Pohlreich's Best Restaurant: Lineup, Results and Restaurant Contacts
Pohlreich's Best Restaurant is a new TV show in which 12 restaurants compete against each other. The series runs for nine episodes and TV Nova airs it every Wednesday at 8:20 p.m. (on Voyo every episode goes up a week earlier). In six opening rounds, two restaurants built around the same kind of cooking go head to head, the winners move on to two semifinals and from there to the final. The format is the Czech version of Ramsay's Best Restaurant, which Britain's Channel 4 aired in 2010 - where Gordon Ramsay put 16 restaurants through their paces in eight pairs, the Czech version makes do with half the field. There are six opening rounds: traditional Czech, Italian, modern Czech, American, Asian and tasting-menu cooking.
Each duel has two parts. First a service challenge right in the restaurant: 30 guests fill the place all at once and the kitchen has two hours to get every one of them through a three-course menu. Zdeněk Pohlreich watches not just the food, but the service, the atmosphere and how well the team holds together. The second part plays out in Pohlreich's own kitchen - both restaurants get the same ingredient and have to turn it into a dish that sums them up. The winner of each round is decided by Pohlreich alone, with no jury and no viewer vote.
It's an unusual role for him. From Ano, šéfe!, his Czech version of Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares, we know Pohlreich as the man who rescues places on their way down - here he is picking between restaurants that rank among the best in the country. A review on the Czech site Kinobox nailed it: the show shines a light on excellent places, but it leaves the chef little room for his sharpest weapon, blunt criticism.
The lineup of restaurants is exceptionally strong - and if you are planning to visit any of them, I would go before the episode airs. After that, expect a rush of curious diners - and a free table will be hard to come by.
Traditional Czech Cuisine (March 8, 2023)
The opening round brought together two places that have hospitality built into the very walls of the house: a South Bohemian coaching inn and a family restaurant in Kutná Hora in a four-hundred-year-old building.
U Jiskrů Coaching Inn
A coaching inn stood on the imperial road from Strakonice to Prague as far back as the 19th century. In 2019 it was given a modern restoration and today chef Martin Jiskra puts a lifetime of experience to work in it. The menu takes in forgotten recipes of Czech cuisine that you won't find on an everyday menu anymore: baked Szegedin goulash, veal udder, pulled pork jowl or pigeon. The inn relies on good local ingredients, uses them sparingly and respects nature. Martin Jiskra has also put his cooking down on paper - the cookbook Recepty ze zájezdního hostince (Recipes from the Coaching Inn) contains nine themed menus, one of them drawing straight on Magdalena Dobromila Rettigová, the grande dame of Czech cookery writing, and it makes a nice gift for anyone who loves to cook.
Zájezdní hostinec U Jiskrů
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Na Pašince Restaurant 🏆
Na Pašince focuses on modern and classic Czech cooking, and on a menu that changes every day it isn't afraid to slot in new and unusual dishes. Going by the many reviews, it's one of the first places to try when you want to eat well in Kutná Hora. The family of Miroslav Kopecký has run the restaurant since 1994 - in a building roughly 400 years old that over its history has served as a warehouse and as a school, among other things. Mr. Kopecký came to his own kitchen the long way around: at first the place was run mainly by his wife Renata, while he spent more than two decades gathering experience at the Hilton hotel in Prague before he could give the family restaurant his full attention.
Na Pašince
Italian Cuisine (March 15, 2023)
In the second round, an established address in Dejvice and a family business that had moved Italy out to the edge of Prague fought over the Italian flag.
Dejvická 34 Restaurant 🏆
Dejvická 34 is all about Italian cuisine. Its chef and co-owner Tomáš Černý has been cooking Italian for over twenty years and picked up his experience under Riccardo Lucque, among others. In the fall of 2021 the restaurant earned a Michelin Bib Gourmand, the guide's mark for places with an exceptional quality-to-price ratio - still a rare thing in Prague. And you can drop in to Dejvická 34 just for the lunch menu (see for instance my article from March 2023 or June 2022).
