Karin Steinbacher and the Limoncello del Lago di Garda
Bbuono returned to Lake Garda, the largest lake in Italy, a destination for foreign and Italian tourists, and specifically to Gardone Riviera to find Ms. Karin Steinbacher. A peculiar story, like her products, of a lady who went from being a journalist in Munich to a producer of Garda delicacies, one above all her famous Limoncello del Garda.
In Gardone Riviera for more than sixteen years Karin left Munich, after her long experience in the editorial and journalistic field and later became head of gastronomic reviews. In love with the lake she opened her own restaurant, chosen in the small square in front of the Vittoriale degli Italiani.
It took her more than a year to struggle with Italian bureaucracy but her passion prevailed.
Here in the Riviera of Lemons she produces, in her small workshop behind the store, citrus, fig and apricot jams and raspberry jelly, always with citrus from our Garda area because, Karin explains, using only the best produces good results.
And we taste her work in the tasting of her famous Limoncello del Garda, different from the many proposals on the market. This limoncello, which fully identifies her, causes an extraordinary fragrance in the nose found consequently in the mouth, has an important gradation and a long persistence that satisfies.
She confides her secret to Carlos Mac Adden, a well-known Corriere della Sera journalist who does not miss good things, who asks him “What is the magic formula, given the essentiality of the recipe? Karin, in that Italian that still has strong inflections of her German identity answers “it is the use of the alcoholic extract of the macerated peels and sugar syrup, and …… made with care and a lot of love” (in addition to the excellent local raw material she herself selected) that is the main and fundamental ingredient for the success of her products. Her limoncello is depopulated and she tells us, with satisfaction, about the joy and amazement she procures in tourists when they taste her creations.
In her homeland, Limoncello del Lago di Garda is all the rage, and Karin Steinbacher is happy to ship her products to the most select German delicatessens to please her many compatriots who visit Lake Garda and drop by her store to say hello. In her backroom, where her small workshop is stationed, she also makes stuffed peppers, apple chutney, and green tomatoes.
But this very nice lady amazed us even more, in collaboration with a winery in Valtenesi, which produces Lugana, she wants to produce a grape jam and is choosing the best grapes to take off the vine at the most optimal time with that single-vineyard winery. What can I say, we left the store enchanted by this German lady with lively eyes, full of energy, passion for the lake and a lot of energy and love for her products, we were amazed by the eagerness to make and the good things that are unobtainable except in her store.
If you are not in a hurry, Karin welcomes you with a smile and you will discover a little piece of her world. You can find her store in Gardone Riviera, in front of Gabriele D’Annunzio’s Vittoriale degli Italiani, under a little porch near the Piazza dei Caduti.
A treat outside where there are little tables laden with baskets of delicacies and treats that is assailed by tourists drawn by the scent of citrus fruits.
Why we chose Karin Steinbacher and her Limoncello del Garda
One evening, while talking with Carlos Mac Adden, we found ourselves discussing Limoncello del Garda. When he told us about this German lady, we were amazed to hear that she produced the best Limoncello of our lake. Knowing his well-known expertise and the strictness with which he judges the finest food and wine products, we had no doubts and went to Gardone Riviera.
What can we say, we were astonished by Karin’s personality and her products, and we thank her for deciding to collaborate with bbuono.
