ballast_regime

mahi typically are at their flashiest colors while in the water; once taken out, they begin to turn a dull grey. males (or "bulls"; the ones with greater perpendicularity to their foreheads) usu. have a greater range of color than do females of the species, and they can be anything from a yellowish-golden (which is where their spanish name, "dorado," comes from) to bright green to (very rarely) blue, with occasional black speckles near their dorsal fin. they are a pelagic fish that reaches maturity very quickly, which is why a lot of states in the gulf of mexico have no upper-limit on the amount of mahi you can catch on one day. their flesh is amazingly sweet, and is best when lightly cooked, if at all. iml ballast/regime

the best way to approach a new cuisine: eat it. iml ballast/regime p.s. i've just learned that objective reality doesn't exist. solipsistic heaven, here i come!

what is the measure of such a proposition? is a ten-year-old restaurant "worse" for a patron who has dined there week-in, week-out for a decade rather than a newcomer? or, if the same newcomer could pick random points in a restaurant's history from which to dine, would an earlier point offer a more positive experience than a later? i understand the general intent of the statement, and i would say there are exceptions, like gramercy tavern or charlie trotter's. i agree with tonyfinch's opinion to a degree: a newbie is more likely to be enthralled than an old hat. conversely, a restaurant that changes on a regular basis is going to be more exciting in the long-run for the old hat. thankfully, i'm neither; i stand firmly at the intersection of inexperience and weariness. i.e., old enough to know what to expect, but not old enough to know better. iml ballast/regime "in a controversy the instant we feel anger we have already ceased striving for the truth, and have begun striving for ourselves." --buddha

the question i don't see people asking is, is there a way to increase culinary knowledge, the availability of rare and/or exotic ingredients, and the overall quality and diversity of food-related products at hand without chefs selling-out? is it possible to attain these things without such a trade-off? i think the answer is pretty evident. iml ballast/regime

from the looks of it, there are geographical and cultural pockets of the culinary avant garde dispersed all over this planet at ostensibly random points: barcelona, the american midwest, with single restaurants dotting major cities. as a nascent movement, i see a lot of similarities between these individuals and/or institutions. ferran adria, along with his many disciples in barcelona, is certainly at the forefront of this culinary revolution. there additionally exists people like kenneth oringer, paul liebrandt, pierre gagnaire, grant achatz, heston blumenthal, roxanne klein, wylie dufresne, and a handful of others that embrace such a forward-thinking outlook to whatever degree (e.g., the boys at blue hill, michel bras, marc veyrat, charlie trotter, or perhaps alain passard). there are some similarities between every name mentioned: they tend to defy traditional techniques, either by inventing a new lexicon (adria) or by melding old and new (trotter, aduriz, arzak); conventional wisdom is chucked out the window concerning the dining experience (liebrandt), if only slightly modified (achatz); and there seems to be the underlying motivation that what they are doing is something completely different, something fresh and never-seen-before. i don't know what the future holds for this burgeoning movement, since there are not a lot of outlets for each of the participants to share their ideas. (international meetings for the world of molecular gastronomy have provided common stomping grounds.) there will always be that loose network that has been in place for centuries: word-of-mouth, friend-of-a-friend, person-to-person exchanges, but these types of interactions are limited and piecemeal. newer means of communication have provided more expedient ways of bringing people together; we're using one this very minute. i suspect that despite whatever category this movement uses to pigeonhole itself with, it might always (and sadly) remain a subculture, as fat guy has pointed out, since most people's eating habits in industrialized countries are defined by corporate food industries that rely on monocrop agroexports and the prepackaging of flavored, rarely nutritive "foods." there is cause for hope, and it's found in many fledgling movements: slow foods, the culinary avant garde, community-based agriculture, and the network of concerned people that type furiously every day about culinary inanities. my hope is that people like chef achatz can gather enough critical mass to cast a long enough shadow so future generations will be influenced to eat smartly, healthily, sustainably, and perhaps radically. i think everybody's thoughts on this topic have been very insightful and refreshing. ian lowe ballast/regime

