Jonathan Day

Pictures would be essential. I do not have a digital camera, otherwise would volunteer to do these experiments. It would also be good to have a recording thermometer, so that you could plot the temperature of water over time as the vegetables are dropped in and the water returns to the boil. Surely one of the scientists on the site has this kind of kit.

I must admit that I've heard dozens of pieces of advice about cooking green vegetables with water. The advice is always delivered in an authoritative voice: always boil them, never steam always steam, never boil no salt in the water salt to taste like the ocean salt only with sea salt, iodised salt, kosher salt, fleur de sel, salt gathered by elves, etc. use Evian water, Perrier water, rainwater, heavy water, water gathered from dewdrops, etc. cover the pot to maintain a rolling boil don't cover it because nasty acids will condense and fall back in add bicarbonate of soda to neutralise the acids never add soda as it will turn the vegetables mushy boil no more than 1 green bean per litre of water boil in just a bit of water. And so on In general, with beans and broccoli I use a large pot of rapidly boiling water, heavily salted, uncovered, shocking in ice water afterwards, and the results are pretty good. But I haven't experimented much. McGee writes that steaming has the disadvantage of retaining the vegetable's acids, rather than diluting them. A French chef told me: never use a rolling boil, the water is no hotter than at a gentle simmer (this makes sense: the water certainly can't get much hotter than 100C without turning to steam) and the fast moving water will damage the food. Thomas Keller, according to Michael Ruhlman, insists that his cooks discard vegetables where the water doesn't instantly return to a rolling boil as the food is thrown into the pot. How about an eGCI course (or just a thread) with some systematic experiments, cooking the same vegetable, purchased in the same place on the same day, trimmed identically, with steam and a range of boiling techniques?

In the Market street in les Halles thread the discussion turned to bakeries and bakery chains. Bux wrote: Paul is part of a large family firm, Groupe Holder, which has multiple ranges: Paul, for more or less artisanally baked bread, Moulin Bleu, which does bread and baked goods on an industrial scale for retail stores and hospitals, and Saint Preux, a fast food chain specialising in breads and viennoiserie. Paul itself has 240 outlets in France (some of which are franchised, in locations such as railway stations and airports) and some 30 outside France, including London, Tokyo, Osaka, Morocco, Spain, Dubai. I believe they retain the practice of never opening a new shop without sending staff from one of the existing shops to transmit their methods. There seem to be different sorts of "chain" bakeries: Those like Paul, where the product is entirely prepared on premises. Sometimes the quality at these places can be very good. We often buy bread at le Petrin Ribeirou, a franchised chain specialising in pain au levain. Sometimes -- not consistently -- this bread rivals Poîlane's product in taste and texture. Those where the dough is prepared centrally, but the bread baked locally. Most of the supermarket "in store bakeries" seem to work in this way "Dépots de pain", or bread outlets, where bread prepared and baked centrally is sold over the counter. ]Some supermarket "bakeries" work in this way. Despite a resurgence of interest in artisanal baking in France, I suspect that the chains will continue to prevail. My guess is that the economics of a standalone bakery, except in very "high traffic" locations, are not very good. The chains must be able to realise savings in purchasing ingredients and equipment, as well as to smooth out a seasonal dip in demand in one location through increases in demand in others. The good news is that it probably isn't necessary to go to the high volume, factory-made product (Moulin Bleu, in the Groupe Holder example above) in order to make an attractive return. A chain like Paul or Ribeirou can have all the bread prepared, baked and sold locally, yet realise scale economies through central purchasing.

These points are supported in an extensive "survey of food" in the most recent Economist. Its focus is on Britain, but it extends to many other countries. Unforutnately viewing the full survey requires a paid subscription, but the start of the survey can be found here. An article in the inaccessible part of the survey describes the trend toward pre-prepped food, e.g. peeled and trimmed carrots, lettuces that are ready to eat without washing, meats ready to drop into the pan. These are increasingly available in France as well.

Ships passing in the night. Didn't spot you. Next time!

Good heavens! The couple sitting at the next table were clearly "foodies" from their conversation, and I wondered whether they knew about eGullet. Tarka, where were you sitting?

