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Some thoughts on merits of molecular cuisine
By David Maguire |
June 14, 2009, Sunday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
THE matter of modern traditional French cuisine versus a new wave avant-garde style was a tete-a-tete point between two prominent French chefs in Shanghai recently.
Claude Troisgros was visiting as a guest chef at Pudong Shangri-La's classy Jade on 36 restaurant, working for two nights in the kitchen recently taken over by new head chef Fabrice Giraud.
Giraud has been in charge for about two months, following the celebrated Paul Pairet who earned a strong following for his "molecular gastronomy" along the lines of that popularized by the Spanish maestro Ferran Adria whose flamboyance is driven by the belief his customers "don't come to eat, but to have an experience."
Pairet was noted for his playful high-end fusion style, using "lots of foams" and "chemical tricks beloved of the new school of kitchen wizardry" that sent palates into ecstasy and the reputation of Jade on 36 to dizzying heights.
Both Troisgros, the son of Pierre Troisgros, who pioneered nouvelle cuisine Francaise in the 1960s and 1970s, and Giraud acknowledged the impact of the molecular style on international cuisine, yet didn't necessarily subscribe to it.
"Ferran is a revolutionary in world cuisine -- he has been called the Salvador Dali of cooking -- and he really changed the way to cook," Troisgros said, having interviewed him on his daily TV show in Rio de Janeiro.
"He told me 'I do molecular cuisine, I have my own style and they call me a genius which I don't think I am. My basis is the nouvelle cuisine Francaise that the Troisgros family, Paul Bocuse and all the great chefs of the 60s and 70s developed.'"
"It was very important for me to hear a chef like him say that," Troisgros said.
"Ferran is a genius, a very strong artist but he admits he does not have a restaurant, he has a cooking laboratory and all the young chefs of the world are fascinated."
Giraud said the molecular cooking style opened his eyes to new techniques that could be applied in the kitchen.
"But for me it's not the cooking of the heart, it doesn't taste how it should," he said.
"Claude's father made us all wonder as well, like in the beginning food was all served on a big plate. Ferran makes us think there's a possibility to cook things differently."
But at the end of the day, Troisgros said, you can't remember a single dish from the molecular style.
"You remember techniques, but you don't remember a food," he said.
"When you say Troisgros, the first thing you remember is a sauce, with Bocuse the truffle soup with puff pastry. The top chefs have their own signature specialties. Ferran doesn't have it."
At the end of the day, the proof will be in the pudding, so to speak, and the traditionalist chef de cuisine Giraud has to put his own stamp on Jade on 36. He promises classical French cooking with a contemporary twist, much like what Troisgros presents with a Brazilian twist in Rio.
And as the internationally renowned three-star Michelin chef Alain Ducasse recommended Giraud to Pudong Shangri-La's Jade on 36, the best is certainly on the way.
Claude Troisgros was visiting as a guest chef at Pudong Shangri-La's classy Jade on 36 restaurant, working for two nights in the kitchen recently taken over by new head chef Fabrice Giraud.
Giraud has been in charge for about two months, following the celebrated Paul Pairet who earned a strong following for his "molecular gastronomy" along the lines of that popularized by the Spanish maestro Ferran Adria whose flamboyance is driven by the belief his customers "don't come to eat, but to have an experience."
Pairet was noted for his playful high-end fusion style, using "lots of foams" and "chemical tricks beloved of the new school of kitchen wizardry" that sent palates into ecstasy and the reputation of Jade on 36 to dizzying heights.
Both Troisgros, the son of Pierre Troisgros, who pioneered nouvelle cuisine Francaise in the 1960s and 1970s, and Giraud acknowledged the impact of the molecular style on international cuisine, yet didn't necessarily subscribe to it.
"Ferran is a revolutionary in world cuisine -- he has been called the Salvador Dali of cooking -- and he really changed the way to cook," Troisgros said, having interviewed him on his daily TV show in Rio de Janeiro.
"He told me 'I do molecular cuisine, I have my own style and they call me a genius which I don't think I am. My basis is the nouvelle cuisine Francaise that the Troisgros family, Paul Bocuse and all the great chefs of the 60s and 70s developed.'"
"It was very important for me to hear a chef like him say that," Troisgros said.
"Ferran is a genius, a very strong artist but he admits he does not have a restaurant, he has a cooking laboratory and all the young chefs of the world are fascinated."
Giraud said the molecular cooking style opened his eyes to new techniques that could be applied in the kitchen.
"But for me it's not the cooking of the heart, it doesn't taste how it should," he said.
"Claude's father made us all wonder as well, like in the beginning food was all served on a big plate. Ferran makes us think there's a possibility to cook things differently."
But at the end of the day, Troisgros said, you can't remember a single dish from the molecular style.
"You remember techniques, but you don't remember a food," he said.
"When you say Troisgros, the first thing you remember is a sauce, with Bocuse the truffle soup with puff pastry. The top chefs have their own signature specialties. Ferran doesn't have it."
At the end of the day, the proof will be in the pudding, so to speak, and the traditionalist chef de cuisine Giraud has to put his own stamp on Jade on 36. He promises classical French cooking with a contemporary twist, much like what Troisgros presents with a Brazilian twist in Rio.
And as the internationally renowned three-star Michelin chef Alain Ducasse recommended Giraud to Pudong Shangri-La's Jade on 36, the best is certainly on the way.
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