for those i know who have been, they compare it very often to l'etoile in madison, wisconsin, but with a better interior: the food's "good," but not great. the high prices are tolerated because there's little else that good to eat in maine during the dead o' winter. iml ballast/regime

the movie of the same name remains one of my all-time faves, and, thankfully, one can rent it whenever one wishes. iml ballast/regime

chocokitty: i think your heart's in the right place, but i'm not sure i agree with everything you say. as i've pointed out: the increased availability of rare, exotic, and otherwise "gourmet" foodstuffs is more of a by-product of the emergence of an otherwise unseen market for companies because there has been a surge in food knowledge, thanks in part to numerous media. the only reason certain asian ingredients are widely available in many grocers is because there is a demand, which is due to more people knowing about bok choy or different types of miso or tofu. the same is true for organic and all-natural foods, whose larger consumer tends to be middle-upper-class citizens worried about their health and diet. there was a great mother jones expose on a related trend, with the implication that such a market wouldn't exist if there wasn't a demand, since there's no corporate imperative for diversity if there is no profit to be found. all of this is not to say the glass if half empty, but to reemphasize the need for people, like every one of us, to continually try and promote all that we know. my belief is that the majority of food knowledge is passed person-to-person, and it is through these means that we can continue to try and change the way we eat, one bite at a time (to steal a gourmet magazine saying about charlie trotter's). thank you for your insight. ian ballast/regime

that's one of the problems i face when dining out, since i'm not a very big eater (by nature, even though i can force myself when need be). iml ballast/regime

kim wb: i think you ask a very intriguing question, but i don't see you ever making a value-judgment statement: should any industry be such that the most rewarded aren't necessarily the most talented or devoted? i'm assuming that you would say no, since you argue that you wish the restaurant industry was more like your law firm. i concur on one point, that a part of the constant dissing in restaurants is due to envy, stress, jealousy, and because a lot of the toil that goes on in a kitchen is grueling and under-appreciated. spencer: today, as much as ever, chefs are still "overworked, underpaid and misrepresented," especially the vast majority of the restaurant industry's labor pool. behind the people who get the recognition--the charlie trotter's, the daniel boulud's, the thomas keller's--is a litany of boys and girls in whites sweating their asses off, and if weren't for their willingness and compliance, then the big-named chefs wouldn't be such big-named chefs. the average line chef's hourly wage in this country still is far, far, far below the poverty line, and the benefits aren't likely to be that great, either. let's not mention immigrants from south of our borders who are paid below minimum wage, and are responsible for a lot of the bone-grindingly hard work. you mention the "search for flavor" and the pursuit of "perfection," but i don't understand what any big-named chef has to do with either of these ideals; in fact, i've found the very opposite. the bigger the venue, the bigger the soundbite. achieving excellence is not done by living a rock-and-roll lifestyle, but by getting up every day, and doing the same thing, over and over again with the help of others who are willing to subordinate themselves for the same ideal.