Dinner at Morgan M last night. The basic "Christmas menu": turnip soup, foie gras with quail, venison as described above, cheeses. This was described as "four courses", with the amuse-gueule counted as a course. Service was clumsy but not terrible. We had ordered glasses of Montbazillac with the foie, and these didn't arrive, but a word to the waiter set things straight quickly enough. The cheese service was amateurish but generous: we had a piece of every cheese on offer. It was all in good condition. The food was not flawless but not bad either. The venison was nicely prepared, though I felt that the apple and red cabbage were overly acid and assertive and the venison itself just a bit reticent. The brown bread was delicious. My companion, a visiting professor from the US who has a good palate and is as "well dined" as they come, enjoyed Morgan M but commented that it didn't have the energy and love of the cooking at Chez Bruce, where we had dined on a previous visit. I wouldn't make a long journey to this place, but it's nice to know it is here. I'll certainly be back.

The thread Robert is referring to is here, in the Spain forum. Well worth checking out if you haven't seen it.

Jason, thanks for the tip. When we first moved to London the washing machine broke down so often that my wife knew exactly how the repairman liked his tea. We've no wish to get to know a stove repairman that well. So we'll stick with our Aga.

Not much to add to what Jack and Moby already said. It took me awhile to get to like the Aga, but once you learn how it works, it's a pleasure to cook on. It's perfect for the damp climate here in the UK; our kitchen is partly below ground, and "should" be extremely damp, but the Aga keeps it warm and dry. It gets shut off roughly 6 weeks a year, during the summer; this gives an opportunity to give it a thorough cleaning and servicing. Since I've become a convert to very low temperature cooking, thanks in part to Heston Blumenthal and in part to Jack's advice, the only regret is that even the slowest oven of the 4-oven Aga, the plate warmer, is too hot -- mine, at least, is more like 95C, not 95F, where what I want is more like 65C or 75C. I've finally managed to adapt the electric oven in the "summer kitchen", a Smeg, to maintain a more or less steady 75C, but this took some doing. The Aga can't do this. I can't imagine an Aga in Texas. Yes, I can: a few years ago, we received an Aga owners' magazine (Agazine, of course) describing US Aga owners. One of them was Mrs Horatio Higginbotham III of Houston Texas. She had not only installed an Aga in her new, 2500 square foot kitchen, but also industrial air conditioning to deal with the heat that the Aga gave off. (The only parts of this story I am making up are her name and the size of the kitchen). Much as I love the Aga, if we were building a new house or redoing a kitchen entirely, I would not install a new one -- I'd spend the money on something like this. But otherwise, the Aga is likely to outlive both our house and its current owners. The ovens, by the way, are not really that small. They are narrower than some American ovens, but they make up for this in depth. You can put two or even three chickens in, easily; a goose; a turkey of any size; many pans of bread. The Aga's ovens are far more generous than the tiny ones found on most European domestic models (Neff, AEG, etc.).

I think this is it. I've spoken with Italian winemakers, for example, who segment the poorer parts of their production for export, since the importing customers "will never know the difference" and local buyers are more demanding. A knowing buyer "on the spot" can choose a product of better quality -- e.g. tasting cheeses until the right one is available -- and hand-carry it back. An importer may have no such choice. I don't know the percentage of excellent Parmesan Reggiano, but I do know that it varies enormously in quality.

