Spago’s final course reimagines the strudel with California plums

The final course of Spago’s nine course tasting menu arrives as a meditation on continuity and transformation. The strudel, still hand stretched gossamer thin as Wolfgang Puck learned in Carinthia decades ago, surrenders to Chef Byron Puck’s vision: California plums replace the traditional apple, their deep mahogany flesh cradled in crimson fruit reduction and scattered with candied ginger and floral garnish. Beneath lies Topfen cream, that tender Austro Hungarian custard, married with marzipan gelato and a glass of Kracher Beerenauslese, the Viennese dessert wine’s honeyed intensity balancing the pastry’s gossamer delicacy.

The dish carries weight beyond its elegant presentation. Spago’s kitchen has always honoured the Austrian traditions that shaped Wolfgang Puck’s early mastery, yet never stayed prisoner to them. This strudel embodies that philosophy: the technique remains sacred, transmitted whole through generations of hands, while the ingredients speak to where the restaurant chooses to exist now. California’s stone fruits replace Central European apples. The wine pairing anchors the dish in something permanent, something that requires time and particular conditions to achieve, yet the supporting flavours move with the seasons and the market’s offerings.

The nine courses that precede it build toward this moment of reflection. Each course appears to contain within itself the restaurant’s dual citizenship: a reverence for the classical foundations that gave Spago its authority, and an openness to California’s light and generosity. The Ebony Rose Plum Strudel, served on pristine white porcelain with meticulous garnish and cast in sharp afternoon light, represents not an evolution so much as an honest answer to a question the restaurant has been asking since it opened. What was learned in Vienna need not be abandoned. What grows in California need not be resisted. The strudel, stretched thin enough to read through, carries both truths at once.

Imagery courtesy of Spago Beverly Hills (@spagobh).