appe­ti­zer, for exam­p­le, is con­stant­ly re-stir­red by col­le­ague Dimitriy, „so that the radis­hes remain crisp.“ And Knogl tastes it anew every time, just as he brief­ly and cri­ti­cal­ly inspects every pla­te befo­re it is sent to the guest. The chef has ever­ything in view; even the cle­an­li­ness of the cut­ting boards does not escape him. And the herbs used for gar­nish go back into a spe­ci­al­ly desi­gna­ted small ref­ri­ge­ra­tor after each pla­ted dish.

Few Words, High Motivation. The warm dis­hes are pla­ted in seconds with a few move­ments by about four chefs invol­ved, so they can be ser­ved as quick­ly and hot as pos­si­ble. This requi­res few words; the chefs‘ moti­va­ti­on is high. Everyone here seems to enjoy their job and has this dri­ve for excel­lence, which the chef exem­pli­fi­es in every small action, every word. There are no short­cuts, no slop­pi­ness in this kit­chen, which is also why the inten­si­ty is high. At 11 PM, the pace slows down a bit; the last main cour­se has left the pass. Now ever­ything is clea­ned so tho­rough­ly, as if the kit­chen had to be han­ded over to a new tenant tomor­row. Perfection, I cer­tain­ly lear­ned that day from Peter Knogl, has many aspects, and it is pre­cis­e­ly the see­mingly minor ones that mat­ter most.