Sustainable Hotel in Bavaria: Slow Food, Organic and the Common Good at the Tannerhof

The essentials at a glance

• The kitchen at the Tannerhof follows Slow Food and the Planetary Health Diet: regional, seasonal, largely organic, with vegetables in the lead role and meat or fish on three to four days a week.
• Purchasing is consistently sustainable, from a regional network of suppliers – from the organic farm to the natural dairy and the Bayrischzell organic bakery.
• The Tannerhof has reported under the Economy for the Common Good since 2019: people and the environment count for more than revenue or profit.
• Its energy comes from a wood-chip heating system, from 100 percent green electricity and from a growing photovoltaic array that heats the outdoor natural pool in summer.
• Social responsibility is part of it: an in-house pay system above the industry average, fair and gender-equal compensation, and staff housing on site.

What makes a sustainable hotel in Bavaria

At the Naturhotel Tannerhof, sustainability is not a department or a label on the door but the way the house does business. In Bayrischzell, at the foot of the Wendelstein in the Leitzach valley, a family in its fifth generation runs a house that thinks pleasure, health and responsibility together. It begins at the dining table and reaches all the way to the heating in the cellar and the pay slip of the roughly 80 staff.

Three strands carry this stance: a kitchen built on Slow Food and the Planetary Health Diet, consistently sustainable purchasing from regional producers, and a business model measured against the Economy for the Common Good. Anyone looking for the house’s combined view will find it on the page about sustainability at the Tannerhof; this article sets out the individual strands. It is not about grand words but about many concrete decisions that add up in the daily life of the house. Mensch, werde wesentlich – “become essential” – the old house motto describes the way it operates too: as little as possible, as right as possible.

Slow Food: good, clean, fair

The Tannerhof is a supporter of the Slow Food movement. Slow Food began in Italy in 1986 as a counter-movement to fast food and today sees itself as a worldwide network for good, clean and fair food. Behind these three words stands a clear principle: good means tasty, healthy and culturally diverse food, clean means production that protects soils, water and ecosystems, and fair means prices that producers can live on.

That is exactly how the house cooks. There is only one menu a day, the menu du jour, prepared à la minute, without a microwave and without convenience food. Once a week, on Friday or Saturday, a five-course Slow Food tasting menu is served. You eat what comes to the table – no à la carte, no choice, but a kitchen that makes the best of whatever the region and the season currently offer. Head chef Nico Sator cooks for pleasure and health at once, and anyone who wants to go deeper into the culinary thinking will find it in the overview of cuisine at the Tannerhof.

The Planetary Health Diet as an organising principle

A second guiding idea sits above the menu: the Planetary Health Diet. The term comes from the EAT-Lancet Commission, which presented a global reference diet in 2019 – a way of eating meant to be both healthy for people and bearable for the Earth’s resources. At its core it is largely plant-based: vegetables, fruit, whole grains, pulses, nuts and good oils form the basis, with fish, poultry, dairy and eggs in moderate amounts and red meat only in small quantities.

At the Tannerhof this becomes lived practice. Vegetables take the lead role, meat or fish are on the table three to four days a week, and two evenings a week are purely vegetarian. The Planetary Health Diet is not a programme of doing without but an organising principle that brings together what is good for people and gentle on the environment. It also shapes the house’s dietary approaches – from the 3/4 rhythm for guests who want to enjoy and rest, to the Schlanke Tanne Low Carb, the house’s own low-carbohydrate approach. Anyone who wants to see the dietary approaches and the associated health programmes in detail will find them in the hub Therapeutic Fasting and Schlanke Tanne.

Largely organic and consistently regional purchasing

What comes to the table is bought largely organic and consistently sustainable: as much organic as possible, regional, seasonal, without convenience food. Instead of anonymous wholesale goods, most ingredients carry a name from the surrounding area. This closeness is deliberate, because it shortens transport routes, supports local producers and makes it clear where the food comes from.

A few steady partners shape the menu throughout the year:

• Beef from animals in the region: in summer, boarding Wagyu cattle from the Wagyu Oberland organic farm in Hundham graze on the alpine meadows; in winter, Highland cattle come from Waller Georg.
• Organic cheese from cow, sheep and goat from the Tegernsee natural dairy.
• The famous Tannerhof bread from the Bayrischzell organic bakery.
• Coffee from Dinzler and a large tea buffet from Herbaria, the herb paradise in Fischbachau.

Beyond the individual farms, the Tannerhof is part of networks that share the same stance: the Werteproduzenten (value producers), the network Die Gemeinschaft and the Bio-Hotels. The Werteproduzenten partners include the Gmund paper mill, the Slyrs distillery in Neuhaus and the Herbaria herb paradise in Fischbachau. As early as the second family generation, Johannes von Mengershausen built a biodynamic market garden at the house – an early sign that the link between kitchen and agriculture at the Tannerhof has a long history.

