Rebecca Palacios |
Logroño, (EFE).- The restaurant with a Michelin star Venta Moncalvillo, in Daroca de Rioja, offers its diners “live an experience” in its new dining room, made with recycled materials and energy efficiency techniques, which has allowed it to achieve the AENOR certificate as one of the most sustainable establishments in Spain.
Carlos Echapresto, the restaurant’s sommelier, has detailed to EFE that, with this extension, the garden next to the restaurant is fully integrated into the dining room thanks to a huge window of almost 33 square meters.
Echapresto and his brother Ignacio, the establishment’s chef, opened this restaurant in 1996 in their hometown, with just 60 registered residents, and they put it on the gastronomic map by achieving its Michelin star in 2010, thanks to a cuisine made with local products. , like vegetables from his own garden.
Venta Moncalvillo, which since last year also has a Michelin green star for its commitment to sustainability, begins the season on May 15 with a renewed menu, in which a totally vegetarian menu has been incorporated, at the request of the international clients.
The menu is nourished by vegetables from the garden and from local farmers, meat from farmers in the area, trout from a nearby fish farm, cod from Rioja suppliers and regional truffles; and spices from abroad, such as cinnamon, vanilla, cloves and nutmeg, have also been replaced by herbs “from the environment”.
With this expansion of almost 200 square meters, the dining room increases from 24 to 34 diners, served by a staff of 26 permanent workers, which has also been reinforced, explained Echapresto, National Gastronomy Award winner for the best Sommelier in 2016.
“The positive part of the pandemic was that it allowed us to stop and think. Many things have changed, from the way of reserving a restaurant at meal times, which has been half an hour in advance. Now the diner selects more and prefers to live an experience ”, she has related.
live an experience
Since its opening, Venta Moncalvillo “had evolved in the kitchen, but not in staging or in the dining room,” he acknowledged, so that “the philosophy” of the Echapresto house has been integrated into the new spaces.
Without any decorative element in the dining room, the large window measuring 11 meters long by 3 meters wide gives diners a peaceful view of the orchard, which is at its best this month.
The entrance to the restaurant is not made through the door of the central building, but through the garden, where an aperitif is taken, to later go to a room, where Ignacio Echapresto receives his clients and dedicates a special time to them, with the sole objective of “enjoyment” of this wine and gastronomic experience.
In the dining room, diners can delight their palates with the best vegetables in the country, because many are usually international tourists who have previously enjoyed the best cured beef T-bone steak or the most exquisite turbot in the Cantabrian Sea.
“We have entered the circuit of the best products, so that customers come to Daroca de Rioja because they want to eat exceptional vegetables and many have previously visited the best restaurants in San Sebastián, Madrid, London and New York,” he indicated. .
Sustainability and energy efficiency
To build the new dining room, “for years”, the Echaprestos have been acquiring recycled materials from other places, such as an 11.5-meter wooden beam from a hundred-year-old winery in the Haro Station neighborhood; in addition to pillars, walls with stucco and lime mortar, “all completely natural”.
With this work, not only has the restaurant been remodeled to have “a beautiful dining room”, work has been done with “Passivhaus” techniques to reduce the carbon footprint, eliminate the use of plastic materials, produce solar energy and the vehicles they use are electric or hybrid, with a charging point for customers.
Fossil fuels have also been eliminated, with pellet heating, and the kitchen stoves work with liquefied petroleum gas.
On the other hand, they take advantage of the rainwater, distilled and without minerality, to irrigate the garden, which is collected in a cistern to which they provide “life” through mosses, lichens, rushes and small animals, such as fish, frogs and crabs. .
This water is also used to cool one of the rooms at Venta Moncalvillo, whose thermal window panes manage to keep the interior space cool or warm.
“All these elements have been placed because we understand sustainability as responsibility: we defend doing things in a natural, respectful and coherent way, not to achieve a label”, he assured.
Venta de Moncalvillo has been the only one that has achieved this year the “Efficient and Sustainable Cooking Certificate” from AENOR in its highest category, which is also held by the Azurmendi restaurants of Eneko Atxa, in Larrabetzu (Vizcaya); and the Cenador de Amós, run by chef Jesús Sánchez in Villaverde de Pontones (Cantabria).