The Alchemist is the title of an article about Grant Achatz, chef at the Chicago restaurant Alinea. Trouble is, when I see a title like that, part of me thinks "yup, another charlatan designing the Emperor’s new clothes". I think of El Bulli, which is supposed to be one of the great culinary experiences of the world, but which I fear is just shock tactics executed on jaded, satiated palates, whose owners wouldn’t recognise good food even if it snuck up their anuses, crawled through their intestines and exploded in their stomaches. Er, I digress. But the point remains. Is this good food, or pretentiousness for the chattering classes? Andy, what do you think?
The Alchemist
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2 responses to “The Alchemist”
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I have not eaten at this restaurant, so it is hard for me to pass judgement. I have eaten at many of the so-called "moecular gastronly" and experimental places, such as El Bulli, the Fat Duck, Marc Veyrat and l’Arnsbourg. I have no problem with people trying out new technqiues; after all, this is how cooking develops. Unfortunately many of these places seem to be experimenting for the sake of experimenting, to get articles written in foodie magazines rathar than remembering that the idea is to produce pleasing food for customers. There is an interesting contrast here between (say) Veryat and l’Arnsbourg, where the chefs have not lost touch with the basic principles of cooking, and El Bulli and its ilk, which to me have lost the plot. A key is that high quality ingrediens are essential to successful cooking, and I recall a perfect lake fish, caught that morning, at Veyrat, which was so fresh it needed no elaboration, and received none other than seasoning: it was perfectly cooked and had beautiful flavour. Veyrat was happy to mix in unusual flavours in dishes, but generally respected taste combinations and used top quality, fresh ingredients. By and large, his dishes worked very well. l’Arnsbourg in Alsace also cooks terrific ingredients in interesting combinatons, yet the dishes aare actually a pleasure to eat, which surely is the point.
By contrast El Bulli uses some pretty cheap and by no means universally high grade ingredients, and seems to have a desire to shock merely for the sake of shocking. You bite into a chocolate with your coffee and discover it is an olive. Yes this is a surprise, but an unpleasant one: chocolate does not work as a flavour with olive, and the olive was not even that good. Having an otherwise pleasing dessert smothered in basil foam, as happened to me at the Vineyard in Stock Cross, is simply an unnecsssary way to disrupt what would otherwise have been an enjoyable dish. Chefs should feel free to experiment e.g. the sous vide technique works well on certain fish, but not on others, and should not be employed willy nilly, whether or not the ingredient suits the technique.
I really worry about much food journalism, which never seems to question whether the latest fad is actually good, since I guess it is easier to write headlines about some wacky flavour combination than it is to write about simply cooked, beautiful ingredients. You should always be asking yourself the questoin: "was this a pleasurable, enjoyable experience?", and if the answer is no then you should not be afraid to say so and challenge the latest fads. If i want to be shocked then I can go to a horror film; I don’t have to pay large sums of money for my dinner to do it for me.
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Thanks, Andy. I knew you’d have an opinion!
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