As FG says, it's not all paradise here in Europe. French super and hypermarkets are generally better, in quality and range than any but shops like Andronico's or Treasure Island in the US. Same is true for the more upmarket British supermarkets (Waitrose and Sainsbury's, as opposed to, say, Tesco and Asda). Yet none of these is as good as the artisanal specialists: butchers, cheesemongers, bakers, wine shops, etc. For those whose goal is fine food, I suspect that the differentiating factor is not price but convenience. Perhaps those who decide to buy foie gras or carnaroli rice will shop on price, but I doubt it: the issue with these products is often more one of access and quality than selling price. What the supermarkets offer is convenience. In France I live near a superb fruit, vegetable and cheese vendor; a good butcher; a very good fishmonger and a very good baker. It still takes a long time to move from store to store, wait in queues, drag things to the car, move on to the next store. When time is pressed, the supermarket wins hands down. And unlike the artisanal shops, the supermarkets stay open all day, without the break from 1300 to 1630, and many are open on Mondays. Same holds in London: the local shopping street has everything I could want to prepare a fine dinner, but it takes longer to get it. In a pinch, a quick trip to the supermarket is easier. And the supermarkets are open later, and on Sunday. The scarce commodity and deciding factor in all of this may be time, not money. Perhaps this should not be the case, and perhaps the previous generation of Europeans was better off with their long vacations, mid-day breaks and generally more slow-paced life. Today's Europeans are working to a faster beat, with longer daily hours, shorter holidays, cell phones everywhere, and a trend toward a "24 by 7" availability. Hence the appeal of supermarkets, prepared foods, microwave ovens. I'm not saying, to be clear, that this should be the case, or that it represents an improvement.

Bux, in reply to Robyn: Robyn's quote was a bit out of context. Here's the paragraph from which it was taken: The poster was describing her attitude toward a repeat visit to el Bulli, one at which, unlike her earlier visit which she found delightful, was a disappointment. But note the generous spirit in which she approached the restaraurant. It's equally out of context to go from a bad experience with el Bulli to a blanket statement that only a few of Adria's course are good, and some inedible. Many have had a very different experience, including the quoted poster on her earlier visits to el Bulli, which she described as "the world's greatest". Nor does it follow that 25 courses invariably lead to a confusion of tastes -- classical French court menus often had more courses than this, and I can assure you that, in my experience of el Bulli, there was no confusion of flavours at all. The small courses made the meal a pleasure. I agree with Russ: judgements based on second party reports are of little value. At least let's not take the secondary sources out of context. Robyn, the QUOTE button will let other posters know whose post you are quoting and when it went onto the thread.

it is possible, perhaps, then that adria's own fetishization of rafa's displays some sort of anxiety/desire on his part--a desire to situate himself at least partially in a different kind of tradition (folk spanish, sushi) than classical french? "i may be wild and crazy and out there but i'm also here" Perhaps. Or perhaps Adria just enjoys eating superbly fresh langoustines, beautifully grilled. The one aspect of Spanish cuisine that is well suited to Adria's style (though I do not know the direction of causality) is the small plates of "tapas" or "snacks", a genre that (apart from amuse-gueule and the like) doesn't really have much of a place in classical French cookery. These small plates seem to turn up on the menus of other avant-garde practitioners as well: Gagnaire, Blumenthal, Achatz. Why, I wonder, is the tasting menu so well suited to the avant-garde? You could do three courses in the style of el Bulli. But it somehow works better with many courses.

I'll let those who know Rafa's speak, because I have not been there. But Adria, for all his admiration of Rafa's simply grilled, perfectly fresh seafood, has invented a new, different and far wider culinary language, one embracing all sorts of preparations and techniques. The experience is not only that of the simple and perfect but also of endless creativity, ingenuity without gimmickry, surprise. Apprendre une langue, c'est vivre de nouveau, says a proverb: to learn a new language is to live once again. That is what many have experienced at el Bulli -- and have enjoyed fine service and delicious (if strange) food at the same time. But nobody needs to go there.