spencer: i understand why a part of you embraces chefs who are seen as sellouts; for the same reasons, i empathize with your viewpoint. question is, what is allowing for this increased popular education of food: technology or chefs? i'm more inclined to think it is the former, since the chefs matter very little in my mind (this is not to suggest they shouldn't be appreciated; they should). if it wasn't wolfgang puck, molto mario, and jamie oliver pushing their wares to the public, it would be somebody else. a part of me cannot believe that it is some personal duty to increased knowledge that guides them rather than more cash stuffed in their pockets. egullet.com, like any technology or media, is just a means to an end, and what matters most is how those resources are distributed; in our case, very equally (even if there are some flaws with the site). the greatest contribution to culinary education comes person-to-person, be it in a home kitchen, at a culinary school, or in a high-end vongerichten joint. other media cannot hurt the cause, but it is unsung people--the mother, the guy standing next to you on the line, the cooking instructor--who matter the most (and will continue to). wingding: i really believe, deep-down, most people abhor some aspect of globalization, especially in the narrow sense referred to by economists at international financial institutions. in this way, globalization is not necessarily the exporting of culture, but the creation of a world economy with ruinous effects upon environmental and human conditions. naturally, these impacts will not be felt as strongly within the rich, industrialized countries (although there are some long-term disadvantages that will come as a result). the CIA released a study entitled "global trends 2015," which predicts that the gulf between the world's rich and poor will continue at an increased rate, with grave consequences (e.g., terrorism will grow, contrary to what economic theory has shown). there will naturally be certain segments that are unopposed to these developments, but they are mostly those will benefit from such a system. the world's population, those in the US included, will eventually do something. one need not look far for encouragement: within the last several weeks there have been unprecedented numbers of people opposing a war that has yet to even happen, which is without parallel in history. in a much broader sense, "globalization" doesn't have to be synonymous with PR firms running rampant, average joe's and jane's being thought of as a potential "demographic," or with the scantly-flavored oft-gummy-textured plastic-wrapped crap that is passed off as food by most companies. thank you both for sharing your thoughts. ian lowe ballast/regime

thomas keller is among the legions of chefs (and americans) who will ultimately contribute to what the world health organization predicts will be the leading cause of death by 2020, a very real, scary, and ugly fact. one finds a positive correlation between high-stress environments, like restaurant kitchens, and the amount of people who smoke. i would like to think chefs aren't people, that they would ignore the temptation to smoke since it impinges upon their ability to taste; alas, they are people, and are no different than doctors who smoke or eat unhealthily. iml ballast/regime

the problem with asking this question is that a lot of three-star restaurants are incomparable in so many ways to the four-star establishments. i.e., gramercy tavern is arguably operating at a four-star level night-in, night-out in terms of consistency, but it lacks the dress code, decor, service, ambience, and so on, that one normally finds at most of the four-starred french places, with only one notable exception (bouley, which is decidedly the most casual of the bunch). there are a handful of candidates that straddle the fence very well, like atelier and maybe the now-defunct cello. additionally, how does one compare the food at lespinasse--while admittedly good, it is very boring (to me)--to the likes of aquavit, wherever paul liebrandt cooks at, and a handful of others? i cannot make such a comparison, but i'm also a heretic that fails to see the genius of nobu or union pacific. ian ballast/regime

from popular culture's perspective, there is usually a backlash concomitant with "overexposure," since too much of a (good) thing is still too much. e.g., britney spears, reality TV, lord of the rings, and so on. in a much deeper sense, this question is probably more nuanced than intended because it captures the tenor of our time: globalization (in the sense referred to by economists at international financial institutions, and not in the cultural sense [i.e., "all the world's a village"]), the increasing inequality of wealth, the commodification and replicability of experience, commercialism, materialism, branding, advertising--all of these amount to a world most people find undesirable to some degree, and chefs who sell out are just one of its representations. iml ballast/regime

mr achatz, as a preface, i just would like to thank you for taking time out of what must be a very busy schedule to come enlighten each and every one of us; from the looks of it, we're learning a great deal. i know you referenced mr keller and mr blumenthal, and the idea of diminishing returns, which pertains to the size of any given dish and its apparent flavor repetition (i.e., how much before it's too much?). my question is, do you think there is another point of diminishing returns within extended tasting menus? i've discovered that most diners begin to get "confused" (be it perceived or because the palate is "fatigued") after appoximately 10 - 15 courses, that after a certain point they stop noticing the individual qualities or contrasts of each dish. do you think there is a vague number chefs should be aiming for when constructing super-long degustation menus? or is the sky the limit? (of course, i understand that there is no theoretical limit, as long as someone's still hungry; i am more looking for a should / normative statement.) thank you for your time and knowledge. ian lowe ballast/regime

