RETO Lampart was only 28 when he earned his culinary stripes in the form of a Michelin star at a restaurant in Winterthur, just outside Zurich.

Since then, he's gone on to open his own establishment, Lampart's Art of Dining, in a 146-year-old former stables located in a scenic mountain village about 30 minutes from Basel. There, miles away from the sea, Lampart, now aged 38, offers a taste of the Mediterranean, Swiss-style, with an emphasis on classical simplicity and the best ingredients possible.

'I work with the seasons,' says Lampart. 'It's wonderful for me to find the produce and work with it. The most important thing is that it is the best. I'm fanatical about always looking for better products.' For instance, Lampart says he uses wild, not farmed seafood, getting daily shipments of items like lobster from Brittany, and wild turbot.

He offers a five-course tasting menu at 138 Swiss francs (about S$173), which, by Michelin-star standards, is a relative bargain. The guests in Europe are very sensitive to price and product, he says. 'I have a big respect for purity of product, and I am not a fan of molecular gastronomy.'

Lampart describes himself as a 'purist', where each dish is not cluttered with ingredients or decorated to excess. 'It's better to have three or four products put together in a marriage that works,' he says.

His is the sort of restaurant where the pasta is made on the premises and eight different breads are baked fresh daily.

At a dinner in the Gordon Grill earlier this week, chef Lampart presented a six-course sampling of his culinary offerings. An amuse bouche duo of pan-fried foie gras topped with cotton candy and seared tuna wrapped around a vegetable julienne set the appropriate tone. This was followed by a scallop carpaccio with chartreuse of green asparagus, deliciously light and beautifully presented.

Then came a fillet of wild sea bass, served atop saffron-spiced onion cannelloni, sauteed frogs legs with tomato, olive and artichoke, a dish that truly characterised southern France - the flavour of the Mediterranean came shining through.

Then came a small grilled Maine lobster, accompanied by fennel spaghetti, dried tomatoes and lime foam, and finally French pigeon breast that was especially tender and juicy. A trio of pineapple desserts rounded off the meal.

The top chefs always have an impeccably precise cooking style, and while Lampart's cuisine lacked an obvious wow factor, the sense of quality was evident throughout.

'I still have dreams in my life,' he says. 'I always look forward. If I stand still, it means I go backward.'