OUR STORY

First things first
You might know us through friends or you ended up on our page by chance. Either way, let us tell you a bit about ourselves. We are Alan and Linda, partners in crime – in so many ways. We met through work in 2015. If you ask Alan, he will always say Linda came looking for a job and got more than she bargained for. We are like fire and ice. The emotional, dramatic Latino and the calm but determined German. On our first lunch together with a set menu, Alan chose sparkling water, soup, meat and red wine, while Linda went for still water, salad, veggies and white. It couldn’t have been more different. But we quickly learned to value those differences and appreciate the strength in complementing each other. Today we have been married for 3 years and have a big patchwork family with four children. We still share more than our private life. We have founded, grown and sold a business, ran various consulting projects together and co-taught at ETH. When we manage to leave the kids with grandma we pack our bags and travel – from the mountains of Patagonia to vineyards in Bordeaux or our sweet second home in Madrid. Our love for food has brought us to the highest ranked Michelin restaurants, as well as street food stalls and local markets. One day in the future we would like to own a vineyard, but that’s a project for another day.

Why a supper club?
There is something special about dinner conversations. Sharing a delicious meal with someone else not only makes the food taste better, better also creates an inviting atmosphere where we feel at ease to share our thoughts, our opinions, our memories, our emotions. Wine glass in hand, we can laugh about what annoyed us that day and make plans for the next. We forget the time and find ourselves not wanting the evening to end.

Once we had kids and were more frequetly bound to home, we started inviting friends over for dinner several times a week. On those nights we rather invested the money saved from babysitting on a fancy bottle of wine and put on our aprons to prepare a special meal for our guests. We always enjoyed cooking and trying out new recipes and ingredients inspired by the restaurants and places we travelled to. But hosting people at home, is more than just an occasion to cook and bring out the nice cutlery. The conversations we have on those evenings around a candle-lit dinner table fill our house with joy and inspire our minds. For one of us it might bring back memories from those big spontaneous weekend gatherings with family and friends in Mexico. For the other, who used to envy her cousins that had a big family, it’s about having a house full of noise and laughter. For us, the kitchen is the heart of a home.

Starting a supper club where we could host not only our friends but also get to know new people, has been on our minds for a while. As it goes, with four kids, several businesses and little side projects it took a bit longer than expected. But we are now all the more excited to share with you : Vino e vida!

And a little about us as individuals…

  • Alan is Mexican, grew up in Mexico and the US and came to Switzerland to do his Masters and later PhD at EPFL. He is an engineer by training who went to the dark side of business. He somehow balanced corporate roles while founding a few startups. The innovation consultancy called Spark Works which he co-founded with Linda, a Fintech for Treasury management, an Ed-Tech for corporate up-skilling or more recently a venture in the energy space. Alan is full of sparks and aspirations. Not a day goes by where he doesn't bring home another idea, whether it's a wine bar or a Porsche garage. Which brings us to two of his biggest passions: beautiful cars and fine drinks. Ask him for his Negroni car, when you come to our house.

    He is the one who will select the wine from his carefully curated, and less carefully purchased cellar. He makes sure your glass is never empty. Because life is too short to drink water.

  • Linda comes from Germany, Munich to be specific. But you won't hear a Bavarian accent, partially because she has been living in Zurich for quite a while now, and partially because she mostly hears Spanish and English at home She did her Bachelors at art school and then a masters in strategic design and innovation management. Together with Alan she started an innovation consultancy which they sold 3 yeas ago. Since then she has been working as Director for Innovation at a large Venture Builder. While Alan is the visionary, Linda is the meticulous executioner and orchestrator. Not only at work, but also in the kitchen. She loves exploring new ingredients and spices and trying new dishes to arrange a symphony for the mouth and the eye. When she finds time for herself between work and the little kids, she goes to a yoga retreat or lets her creativity flow with a painting, pottery or goldsmith workshop.

    To Alan's disappointment, she is a vegetarian for over 20 years now and makes sure there's always a fresh salad and vegetarian dish. Life's to short to worry too much about disappointing Alan.