is there really that much of a split between postmodern cuisine and that which is considered to be classicist? i find three of vmilor's defining characteristics of a postmodernist cuisine to be interesting, but not representative of reality. firstly, no cuisine is purely ahistorical, at least that i'm aware of, unless one is referring to (maybe) artificial flavor techniques that were invented in laboratories in the last fifty years. the avant garde chefs of the world--the blumenthals, the adrias, the liebrandts, et al.--are not completely reinventing the wheel at all, except maybe reconnecting the spokes in funny fashion and changing the tire tread. secondly, that such a cuisine should be "denatured" and without "seasonal variation," which is true of many chefs working today (down to people like vongerichten, or the guy "grilling" chicken at applebee's) is most true of the sector of the food industry that is also the most corporate (be it chain restaurants, or prepackaged food) and somehow the most reactionary (which is not necessarily the same as classicist). thirdly, the "theatrical" nature of food is nothing new, and has been replayed by generations for thousands of years (satyricon, anyone?). if we were to combine these three criteria--the ahistorical, the denatured, the histrionic--i think we'd be left with what is the biggest, most profitable, and most innately conservative portion of food production in the world: mcdonald's, kraft, you name it. as a side note, for those seeking parallels between postmodern cuisine and other postmodern/poststructuralist endeavors, i think there are few comparisons to be found from the postmodernism of literature and a lot of the social sciences. i find that what people in this forum are referring to as postmodern within food most resembles the postmodernism of painting and architecture (i.e., not all PoMo's are same; collect them today!). iml ballast/regime

i still have a hard time swallowing the comparison between music and food, which is OK, since i'm from kansas. the reasons for my hesitation have been vented here before, especially because i think there's a lot to be learned from pretty much all artistic media; nor do i find there to be such a degree of similarity between the two that music should be the most oft-paralleled art form. i think this issue, though, has been well-answered by most people: le fat guy correctly pointed out that every chef uses counterpoint (in the populist "contrasting" definition), and jonathan day has rightly said that it wouldn't be hard for a chef to compose a menu that resembles the traditional understanding of counterpoint (as two alternating themes or melodies throughout the composition). my question is, why would a chef want to use counterpoint (in the second, more refined sense)? should a chef try and accomplish the technical constructions found in other arts, importing into his or her kitchen? ian lowe ballast/regime

robert: i was running on very little sleep, and had confused rothko for robert rauschenberg--who was incidentally a personal inspiration for cage's 4'33", along with a few other artists cage met while teaching in seattle--which came from rauschenberg's series of completely black and white paintings. sorry if i misrepresented rothko, but a retraction's in order. if you'd like references to rauschenberg, i'd be more than happy to dig some up. one that springs to mind is in a phaidon collection of 20th century artistic movements; the title escapes me, but i can find out if you'd like. also, i think your second question is a very good one, about the "rests" or "silences" between dishes. of course, this assumes that one is having multiple dishes in the first place, but if this were the case, then. . . no, i don't think that the "silence" would be the same. for one thing, cage intended there to be sound during 4'33", but it was ambient sound (the sound of the performer, the sound of turning pages [of the musical notation], the sound of the audience, and so on]. when one is not tasting food, there is no "ambient" taste to speak of. cage's intention was to show that everything is music, really, since noise is always present. second, cage was trying to allow for there to be a sort of interactivity between performer and audience, ultimately trying to snuff the line between the two. i'm not sure that the space between dishes does the same, that it would elevate diners to the role of creator (in fact, i know it doesn't). JAZ: all in all, i have no bone to pick with your beliefs, and just wanted to state mine. however, to answer your question, such comparisons aren't necessarily fruitful because, all too often, i see people make this kind of parallels between music and food, but with little success. what about the other arts? (my critique, understand, isn't aimed at you.) what about the underlying need to turn a profit with food? (let's not pretend that restaurant-quality food, which is the level of cuisine most likely to be maligned as "art," isn't dependent upon profit.) why is there a music theory but no food theory? etc. there are just too many dissimilarities for me to even try and make such a comparison (which doesn't mean that i can't appreciate the things they do have in common, which are very few). i would say it's dangerous because it's often lazy: people don't try and treat food as an art unto itself (which it is) and don't try and learn things from other arts (architecture, painting, sculpture and design for the arrangement of foodstuffs on a plate; film for the movement of dishes; and so on). ngatti: i don't disagree with what you're saying: there are, and can be, similarities. iml ballast/regime

