Bernd Knöller
Chef and owner since 1993
He milked cows in Segovia and studied at a theater school in Italy, but his life was in Valencia and in cooking Mediterranean cuisine. Now, this German is happy visiting the Central Market daily.
Text by Vicente Agudo (Las Provincias)
His nine-year-old daughter always reminds him with a touch of irony. "How is it possible that you have a horse named Rayo (Lightning), a daughter you named Nora, and a restaurant called Riff if you can't pronounce the spanish 'r'?" This is Bernd Knöller, a German who has never cared about swimming against the current. In fact, he probably enjoys it. Always ready to enjoy a good meal but, above all, to get carried away by an endless conversation. Talking to him is like diving into the unexpected. Interviewing him is a mere fantasy. It's not worth it. You just have to let yourself go. He's a sage, in every sense of the word, so all that's left to do is get comfortable in your chair, be quiet, and listen to him attentively.
Behind a stature more befitting a basketball player hides a person happy with what he does. Ideas for his restaurant are constantly brewing in his head, and he still finds time to enjoy his podcasts and ride his horse.
He was born in Höfen, a small village in the Black Forest, 63 years ago. And he did so on a day that, although he didn't know it, already predestined him for Valencia: March 19th. As a child, he liked few things. He ate poorly. "I tried my first pizza at 13 thanks to an invitation from a friend. I remember only tasting the crusts, because everything else seemed suspicious to me," Bernd explains, while laughing heartily. Now there's nothing his palate rejects, although he admits that snails are a bit of a struggle.
His training began early. At 15, he was already at the Hotel Ochsen in his hometown, before leaving at 18 for the Kesington Hilton International in London and then the Grosvenor in Chester with the firm intention of learning English, something that would be very useful for his real motive: to travel and work anywhere in the world. Like a nomad, he wandered from kitchen to kitchen until he arrived at the Maître restaurant in Berlin. There, the chef Henry Levi instilled in him the value of creativity and haute cuisine.
But Bernd's head was overloaded. "In Germany we have a word that is 'Fachidiot', which translated into Spanish is something like 'professional idiot'. I didn't want to become a person who doesn't know how to talk about anything other than cooking," he explains. So he put a pause in his life. "I even worked caring for sick people in their homes for Cáritas (Caritas). I did that job in the mornings, so I had the nights free and started doing theater with friends. Then I went to Italy and founded a theater school, and that's where I met my ex-wife." In the end, the experience away from the stoves lasted three years, but cooking called him back. With a backpack full of experiences and emotions, Bernd set course for Sylt, a small German island, to work for a few months at Nösse with Jörg Müller.
Bernd knew he wouldn't put down roots in that idyllic area. In his head was to continue discovering the world and expanding his knowledge of cooking. From there, his steps led him to Spain, but since they didn't know where to land, they settled in Segovia, where his ex-wife's family had livestock. "I dedicated myself completely to milking cows and working the land," explains this German, who claims to learn from all experiences, even the most traumatic.
The journey didn't end there. Like nomads, they arrived at the restaurant that Pedro Subijana has in San Sebastián. When the 'stage' (internship) ended, he knew his place was in Spain, but they still had to decide where. "San Sebastián was ruled out because it was expensive; we thought about Bilbao, but at that time it was a very dirty city; Seville had the Expo and Barcelona the Olympic Games, so we finally decided on Valencia."
With the thousand marks his grandfather gave him for his birthday, he bought a dilapidated Mercedes older than Bernd can remember, and with which they barely managed to reach their destination. "We arrived at night in Malvarrosa, and the first thing I saw was a man telling me not to turn off the car lights; he took out a syringe and injected himself in front of us. I thought then: damn, I'm not staying here long." Nothing could have been further from the truth. Let's remember that he was born on Saint Joseph's Day, he was predestined.