Dejvická 34
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Di Nuovo Restaurant
Behind the Italian restaurant Di Nuovo stand two seasoned pros, Karel Šimůnek and Petr Hajný, both with time in a string of top places. Years ago they opened a family restaurant, Zas a Znova, in the small village of Hlubočinka - and when the chance came along in the summer of 2022 to take over another space just two kilometers away, they didn't hesitate. So at the end of 2022, "a piece of Italy on the edge of Prague" opened in Horní Jirčany - the Di Nuovo restaurant. The name follows the Italian thread too: di nuovo means "again", so Zas a Znova, Again and Again, got itself an Italian twin.
Restaurace di Nuovo
Modern Czech Cuisine (March 22, 2023)
The modern Czech round is really a clash of two takes on the same idea - cook from what the farmers next door grow. In one case from the Haná region, in the other from South Bohemia.
Long Story Short 🏆
The Olomouc restaurant Long Story Short opened at the start of 2020 after a year and a half of preparation and brings a restaurant, a bakery, a café and even a hostel together under one roof. The kitchen is built on a "world fusion" concept: dishes from seasonal ingredients grown by local farmers, a daily menu and creative dinners that shift with whatever the season offers. In the open kitchen, a Josper grill takes care of the high heat. The restaurant is led by Petr Heneš, who picked up experience in Austria and on stints from Canada through Argentina and Brazil all the way to Indonesia; before that he ran the kitchen at the Cuban restaurant La Bodeguita del Medio in Prague. The in-house bakery supplies the place with all sorts of bread and sweet things.
Long Story Short Eatery & Bakery
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Sůl a Řepa Restaurant
Sůl a Řepa in Strakonice sits on Bavorova Street, in a house that was already a coaching inn in the 18th century. Chef Pavel Drdel, who picked up most of his experience in Italy, works with local ingredients and interesting flavor combinations: the place partners with the farmers around it and tries to use plants from root to leaf. Whatever doesn't get used right away goes into brine or off to ferment - a mark of respect for the plant itself and for the work of the farmers who grew it. Drdel is also the author of "Postní kuchařka", a Lenten cookbook full of meat-free recipes, which took second place in the international Gourmand Cookbook Awards and makes a nice gift for a food lover.
Sůl & Řepa
American Cuisine (March 29, 2023)
The American round is all about meat - Southern barbecue from Poděbrady against a steakhouse by the docks in Michle.
Obora Restaurant
Meat, meat and, for the third time, grilled meat - that's Obora in Poděbrady. Even the web address, pitmasters.cz, tells you where the place is headed: in the Southern states of the US, pitmaster is the title for the person who rules the grill and the smoker. On the menu you'll find a wild boar burger with slices of crisped bacon, a pulled pork burger or a fried chicken burger. Alongside that, a steak of aged beef or the American classic mac & cheese, pasta baked with cheese. And anyone who wants the full American take on breakfast can head over for the Southern brunch they serve here every Sunday.
Restaurace Obora
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Dock House🏆
Dock House means faultless beef on the open lava grill that sits at the heart of the restaurant. The steakhouse by the docks in Michle has been running since 2006 and on the menu you'll find beef from North America, Brazil or Australia - Charolais among other breeds. Alongside the steaks they have a soft spot for veal from an organic farm in the foothills of the Jeseníky Mountains, and the desserts come from their own pastry shop. Anyone who can't settle on a single cut goes for the tasting portion - you can pick 750 or 1,500 grams, with a wide range of sauces and sides to go with it.
Dock House
Asian Cuisine (April 5, 2023)
Two Vietnamese places took the Asian round, and both bet on eating family style - one in a modern restaurant in an office district, the other in a small bistro in Smíchov.