mr lynch's and mr o'connell's institution is two weeks older than i am. that's incredible. if anybody goes, i'd love to hear the report! iml ballast/regime

just a short note, since time only permits such: i think it's dangerous and not necessarily analogous to compare food to music (and only music), for reasons that i have already stated. food as art emerges from one overriding principle that one does not find in music, or most arts: the culinary arts are driven by profit, bottom-line, and would otherwise not exist. using cage's 4'33" also doesn't lend itself to any clear parallels that i can see. cage believed that (i) the two qualities that all music shares are (a) the possible range of all sounds and (b) that all music occurs over time ("rhythm"), and (ii) his use of silence was to prove a point (at least to him), that it is impossible to ever really have silence (and that what we refer to as "silence" is a part of sound). to more appropriately extend the cage analogy, it would be beneficial to ask about what qualities one finds present in every food around the world: (i) the range of all possible tastes (and smells); (ii) it is all nutritive; (iii) ? ? ? [your suggestions here] true "silence" on the plate isn't possible in the same context as it was for cage within music, since one is always hearing something. it is imaginable that when i starve, i'm not going to be tasting anything (other than my own saliva). perhaps a more interesting example (at least for me) has to do with minimalism. people like rothko and tadao ando (after a recent venture to his fort worth museum of modern art) have led to me to think seriously about institutions like museums or churches or zoos. a lot of minimalist work (say, rothko) created "empty" or "negative" (re: all black) canvases to point the viewer's direction away from the canvas, so as to call into question the very idea of a museum. similar doctrines have been espoused (and more fully) within religious sects: churches and church officials obfuscate god, and take the true meaning of spirituality out of the hands of the people. i ventured across an essay on ando's work that asserted his museums try to point the museum-goer's attention outside, since it is nature that is infinitely beautiful and since the works hanging inside are reinforce the belief that "art" is something only created by an elected handful. all of this reminds me of a calvin & hobbes, where calvin runs to hobbes, excited about going to the zoo. he tells hobbes, c'mon let's go, buddy. hobbes says, only if we go to a prison first. calvin then walks back up to his mother after pondering hobbes's point and says, i don't want to go anymore. if there were a minimalism within the culinary arts that had a simliar goal--to call into the question the very nature of fine dining by putting nothing or next to nothing on a plate--then i think that would be interesting. there is plenty to be learned about the nature of food as art by comparing gastronomy to all arts, since it is through such comparison we can learn what's relevant and what's not. iml ballast/regime

i'd be really interested to see how many egulleteers, on average, would prefer longer, multi-course meals, rather than a simple string of dishes. certainly every person has enjoyed long-ass tasting menus; they're fun, and are appropriate on particular occasions. i'm also interested to see how many courses is too much, at what point do most egulleteers experience "palate fatigue" (as some have called it) or that indescribable haziness where, after so long, dishes begin to all look and taste alike. what's more, if egulleteers could have their way--if they could mandate what, and how, they ate--how many courses would be ideal? between 3 and 5, for myself, at least at lunch (i don't eat very much). let the diminishing returns come rolling in! iml ballast/regime

