New Swiss Restaurant Brings Gooey Raclette Cheese-Topped Dishes to Cypress

A brand new Swiss restaurant is headed to Cypress with plenty of gooey melted raclette cheese in tow.

Edelweiss will debut next month at the Lakeland Village Center development inside the masterplanned community of Bridgeland in Cypress. The restaurant is the brainchild of Markus Klauser, a Swiss native who will serve as head chef, co-owner William Payne, and their wives, all of whom live in Cypress.

According to a press release, Klauser has a restaurant background, his aunt owns an eatery in their hometown, and he missed Swiss cuisine while living in the U.S. “The Swiss see dining as an experiential coming together of family and friends,” he said in a statement. “Through collective, sharable dishes like raclette, that experience of actually enjoying a meal is amplified.”

To that end, diners will find a plethora of the cheese rounds, melted and scraped table-side onto pasta, meat, and veggie dishes. Other traditional Swiss dishes on offer will include Älplermagronen, which involves penne pasta peppered with potato cubes in a creamy cheese sauce and topped with onion crisps, alongside zürcher geschnetzeltes mit rösti, a dish of beef strips and mushrooms in house-made gravy served with shredded roasted potatoes, which is considered to be like Swiss hashbrowns.

“Edelweiss is a place where you go to relax and spend time with friends and family. We aim to make dining an event versus a simple, quick meal,” said Michele Laughlin-Payne, wife of co-owner William Payne. When Edelweiss opens in Lakeland Village Center, it will join a roster of forthcoming restaurants including Local Table.

Edelweiss plans to debut in mid-April and will operate Tuesday through Thursday 11 a.m. to 10 p.m., and Friday through Sunday, 11 a.m. to 11 p.m.