Mongo, I'll start by saying that I am far from an expert on el Bulli. I've read two of Adria's books and dined there once. Others have dined at el Bulli far more often. But here are a few thoughts on your questions It's unquestionably the case that Adria himself started within a European tradition; he claims that it was during a stage with Jacques Maximin, a French cook, that he realised that he wanted to stop "copying". And many of his dishes are labelled with references to traditional French, Spanish or Italian preparations -- e.g. "raya beurre noir", a deconstructed version of the classical skate wing with brown butter and capers. To me, at least, only a fraction of the interest in Adria's food is a result of the riffs on traditional dishes. Yes, these dishes are clever, rather like Thomas Keller's "coffee and doughnuts" dessert, or his "oysters and pearls". But, first and foremost, they are good. You could enjoy Adria's cuisine with no knowledge of European cookery. Some people on eGullet -- in particular, some no longer with us -- made the claim that high cuisine was almost entirely a French phenomenon. Personally I think that claim is rubbish: "high" Japanese cuisine, just to name one I know a bit about, is every bit as intellectually interesting, elaborated (ramified) and developed as the French; and I suspect that some of the Chinese traditions may be even more so. I can't imagine that Adria would see things differently. A number of his dishes attempt to connect with Asian methods -- e.g. the "viaje por el mundo" (no 752 in the 1998-2002 collection) and others reported here on eGullet. These are in the minority; I suspect that this is simply because of where Adria started. It's hard to see how this sort of aesthetic shock would be limited to one set of diners. I remember similar experiences on first going to Japan -- and, after living there for awhile and eating nothing but Japanese food, on first returning to Western foods like milk and butter. I remember the first taste of French cuisine (suprèmes de vollaile à blanc, prepared from a Julia Child recipe) and, a bit later, really good French cuisine (Mère Allard's duck with green olives). There are similarities, for example the "parmesan spaghetti" we had, where they transformed cheese into strands resembling pasta, or the new "caviars" they are now making from apples, mushrooms and other substances. I still don't understand the fuss about rabbit brains. We eat rabbit. We eat brains of other animals. Nothing we had at el Bulli was unpleasant or disgusting, and most of the dishes were delicious. Is the worry about rabbit brains somewhat like the reaction that some Western diners have to certain Chinese dishes -- duck webs, fish maws, pigs' ears, preserved eggs? All of these things can be very tasty.

Moby, I'm enjoying this topic enormously. But I'm wondering where your facts are coming from. I heard a radio interview with Ducasse last year that implied he did cook from time to time -- not much, but enough to stay in touch with his various restaurants. And he spoke of teaching in his culinary school. He also spoke of the importance of creating well lighted and air conditioned kitchens in the school and in his restaurants, so that his cooks would have a positive experience and transmit this through their food. Is Ducasse's pedagogical regime any more brutal than any other top chef's? Than a first-rank law firm? Than a top teaching hospital? Perhaps Louisa could give some first hand information on all of this.

You are right, Victor -- "reactionary" implies a retrograde move. In fact we could dispense with the adjective altogether and just talk about "a strike against classical French cuisine".

There is far more to Adria than a reactionary strike against classic French cuisine, even though that is where he started. His simplicity is different to a place like Rafa's. That's why the ideal move would be to dine at both restaurants. El Bulli's prices are reasonable, for what they provide. For most of us, the cost of getting to Roses far exceeds that of dining at el Bulli.

curlywurlyfi -- the typical domestic steamer looks like this. This is the Miele, probably one of the better ones, but it's still small. Most of the home models I've seen are even smaller, and many have round doors, inconvenient for anything but small amounts of food. As far as I know, all they do is steam. My guess is that these became somewhat popular on the back of the low fat movement. A combi looks like this. It's large, and it both bakes and steams. You can start with steam and then switch to dry heat, or the other way around. The combi is incredibly flexible and useful, though very expensive. The home steamer (top link) seems to fit your Scottish saying. A stovetop steamer would be as useful, cheaper, more flexible. But I don't have one of these steam-only models and I may be misjudging it.

Agas turn up in a very few restaurants, mostly smaller ones. An Aga alone will not work, even for truly serious home cooking, because it is a heat storage system: the heat input is less than the output delivered to the hottest parts of the system. Hence especially when the boiling plate is in use, the internal temperature of the system falls. This makes some serious cooks hate Agas with a passion. Ours came with the house, and I disliked it at first. Once I got accustomed to the Aga, I started to find it a pleasure to use. The ovens are very steady, the heat comes from all four walls of the oven, and you have a large warming plate for holding sauces and resting meats. You develop a flexibility and an intuition that doesn't require turning dials to 182.5 degrees, and you start relying both on touch, and, where precision is needed, an instant-read thermometer or probe, far more accurate than an oven thermostat. But a pro cranking out hundreds of covers might find the Aga frustrating. It is for meditative rather than rapid-fire cooking. In France we have a restaurant cooker, "un piano" (again, came with the house) with a grill, two enormous burners, and the plaque à mijoter that Boris describes. It also has an oven, but because we have the electric combi it is almost never used. The plaque is wonderful, but the cooker itself is a pain to clean up.