cherimoyas, then blood oranges. ian ballast/regime

wilfrid has advanced a notion that argues food and drink as art engage different senses than any other artistic media, and therefore should be treated as having intrinsically different aesthetic appeal. while i don't entirely disagree with this idea, i do not think food as art is entirely dissimilar to other arts. there seems to be a lot of concentration in this topic about the way in which people experience food as art (sensational experience), but two things ought to be pointed out. one is that there is very little that the hard sciences understand about aesthetic preference when it comes to food. evolution hardwired humans with a body that is capable of experiencing the outside world in myriad ways--taste, smell, and sight among them, all of which are used while eating--but one would be hard-pressed to rank the senses, or to try and perceive them as being discrete and separate from the others. there is a lot of physiological overlap in the human body, and as such the brain processes all of these experiences as one: consciousness. when the senses are being triggered during a meal, a diner almost always "feels" one thing, even if that one feeling is textured, nuanced, and with many layers. a cold, paper-thin beet ravioli stuffed with pine nuts and warmed goat cheese will be, despite all the information it contains (different textures, temperatures, colors, and tastes on the tongue and in the nose), seen as the same when plugged into the brain. there are so many factors, both internal and external, that can confound the experience of art. a person may be sick with a stomach flu, going through a divorce, exhausted, or simply cold. all of these will affect the way a person interprets art at a given time. one of my favorite restaurants in phoenix, arizona is restaurant hapa, where i have had many dozens of meals. during these repeated dining experiences, i would often eat a particular dish over and over. some nights it just plain tasted better than others, even if it were objectively made the same. it could've been my mood, the weather, the amount of alcohol i consumed, or even divine intervention. to make statements about food as art and how its different from other artistic media because of the way in which it's perceived is tricky, simply because no one knows enough to make such statements. there are some philosophers and biologists that think all aesthetic preference has the same evolutionary root in our brain, which means there may or may not be qualities that bind all arts together (there's bound to be some forms of overlap, just probabilistically speaking). the second and more important point is that, although food is different than other arts, there has been so little "theory" developed about what it means for food to be considered art (and by art i mean a media that where the creative and interpretative processes are conceptualized and explored just as much as the end product [the art] itself [i.e., people ask questions about what it means to be an artist just as much as they do about what a particular piece of art means itself]). this discussion will benefit greatly from the study of other artistic media because they provide a starting point. we take what's relevant, and scrap the rest. what will it mean to have a food theory? will food ever become art if a restaurant's main goal is profit and survival? will food as art ever have artistic movements like expressionism or romanticism that come out of a particular time, culture, and ideology? what sorts of tastes to people prefer, and why? it is my opinion that food as art will learn a lot from the hard sciences, which can inform curious observers about the nature of the human brain and body: its preferences, its dislikes, and so on. the other side of the coin is, how should food as art be different than other artistic media? are restaurants the only place one should be able to experience truly fine dining (say, of the ducasse level)? can a plate with a collection of arranged foodstuffs have a theme, a message, an ideology? can it say something--anything? how? no one knows the answers to these sorts of questions yet, but i look forward to hear people's responses. as a side note, i would just like to say that i do not think that because a person puts food inside their bodies that it categorically makes food different, since most of this experience is still cerebrally-processed, like all other arts. in fact, all art goes from the outside-in, and ends up as firing of neurons in the gray matter of that wet computer in our skull. of course, food can cause indigestion or other physical discomforts, and it also leaves a taste on the tongue and in the nose--but the final result is something that is emergent and synergistic, something emotional, something not readily put into words. although i think a hierarchy of the arts is not feasible, i do think most of the population unconsciously has preferences for some (say, for narrative media, like films, books, and music first) over others (like functional, non-narrative media, like architecture, food, design, and so on). such a fact is inevitable, but shouldn't be of any concern. chefette argued that pastry probably provides more of a chance for artistic expression than savory cooking, but i'm not so sure. for one, kaiseki is among the most aesthetic forms of cuisine in the world, and there is little, if any, emphasis placed on sweet things. my girlfriend, who lived in taiwan for many years, has said that she hated asian meals (her father was a chef-owner at a chinese restaurant as she grew up) because of their lack of desserts (or because their desserts simply "sucked"). what's more, protein and non-sweet foodstuffs have been very important to our evolutionary forebears in uncountable ways, which may or may not mean that humans have an aesthetic preference for savory things (the proof's in the pudding, so to speak, since most of the world's cuisines do not place a lot of emphasis on desserts, which is because a lack of money and access, but also because of preference too). chefette has also pointed out that need has little to do with art and artistic preference, but i think this is completely untrue. the more someone has of something--say, design or food--the less inclined one will feel to imbue it with "special" qualities, to see it as unique and elevated. therefore, the more functional artistic media probably aren't appreciated as much as those that aren't as everyday and utilitarian. wilfrid asked one of the most important questions that i've seen asked in this discussion: what if most people had a food replicator (a la star trek: the next generation) that could create any food-related thing a person's heart could desire. what would this do (other than solve hunger and make ron popeil even richer) to food as cuisine? there would still need to be people to create dishes and particular types of cuisine. (wilfrid's comparison to music was inaccurate, since a recording of music is still a replication of techniques that most people couldn't do [that is, i listen to yo-yo ma on cd because i couldn't do what he could do, and would still go see him in concert because even if i had a cello, i couldn't play the way mr ma plays (as an aside, i really don't like yo-yo all that much)], which makes the food replicator different than a cd player). if haute cuisine were infinitely replicable, would the preciousness be lost? my guess is, yes, since part of its darling nature is not only its insouciance, but also its uniqueness (i.e., that the experience won't be had again and again). there have been times when i would eat at the same restaurant--say, gramercy tavern--over and over, but it would lose its impact because it became routine. too much of even a good thing is a bad thing, like having to wade through my boring-ass writing. ian ballast/regime

