In collaboration with out partner MICHELIN, let us take you on a culinary journey across Europe to the restaurants of the most extraordinary MICHELIN star chefs. Experience how passion meets perfection to create unique delights. Every month we accompany an award-winning chef in a video portrait, as they lead us through unique dishes and gastronomic virtuosity . Get inspired by the exclusive recipes of selected star chefs. Welcome to the world of High Performance Chefs!

We were delighted to meet the chef at his restaurant Rutz in Berlin and get a glimpse behind the scenes whilst he prepared three star High Performance dishes. He was also accompanied by another protagonist: The Mercedes-AMG GT 63 S (Kraftstoffverbrauch kombiniert: 12,5 l/100 km, CO2-Emissionen kombiniert: 285 g/km, Emissionsangabe [1]).

Located in the heart of Berlin, Marco Müller has been the head chef at Rutz for the last 17 years. Although the restaurant may be small, it is nevertheless Müller's ambition to transform creative thinking into the finest degree of culinary genius. Enthusiasm, high precision, and elegant design are all things Marco Müller and AMG have in common. Just like AMG vehicles, the complex components of Müller's dishes are a kind of artistic science, executed with maximum precision: Needles from larch are plucked and pulverized with the help of frigid -250°C liquid nitrogen; at the other extreme, 28g slices of tomato are steeped for six hours in 100°C green juniper oil; crayfish are cooked for exactly 34 seconds and butter is aromatized with charcoal ash.  

As fascinating as it is to watch the craftsman at work and his art of cooking unfold, one must still ask the question: Why? Marco Müller prepares his "Garum Oxheart Tomato & Green Juniper" dish and explains: "There are a lot of seemingly inconspicuous products. We try to make the products that grow here in our region shine, find new approaches to them, and develop new cooking methods and powerful ways to present them. Our aim is to discover the best way to serve our dishes and bring the ultimate design onto the plate. Just as a car should inspire, so must our creations."

Consciousness for regional products plays a vital role at Rutz and in their success. The restaurant has now been awarded its third star in the the MICHELIN Guide 2020 in recognition of its regionally German cuisine.  "We are situated in the centre of Berlin. Regionalism is incredibly exciting here, but also difficult to accomplish". Like AMG, the MICHELIN-star chef leaves nothing to chance: Water samples are taken in order to find the freshest fish, and farmers work exclusively with Rutz, for which they cultivate special, sustainable seeds and thus produce top quality products.

Marco Müller is one of the top chefs in Germany, but during our visit the high pressure of the MICHELIN world was not at all apparent. “High Performance is a term for aspired perfection. The ‘High’ can be redefined again and again, a goal that can be constantly striven for – I experience this in my kitchen. High Performance is a state of development: Classic structures – rethought and improved". The success of Rutz blossoms from the curiosity, joy, spirit of adventure, and the drive of Müller’s team. For Rutz this means experimenting with methods to produce the best possible surprise. When a particular method proves successful, a whole new world of taste will be created around a particular product.

"The third star is about absolute perfection and every little detail counts. Sometimes there are ideas that only take five minutes to realize. Some take weeks and some take years" before the team can implement them. Part of the "Garum Oxheart Tomato & Green Juniper" dish is a trout garum that takes approximately one year to produce and requires a further three years to mature before it even makes it onto the menu. With curiosity, Marco Müller dares to think outside the box, and in doing so highlights condensed and intensified flavors in his products in a consistent and charming manner. 

When asked: “Performer or hedonist?” he answers: “You cannot separate the two. I am first and foremost a pleasure-seeker, I like to eat. But as a chef I am a perfectionist!”.  This is precisely the mentality he radiates as soon as he enters the kitchen. And what follows is an orchestrated performance without compromise: A scalpel is used to finely slice crayfish, tweezers are used to place a single roe egg on two-centimeter-wide slices of kohlrabi, eight dots of raspberry gel are distributed via syringe, with exactly seven Oxalis tips. Like clockwork, Marco Müller, his second chef Dennis Quetsch, and sous-chef Aaron Eckenfels work in rotation to prepare the dishes as quickly and precisely as possible.

For his dishes, Marco Müller finds inspiration in nature: "I prefer to be in the open, by the lake, in the countryside – and when these places are connected with a beautiful route, that is the perfect combination of adrenalin and tranquility.” People are always looking for unique experiences and a visit to Rutz is an experience for each of the senses. “For us it’s about food, for AMG it's about driving pleasure.” Each dish tells a story and Marco Müller paints detailed scenes from his childhood in his descriptions – surroundings of forests, streams, fish, gardens, fresh fruit and vegetables, along with the scent of mowed meadows and sawn wood. Shaped by these experiences, Müller incorporates them into his dishes. "The menu should take you on a small journey through the world of our products, capturing the forest-like, resinous scents of nature and reflecting the aromatic world of the forest." Dishes that simply thrill you. An experience that goes well beyond the food itself. 

Throughout the whole process, one notion became clear: MICHELIN cuisine is not only a journey to perfection, but also a path to self-discovery. Marco Müller's culinary story did not begin with cooking, but much earlier with his ever-present passion for nature. Over the past 17 years, he has proven himself as a visionary time and again. Referring to his personal performance moment he says: "For me, there are two kinds of satisfaction: One is creating and the journey to finalizing the dish. The other is to inspire our guests. I am driven by innovation, to always have new ideas, and by the desire to execute them perfectly – when you have reached this point, it is the highest degree of satisfaction. When appearance, grace and passion meet, then I inspire myself.”