His ex-wife had already given birth to Yannick, his first son. Bills had to be paid and money was scarce, so the insistence of the owner of the Sorrento pizzeria had an effect, and he started working there, but with three conditions: "I told him that my family would eat with the workers, that he would buy me a pasta-making machine, and that he would remove the plastic flowers from the tables. They were horrible."
He already knew that he wasn't going to leave Valencia, that his life was going to be linked to this city, so he decided to open his first restaurant, El Ángel Azul (The Blue Angel). The year was 1993, and the first reviews already spoke highly of a German who was developing a very particular cuisine. Eight years later, he decided to embark on another path and opened the doors of Riff, his current establishment. "The name means 'reef' in German, and I gave it that name because I dreamed it during a trip to New York." The Michelin star didn't take long to arrive. "The truth is that I didn't work to get it. I want people to come here to enjoy themselves, starting with my employees, that's why I buy them sneakers and force them to wear them so they're comfortable. I've never sought luxury. I don't want the customer to be intimidated when they see us, that's why we don't wear suits," Bernd reflects.
Knöller's life has always been linked to the product. Specifically, to extracting its full potential until it acquires personality, his great obsession. He cooks it in a thousand ways, explores every possible angle. Like with the oyster, which he has gone from serving raw to even drying in the oven and turning into a spice. "I've always gone through phases. Now I'm into grilling, but I had a time when I turned everything into powder. They called me to give a presentation in Alicante and wanted me to give it a name, and I called it 'Echando polvos' (Throwing Powders). They immediately told me that it might be too daring, so I changed it to 'Echando polvos en la cocina' (Throwing Powders in the Kitchen)," he explains while his jaw drops with laughter and his eyes narrow. He's not into the conventional.
Bernd wants the customer to taste the product on the plate. He detests hiding it under a mountain of ingredients. But for that to happen, the meat, fish, or vegetables he uses need to achieve personality. He doesn't give up until he achieves it.
That happened to him with lamb. On one of his trips to France, he ended up at Alain Passard's three-star restaurant, where he tasted a lamb chop that still lingers in his memory. And a lot of time has passed since then. "During the return trip, I started thinking about how I could achieve that very personal flavor, so I came to the conclusion that I had to let the lambs grow much larger than usual." But of course, these types of animals taste worse the bigger they get, so he decided to castrate them much earlier so that the hormones wouldn't spoil their flavor. "Here it was unthinkable to do it that way, but with my friend Jaime, I've managed to get 27-kilo lambs with a spectacular flavor," he recounts, while asking a waiter to serve us a ham he makes with the meat of this animal.
The Great Conversationalist
"A 'crack' (a star, someone very good at something) is someone who knows how to do one thing very well, a 'puto crack' (a fucking star) is a master. But not only that, it's someone who cares much more about their profession than about having to make money." This is how Bernd, accompanied by Paco Cremades, presents his podcast. This German is a man of long after-dinner conversations, he loves to chat, hence he launched this proposal he called 'El PutoCrack Club' (The Fucking Star Club). For more than an hour, guests share their experiences. It's not a typical interview. They know that Knöller is more about chatting without looking at the clock. Chefs of the caliber of Ricard Camarena, Manuel Alonso, or Steve Anderson, or Begoña Rodrigo, whose conversation lasted almost 6 hours, have been on it. Also sommeliers like Josep Pitu Roca and countless guests who have nothing to do with cooking. He learns from everyone.
Now he lives like just another Valencian and visits the Central Market daily. It's his temple. The place that brings him serenity and where he has found a large number of friends. That's the case of the barista Martina Requena, who has a small coffee stall. For Bernd, "it's the best you can find." Therefore, his daily routine leads him to wander through the stalls to place orders, and then he lets himself be carried away by Martina's coffee concoctions, which have turned this German chef into a junkie for her brews.
Bernd Knöller has dabbled in the cuisine of various cultures, but he soon realized that it wasn't for him, that what he really wanted was to bring the Mediterranean to the plate, "but not the one that goes from Castellón to Alicante," he points out. And he doesn't deviate from that line in the slightest.