Ristorante Montalbano by Mirko Rainer : Via Montalbano 48, 6854 Stabio

A very nice restaurant

A lovely view over the Mendrisiotto and a stone throw from the Italian border. Nice regional wine selection and good food.

The location is well-kept, right from the moment you enter you feel welcomed and at ease: soft lights, warm tones, large, round tables, a large but not distracting room and not overly crowded either. The service is friendly, elegant, without seeming necessarily luxurious, so that you can feel almost at home. There's even a welcome bubble to get you into the mood for a good dinner. The menu is not very long, but sufficiently varied (a single A3 page in a graphic layout in line with the atmosphere), a sign that the kitchen is well organized to provide dishes of identical, and high, quality. You can choose between very creative entrees, first courses that wink at the classics without being banal, and second courses of fish and meat that entice one more than the other. The menu also has a section dedicated to meats (beef, in particular) cooked on the Big Green Egg, another dedicated to raw fish (and mixed fried fish) and finally the possibility to choose between a pre-established tasting menu and another 6-course free-style menu. Desserts are explained upon request at the end of the meal. The meats are probably the flagship of the restaurant. The locally sourced roe deer, cooked in blue and served with sauerkraut, pak-choi, chestnuts and a taste of polenta, deserves a special mention for its tenderness: there was almost no need to cut it. The beef steak is also very tasty, perfect as a starter. The bread basket is also lovely, a whole loaf served with a little butter on the side. The only flaw, perhaps due to an oversight, but worth mentioning, is the dessert: the pistachio, pear and zola semifreddo is captivating in description and generally interesting. However, the semifreddo insert, still frozen, prevents you from enjoying the dessert in a harmonious way: if you were to wait for the insert to defrost, the mousse that encloses it and the pear sorbet that accompanies it would turn into a soup. Therefore, some technical and service aspects need to be reviewed, to avoid ruining what is otherwise a spectacular experience. The restaurant prices are not low, but they are completely justified. For a diner who loves good food and who sees catering beyond the meal, the amounts spent are very acceptable.