Portrait: Best Bar Menu 2020

Sigi's Bar in Grächen

It is the first SWISS BAR AWARD, which goes to the small Valais village. After the surprise moment, there is great joy in Sigi's bar about the Best Bar Menu 2020 award. The business card of the Schalbetter house reflects how things are done at a high level: down-to-earth, honest and close to nature.

Shortly after the award ceremony in September, Hannes and Sara Schalbetter's Sigis Bar received congratulations ranging from "congratulations" to "we are already looking forward to winter". From villagers, returning regulars and also by digital mail. Because the victory in the Best Bar Menu category of the SWISS BAR AWARDS 2020 also goes viral from the 1400-strong village of Grächen in the Valais.

"We are very happy about this award," says Hannes Schalbetter, who took over Sigi's bar from his father after the renovation in 2009. The Schalbetters had hoped for the title, but they didn't expect it: "We, in such a small village in the mountains, compete exclusively with city dwellers.

With the award, Sigi's Bar beat out two top-class cocktail makers in the finals: the Barchetta Bar in Zurich's Storchen Hotel, which won the same award twice in a row, and Basel's Conto 4056. You won't find a rotary steamer, a centrifuge or extravagant essences with a foam crown in Sigi's Bar. The food is down-to-earth, close to nature and honest on a high alpine level.

Best Bar Menu 2020

In 2020, Sigis Bar won the SWISS BAR AWARD in the category "Best Bar Menu". In this category, the bar with the most exceptional bar menu is awarded. The criteria are both attractive design and a contemporary menu. Further information at www.swissbarawards.ch

"The menu reflects what we are like," Sara Schalbetter explains. Big-city chi chi doesn't wander over the counter. Because in the mountains, the beat is different than in urban centres, where one trend chases another in many places. In the winter sports resort of Grächen, Hannes Schalbetter, a trained hotel manager, does the chasing himself.

As a tapas option, there is dried venison or venison sausage from the patent hunter's own hunt. Even the large antler chandelier is self-mastered. Hunting is also the visualised main theme in the chosen bar menu with the Gamsbock logo on the cover, while a stag subject roars on the associated all-year-round restaurant Walliserkanne.

Located in a winter sports area, it makes sense to run Sigi's bar only during the winter season. "Because après-hiking doesn't seem to have arrived yet, but maybe that will come," jokes Hannes Schalbetter. Each seasonal ticket is adapted to the winter clientele and winter consumption and drinking behaviour.

menu_Sigis_Bar_sprizz
menueSigis_Bar_Mule
menueSigis_Bar_tobegin
previous arrow
next arrow
 

"We are currently working on a variety of sours that are in greater demand here. In general, however, we are noticing that interest in cocktail culture and high-quality drinks is also growing here in the mountains," says Schalbetter. In addition to the owner, there are two permanently employed barmaids who do more than just pour pure wine for the winter guests.

There is plenty of Swiss wine, especially from the Valais. But the menu also lists an aperitif collection with the top seller Porto Tonic, local beers, all spirits, classic cocktails, own creations, Swiss brandies, liqueurs, fortified wines and quite a lot of whisk(e)y including aroma and taste profiles.

In general, we notice that the interest in cocktail culture and high-quality drinks is also increasing here in the mountains".

Hannes Schalbetter, Sigis Bar, Grächen

Hannes Schalbetter doesn't want to withhold his preference for Scotch whisky from his guests either, just as he doesn't want to withhold American, Irish and Swiss whiskies. "It's not a spirits bible, although it has everything. Its design surprises with art and humour from the first to the last page," says Patrick Lobsiger, Head of Marketing and Procurement at Transgourmet Switzerland, in praise of the magazine-oriented bar menu at the award ceremony.

The basic framework of the menu with artfully initiated images amidst the mountains moves from one season to the next. An annual update with new spirits and drinks is created in the months before. "Kick of a Mule" is the title of the photo of Donkey Pedro alongside a fleet of mules like the Winter Special Hot Mule with rum, ginger beer and rosehip tea.

Schalbetter himself stages himself as the hunter of a seasonal whisky speciality, Schalbetter's owl trophy guards tequila in skull bottles, and the badger hunting trophy lurks behind earthy beer on the mountainside. The chef also figuratively sets the scene of the family-run bar in the menu.

With a season opening, when the predominantly winter ski resort fills up with around 5 000 tourists, and an end-of-season party, in normal years the wood- and stone-panelled drinking establishment goes all out. In the off-season, it is the locals who take a break from hiking or working at the counter of Sigis Bar, one of seven bars in the village, or who come specifically to the Schalbetters.

Best Bar Menu 2020

Restaurant Walliserkanne
Dorfstrasse 492, 3925 Grächen
walliserkanne-graechen.ch

This article appeared in
Issue 1-2021

BAR NEWS magazine as single issue

Product added to shopping cart.
0 Articles - CHF 0.00