viva la symposium! the quality of discussion is decent, but i agree with hopleaf's assessment of this topic, that it has slightly stagnated ("plateaued," in his tongue), for understandable reasons: (i) we are at an impasse about what constitutes art; (ii) we are uncertain about what we're really discussing (i.e., a hierarchy of the arts, aesthetic preference or food as art?); on (i), merriam webster can provide us a little insight. it defines "art" as, "skill acquired by experience, study, or observation," which is a throwback to times when art was craft, and vice-versa, when it was primarily either functional, social, or religious in nature. another definition--the most comprehensive--further fleshes out art: "the conscious use of skill or creative imagination especially in the production of aesthetic objects." definitionally, art is slippery, especially because exceptions abound. art isn't always conscious (it could be algorithmic, unintentional, aleatory, and so on); nor is it necessarily creative (anyone seen tomcats?); and it certainly doesn't have to be aesthetic (see my preference post about karlheinz stockhausen). all in all, the one aspect that is present in all definitions of art refer to its process, implying that it requires time and skill (even here there are exceptions, but i find these characteristics to me, for the most part, universally applicable). there are many schema designed to dichotomize art into its appropriate constituent parts: organic vs inorganic; representational vs abstract; permanent vs impermanent (chefette); rational vs irrational; functional vs aesthetic; and on and on. most of these systems are just that: intellectual devices used to try and make sense of something that is too broad, rich, and complex to effectively capture like a butterfly. so, when someone tells me food isn't art, i say ok, since such claims are objectively inarguable. i may personally disagree, but my opinion is no more valid than theirs. other egulleteers have also done a very good job summing up art: lord michael lewis has pointed out that art is a proxy for real-life experience (and it often is, but i know most of you can think of counter-examples), while chefette earlier posted that art is fundamentally about ideas (i think this idea could be construed to say that art, like everything, is informational, since it exists, and it is therefore too broad to be meaningful for me). on (ii), i think it would be wise to think long and hard about what we want to accomplish with this topic. are we driving at the nature of art, or food in general? or are we supposed to be contemplating what is beautiful and what sorts of things move of more than others? on hopleaf's assertion that plating foodstuffs in an "aesthetic" way is important, let us not forget japanese kaiseki, which has a longer traditional of refined presentation than either the examples he listed. i would also point out that, while important to the experience of food as art, i don't think plating is integral. which brings me to an important question: what elements within food in general, and dining in particular, allow it to be an art for each and every one of you, if anything? ian ballast/regime

in other words, steve klc, food criticism is just as much a bidness as a restaurant, and it's all just pomp and circumstance. ian ballast/regime