Dian Restaurant
Vietnamese cooking with a modern twist - that's Dian in the BB Centrum complex in Prague's Brumlovka. Along with the Taro and Gao Den restaurants it comes under the wing of the brothers Khanh and Giang Ta - the older Khanh runs the kitchen, the younger Giang looks after service and finances. The name of the place says it all: it comes from the Vietnamese "di an", roughly "come and eat". The brothers are trying to teach Czechs to share food and to take pleasure in it - the evening menu is served to the middle of the table and guests taste several dishes at once from shared plates. On the menu you'll find beef rendang, gyoza dumplings or banh it, and bánh cuốn rice rolls.
Dian
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Nhà hai hành Bistro 🏆
The Smíchov bistro a short walk from Anděl is run by Tomáš Cibulka and his wife Tinni - and it owes them its name: Nhà hai hành means "The House of Two Onions". The bistro serves food the Vietnamese "mâm" way, family style, with the dishes set in the middle of the table and everyone helping themselves from the shared bowls as they please; you can pick a meat, vegetable or fish mâm. Don't expect polished design - the place describes itself, tongue in cheek, as Vietnamese punk, and the kitschy decor with flyers on the tables is part of the deal. Order ahead and they'll also make a "hot pot" (see my article from March 2023): a pot of simmering broth goes in the middle of the table and guests cook in it whatever they feel like - thin slices of meat, vegetables, mushrooms or tofu. If Prague's Sapa is too far for you, or you want to try this unusual way of eating on a smaller scale, definitely pay the Nhà hai hành bistro a visit.
Nhà hai hành
Tasting-Menu Dining (April 12, 2023)
The last opening round belongs to places where dinner is ordered as a six-course tasting menu - except the price tags differ by more than double.
Salabka restaurant🏆
You'll find Salabka in the vineyard hills of Prague's Troja, in the middle of a 4.5-hectare vineyard - the largest in Prague, with a winemaking tradition reaching back to the 13th century. Besides the restaurant and the winery, the grounds also hold a distillery and several apartments. The creative, modern kitchen here is in the hands of Petr Kunc, who brings plenty of experience from Michelin restaurants and has cooked for the British royal family and Elton John, among others. The tempting six-course tasting menu, which changes roughly every ten weeks, costs 3,000 CZK (120 EUR); a vegetarian version is available too.
Restaurant a vinařství Salabka
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MACE restaurant
MACE in Tábor offers a modern, lighter take on Czech cooking. It sets store by fresh regional ingredients and a return to nature - much the same philosophy that Sůl a Řepa from Strakonice brings into the show, just a stretch further east. The six-course tasting menu costs 1,250 CZK (50 EUR); don't go looking for an à la carte menu on the website. Chef Martin Svatek's signature dish is chanterelle soup, and the regulars keep coming back for it.
MACE restaurant
Semifinal 1/2 (April 19, 2023)
In the first semifinal, Na Pašince, Dejvická 34 and Long Story Short went up against each other. The semifinal runs on different rules from the opening rounds: first a secret diner visits all three places and one restaurant drops out based on that verdict. The remaining two then face a proper grind - in 80 hours and on a budget of 100,000 CZK (4,000 EUR) they have to build their own pop-up restaurant and hold their own in it. After the secret diner's visit, Na Pašince was out, and in the pop-up duel the Olomouc team beat the Michelin-listed favorite from Dejvice. The winner of the first semifinal is Long Story Short 🏆.
Semifinal 2/2 (April 26, 2023)
In the second semifinal, Dock House, the Nhà hai hành bistro (The House of Two Onions) and the tasting-menu restaurant Salabka went up against each other. Here too it started with a secret diner's visit and moved on to building their own pop-up restaurant. The winner of the second semifinal is Salabka 🏆.
Final (May 3, 2023)
In the final, Long Story Short and Salabka went up against each other - the Olomouc world fusion place with its own bakery against the Troja winery with an entry in the Michelin guide. Zdeněk Pohlreich decided the result himself. The outright winner of the first season of Pohlreich's Best Restaurant is Salabka! Petr Kunc and his team became the first winner in the show's history, picked by Pohlreich himself.
Source of the opening image: the official website of Pohlreich's Best Restaurant.
