Tantris has an expansive and rather peculiar dining room, decorated in the style of a 1970s disco lounge. Orange is a dominant colour. Fortunatelv the food makes up for the surroundings. An amuse bouche of chicken liver was very good (17/20) but my wife´s amuse bouche of a little filo pastry cornet of marinated salmon with a hint of dill was just about perfect, dazzlingly fresh with the acidity of the marinade beautifully balancing the salmon (20/20). I began with scallops with mango and avocado, and this was as light as could be, the scallops seared but retaining their natural sweetness, the mango (from Thailand) of the highest quality, indeed some of the best mango I have ever eaten. The citrus dressing was an excellent foil to the sweetness of the scallops and the richness of the avocado (19/20).
Ravioli of quail egg and peas with morels kept up the standard, the pasta extremely delicate, the baby morels superb, the combination of flavours working well (19/20 easily). Sea bass was served as a generous fillet on a bed of tomato risotto. The risotto itself was excellent, made with a vegetable garlic stock, and the fish was tender though perhaps not quite to the standard of the rest of the meal (18/20). Stuffed tuiles with mango mousse and passion fruit sorbet was a refreshing way to finish, the rolled tuile containing lovely mango mousse, the passion fruit sorbet delicate (19/20). The wine list was extensive and not priced too aggressively. Service was very professional.
What stood out for me were the clean flavours and high grade ingredients. The cooking does not try to pile on too many flavours, and the technique was superb. This had 2 Michelin stars in the 2007 Guide, yet the meal tonight was better than many 3 star places in the world. Its 19/20 rating in the Gault Millau 2006 more accurately reflects the high level of cooking here. The only weakness in the meal was the bread, which was bought in and frankly was just not that good (13/20). It was an odd aberration for a restaurant whose standards are so very high elsewhere.
Further reviews: 25th May 2023
Peter Auburn
07/12/21 It has recently reopened and to enter you have to have had a negative Covid test in the last 24 hours, which they also conduct just outside the restaurant. There was only one menu, priced at E 270. There were 3 excellent canapes to start with - French onion tuile; caviar/beets tart and a wild mushroom tart. A bizarre and frankly pointless beeth broth followed accompanied with a fairly basic sourdough baguette. The following courses were all aesthetically pleasing to look at : Oeuf : delicious Osietra caviar with cauliflower, sorrel leaves in a beet, which combined well. Casier : langoustines with radicchio in a sauce matelote. Terre : celeriac with black truffle in alternating leaves in an olive oil sauce, sadly the truffle was tasteless leaving an overwhelming taste of celeriac, which was very disappointing. Plongee : scallops with various radishes and beets in alternating leaves in a buttery Sancerre nage. This would have been much better if there had been fewer beet courses beforehand and more scallops. This was accompanied by an unnecessary buttery caraway seed tower. Foret : Shoulder of roe deer and apple wrapped in bacon in a rich peppery wine sauce with two roast potato puffs. Buisson : Very light milky ice cream ball with grated bay on its top and a quince base. Chocolat : Very dry dark Sao Tome chocolate twirls on a cinnamon caramel sorbet on top of a soft hazelnut biscuit base with cacao soil. Petits Fours were an iced cinnamon star, a mango macaroon and a light mini stollen. A bottle of 2015 Kuehling Gillot Nierstein riesling premier cru was E 60. Service was very good and overall it was of 2 star standard, despite some courses being poor and having far too many beets included. It was also very expensive at £ 270 per head.
Nic Moga
I ate here on a very quiet Tuesday night last week; I think there were maybe 30-40 other diners so in a restaurant that can seat over 100 I guess that counts as "empty." The 8-course menu was my option with superbly selected wines from their new head sommelier (Justin Leone) who is a fantastic guy and very, very knowledgable. The evening was perfect weather-wise and thankfully this was also reflected in the food, service, and overall experience. The principle of Mr. Haas cooking from your visit appears to be intact: fresh ingredients, sensible combinations, and minimal noise. The last savory course, a medallion of venison, made my knife superfluous as I only used my fork to cut it. If anyone is looking for a safe, classic option for fine dining then look no further than here. As an aside, the decor that everyone mentions is now going nowhere; the staff informed me that it is now considered an "historical treasure" by the city and will never be changed.
J.J.STIVES
This year, (2007), Tantris was 35 years old and, in my opinion, not showing its age a bit. Frankly, I love the red/orange decor and it was updated and redone within the last year, retaining it's distinctly Tantris flavor. "Like a disco" is a bit overboard, I think, for describing the look, and I have always found the colors and lighting stimulating and so different from anything else anywhere in the world, except perhaps in Japan. Certainly, there are those who would view the colors as more suited to a bordello, but then again, if one has never been in a bordello, one would not know. In any case, the brightness of Tantris inside encourages one's indulgence in, and understanding of, what great food and drink should be. I first visited Tantris in the early 1980's when Heinz Winkler was still competing for notoriety with his mentor who ran a far less sparkling restaurant elsewhere in Munich. At 31, Winkler put himself and Tantris on the global restaurant map by being the youngest chef ever to gain three Michelin Stars. Tantris quickly got the reviewers' tag of being "A Temple of Gastronomy in Germany" and it stuck, probably because the designers were supposedly also known for their church designs. In any case, when Chef Hans Haas took over the culinary reins from Winkler, all of us wondered what would become of Tantris. Haas has done a superb job in carrying on the tradition with total dedication, innovative style and a constant, but subtle reference to the glorious Tantris past. I dined there three times in the last year and found the service, cuisine, ambiance and overall quality far better than many 3 star establishments I have visited. (Hayler's similar comment brought this to mind, but I think it remains true). Haas, apparently, refuses to bow to the political powers that have so much to do with recognition in the Michelin and this is, according to some who know far more than I do, the only reason he has not garnered the third star. Not much of a promoter, Haas remains a dark horse in Germany's hotly competitive cooking contests. He is not on TV, doesn't turn up in print advertisements and takes a low profile even in his own restaurant. Haas is seldom seen on the floor, but in the last hours, he may visit quietly with guests on the new upper level over the bar. There is nothing on the menu that I will not die for and each course represents the antithesis of the cliché about Bavarian cuisine consisting of bread, beer and bratwurst. Cataloging the various offerings I've enjoyed over the years would be pointless. I once took a business associate and his wife to Tantris and they sat in stunned silence once they had seen the multi-language menu. Despite my encouragement, they both said they wanted spaghetti and the Director, staff and kitchen accomplished this request without a blink of an eye. On another occasion, a young daughter of a friend was with us and she devoured her dinner and then did the same with the strawberry dessert. Kluge asked her if she would like some more and quickly appeared with what must have been a quart of strawberries. One interesting change over the recent years has been the addition of talented and knowledgeable female servers and captains on the floor. For much of its history, especially while under the lovingly detailed and careful guidance of former Director Peter Kluge, there were few, if any women in service. This change perhaps reflects Tantris' more diverse global clientele these days. If the customers appear to be more cosmopolitan, the prices are not. At current dollar/Euro prices, this is not a place for the fiscal faint of heart. Two recent, (September 2007), meals for the solitary diner, with a bit of wine by the glass, were in the $300US range. The evening menu was pegged at 145 Euro and the "small evening menu" at 125. Whatever the price, Tantris still holds up the bright light for top dining in Munich. Some of the older properties have long gone and a few, like the lovely dining room in the Hotel Konigshof, while equally pricey, lack the finish and sparkle of the Tantris. Located on a side street, within the cool residential trees of Schwabing, Tantris, with its stone gargoyles in the front entry, remains the jewel of restaurants in Munich. JJ Stives, November 2007