New York’s Eleven Madison Park, often cited as one of the of the best restaurants in the country, opens a pop-up in Aspen this weekend.
EMP Winter House will take over the Chefs Club space at the St. Regis starting Saturday. Diners can eat in the restaurant or in a collection of outdoor yurts.
Chef Daniel Humm and restaurateur Will Guidara also have restaurants in Las Vegas and Los Angeles. They opened Eleven Madison Park Summer House in the Hamptons earlier this year.
Humm says that when the pair creates restaurants, they think about what they would want to eat in that setting. For Winter House, Humm saw an opportunity to return to his Swiss roots.
"Here, when we think about skiing or snowboarding the whole day, what’s the food we really want? And that’s really the food I grew up with," said Humm.
That means the menu includes classic Swiss fare like fondue and schnitzel, alongside some more obscure dishes like Rösti, an Alpine version of hashbrowns, and Zurich-style chicken in mushroom and cream sauce.
Ninety members of the Eleven Madison Park crew have moved to the Roaring Fork Valley to staff the pop-up. Guidara says that even though Winter House is just in Aspen for a few months, the team wants to be a part of the community.
"We feel a responsibility to bring something really special to the city. We feel so grateful that people have been so welcoming, and we don’t want to let them down," he said.
Chefs Club will return after Winter House departs in April.