There is another way: components rather than a single integrated range. If I were starting from scratch, I would consider getting a few electric induction hobs (these perform beautifully, with the right cookware, and the price is high but falling) and a proper "combi" oven, with digital temperature controls. The combi I have in France will maintain a very precise temperature, and a very low temperature -- anything from about 40C to well over 300C, maintaining temperature within a few degrees. It will also steam, though I don't use that because it requires maintaining a water softener. It is perfect for slow-roasting. You can get these ovens without the steam feature. This doesn't give you a grill or a salamander, but this could be added separately. I wonder whether you might get far better performance this way for much less than the cost of a La Cornue, Lacanche, Aga, Bonnet, etc. It would still be more expensive than a domestic range, though, and you would have several vendors to deal with.

Don't bother with a "cooking blowtorch", by the way -- go down to the local DIY (hardware store) and get yourself a proper carpenter's model. It's great fun to attack a slab of meat with one of these and watch it brown before your eyes. Last Saturday I did a leg of mutton -- boned, blowtorched, seasoned, slow-roasted. Delicious. I'm still trying to get a Smeg electric oven to maintain a reliable 70C, though. It takes too much attention, as the temperature constantly veers above 100C and then falls back. And the Aga cooker's oven is too hot, even the "plate warming" oven.

The two are in very different places, and different categories -- so you should go to both! St John and its offshoot, St John Bread & Wine, are fairly centrally located, in Smithfield and Spitalfields respectively. Their food is simple and basic, "nose to tail" cooking using every part of the beast, and more British than continental: calf's liver and turnips, potted rabbit, etc. Chez Bruce is located south of the river, geographically not that far from the West End but psychologically much further. You can easily get there on the overland train, but not on the Tube. Its food is basically French, though on the simple rather than the fussy end -- e.g. duck breast with a pithivier savoyarde, glazed endive and madeira, sauté of stuffed poulet fermier with parsnips, lentils, chanterelles and tarragon. Some eGullet members don't care for Chez Bruce; I like it a lot, and it is a joy to have a restaurant of this calibre near where I live. But as good as it is, there are other restaurants like it, both in London and especially in France. There is nothing like St John, anywhere.

This does look like an eGullet scoop! Congratulations to Jellybean and the France forum! Robert, I am jealous every time you post those memoirs of 3-star dining in decades past. Makes me wish I had started this earlier. As a part-of-the-year "Mouginois" I have a strong personal interest in seeing the Moulin live again. As I've posted before, M. Vergé and the village have had a love-hate relationship for a long time, stemming in part from a decision to separate the Moulin from the old village by a motorway. Vergé sold L'Amandier, the less upscale restaurant in the old village, about a year ago; as of October they still had the wine shop and Denise Vergé's gift shop, as well as the Moulin. We dined at the Moulin a few years ago, when it had fallen to one star, and we felt we had badly overpaid for the food we were served; also the service had some terrible moments. I was tempted to write to Michelin and complain that this place didn't possibly deserve one star. Once they had regained a second star, we had lunch at the Moulin this summer, and enjoyed that a lot more. The welcome and service were wonderful, the food was pretty good, and we had a pleasant walk amidst the modern sculpture in the garden afterwards. I would still not have given the cuisine two stars -- more like one or one and a half. The ingredients and execution was good, but there was a certain sameness to some elements of the menu, such as a light green pistou served with virtually every dish: "cuisine du soleil sauce", I guess. There was a certain sense of going through a dance that had been fresh many years before, but was so no longer. The Moulin also operates an "école de cuisine", and we attended a class this fall. Serge Cholet, chef de cuisine at the Moulin, was the instructor. It was fun, the dishes he prepared were tasty, and it made me want to attend more of M. Cholet's classes. But I had the impression that Cholet either didn't have much of a vision of his own, or wasn't allowed to express one. M. Vergé's long shadow hung over the whole. I wonder whether Cholet will move on or stay to cook with M. Llorca. "Cuisine de soleil" is certainly right for that part of France -- as Jellybean says, the ingredients and the setting are all in place. Roll on January...