One note for context: the Tannerhof is currently organic-certified. This external certification expires at the end of 2026 and will be replaced by an in-house sustainability purchasing rule that carries the same standard forward – as much organic as possible, regional, seasonal, no convenience food. The stance remains, regardless of the label.

The Economy for the Common Good: doing business by a different measure

How a company operates can be measured – and not only by revenue and profit. That is precisely the idea of the Economy for the Common Good, an ethical economic model that puts the well-being of people and the environment and the contribution to the community at the centre. The Tannerhof has reported under this model since 2019, initially in a peer evaluation with two other organic hotels.

The tool for this is the Common Good Balance Sheet. It describes a house’s business activity and assesses it systematically along four core values:

1. Human dignity – respect for everyone who deals with the house.
2. Solidarity and justice – fair dealing and the sharing of responsibility.
3. Ecological sustainability – careful use of the Earth’s resources.
4. Transparency and co-determination – open information and participation.

These values are thought through for all of a company’s stakeholder groups: staff, suppliers, financial partners, guests, fellow businesses and the wider social environment. A large share of the topics assessed overlaps with the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals, among them Good Health, Gender Equality, Affordable and Clean Energy and Responsible Consumption and Production. For the Tannerhof this is not a marketing instrument but a mirror: it shows where the house stands and what it is still working on. The detailed account is on the page about sustainability at the Tannerhof.

Energy: wood chips, green electricity and photovoltaics

A house of this size needs heat and electricity – and here too sustainability is decided in the concrete. Heating runs on a wood-chip system, that is, on wood from the region rather than fossil fuel. The electricity is 100 percent green, partly generated on site, supplemented by Greenpeace Energy.

The largest visible step the Tannerhof is taking right now is with the sun. The photovoltaic modules are growing on the roofs: currently around 450, with about 900 planned by the end of 2026 in the final expansion, installed step by step. In summer the array heats the 25-metre outdoor natural pool, which lies between the Wendelstein and the Sonnwendjoch and stays open for ice bathing in winter. Beyond energy, a sparing use of materials shapes the house: waste is consistently reduced, plastic is largely avoided, and furniture and building materials are reused rather than replaced – whole barns have been relocated rather than built anew.

The house also thinks about the journey there. Three EV charging points are available on a trust basis, and anyone arriving by train is collected free of charge from Bayrischzell station, which is connected to Munich every hour by the BRB.

Fair wages and social responsibility

Sustainability does not stop at energy and purchasing; it concerns the people who carry the house. At the Tannerhof the host is the whole team, not the owning family – around 80 staff look after guests, grounds, animals, paths and flowers.

For this the house takes on responsibility beyond the usual:

• An in-house pay system with pay above the industry average as well as fair and gender-equal compensation.
• Staff housing in houses bought and renovated specially for the purpose, on site.
• Employment of recognised refugees wherever possible.
• A long-serving core staff, which shows that people are glad to stay.

This social side is part of the same stance that shapes the kitchen and the energy. Those who work at the Tannerhof should be able to live well from it – and those who are guests here feel care that is attentive and individual, because there is almost one team member for every guest. More about life and culture at the house, from farm culture to the events across the summer, can be found under Culture and Events.

Why all of this belongs together

Slow Food, largely organic, the Planetary Health Diet, the Common Good Balance Sheet, wood chips, photovoltaics, fair wages – it sounds like many separate topics, but it is a single stance. The Tannerhof sees itself as a nature hotel, and here nature is not décor but a measure. What is good for the soils, the climate and people is good for the house too.

This connection is not new; it belongs to the DNA of the Tannerhof. The first generation already founded the house in 1905 in the spirit of back to nature, and since then each generation has added something – the biodynamic market garden, the new alpine architecture, the Common Good Balance Sheet, the growing photovoltaics. What is called longevity today, we have been doing for 120 years – and sustainability is part of it. At the Tannerhof it is not a fashion but the simple consequence of taking a house in the mountains seriously.

Discover sustainability at the Tannerhof

The Naturhotel Tannerhof combines Slow Food, a largely organic kitchen following the Planetary Health Diet, fair wages and its own energy into a stance measured against the Economy for the Common Good. Anyone who wants to go deeper will find the house’s combined view on the page about sustainability at the Tannerhof, the culinary thinking in the overview of cuisine, and life at the house under Culture and Events. For personal advice, an enquiry is always possible.

Note: This article describes the sustainability and values stance of the Naturhotel Tannerhof as well as the underlying concepts of Slow Food, the Planetary Health Diet and the Economy for the Common Good. Details on suppliers, photovoltaic expansion and certification reflect the state at the time of publication (June 2026) and may develop further.