Jonathan Day

Matthew, thanks for a great essay. When you are ready for some real food shopping, hop a plane to London. And thanks for a recipe that I will try soon. One query: why would you cook the egg yolks at all? Would not the heat from the pasta do that, as with a spaghetti alla carbonara?

I share John Whiting's concern. On the one hand, you could argue that "flawless flavour engineering" is simply the gastronomic equivalent of a CD-ROM: I can now listen to my favourite Bach concerto whenever I want it, and as many times. I don't have to wait for it to come to a concert hall, nor (going back a bit further) do I have to inhabit a stratum of society where musicians perform in camera. Yet there is something sinister about this -- just as there is about the CD-ROM, but this seems far worse: the experience of food is divorced from any setting of care, conviviality, hungers satisfied. Do you remember the scene in Terry Gilliam's film Brazil, where the characters ate in a fancy restaurant, looking at cards with pictures of duck, lobster, etc? Then the camera pans back to show them eating piles of green sludge. This technology opens up similar possibilities.

eGullet's Vedat Milor (vmilor) proposed the following topic for discussion. Quite a few contributors to eGullet forums have been discussing the elements of Haute Cuisine (HC)* and the relative merits of various national cuisines, especially French and Italian. In my mind, there indeed is a bifurcation in the world of HC today, but it is less along national lines than what I name Post-Modern and Renaissance schools. I believe this cleavage cuts across national borders and is also felt in major dining centers of the United States. Both of these schools can excel in what they do, and the best examples of each rightly get crowned with the maximum numbers of stars and toques. My concern is that, primarily due to economic factors, the post-modern school may gradually drive the Renaissance school out of the market or squeeze it into the margins. I would hate it if the pinnacles of HC all turn out sophisticated French "dim sum" at the expense of classic sauces (Albufera, Perigourdine and Bordelaise to name a few) and the best examples of rare game and fish dishes. Let me elaborate. I call the first school "post-modern" because some of the more creative dishes prepared by the likes of Thomas Keller, Alain Passard, Ferran Adria, Marc Veyrat, Martin Berasategui, among others, bear very little resemblance to the dishes eaten otherwise universally, albeit, at their best, these dishes advance the limits of culinary esthetics. These dishes are often soft and creamy in texture in which flavorful mousses, gelees, ice creams (!) abound (hence pejoratively called "cuisine for the baby"). Post-modern chefs prefer to present their creations in a procession of small courses prior to the fish and meat courses. Although some final courses prepared by these chefs can be stunning in texture and titillate all sensations known to mankind (like bone marrow with caviar of Adria and baby venison chops with herbs of Passard before he earned his third star), it is not unfair to claim that the post-modern school excels more in the "pre-meat" and "pre-fish" courses than in the dishes just before cheese or dessert.. I call the second school "Renaissance" because the most gifted proponents of this cuisine, like Bernard Pacaud (L'Ambroisie in Paris), Gerard Rabaey (Pont de Brent near Montreux), Alain Ducasse, Philippe Chevrier (Chateauvieux outside Geneve), Santi Santamaria (Raco de Can Fabes outside of Barcelona), David Tanis, and Alfonso Iaccerdino (Don Alfonso near Naples) are not dogged traditionalists, but intent on subjecting traditional dishes to a rigorous re-evaluation. Some of the best dishes created by these chefs (such as Pacaud's wild duck torte, Chevrier's roasted woodcock, and Iaccerdino's fisherman's soup) look deceptively simple. But the truth is that these dishes often represent the culmination of an arduous and intelligently executed research process. The element of creativity in some of these dishes is expressed perhaps less in the main element of the dish (which is often a whole roasted meat or fish), but in the way the sides have been chosen, organ meats (kidney, heart, liver) separately cooked and artistically presented, and beautifully balanced sauces have been prepared without shortcuts. While some of the entrees prepared by these chefs (try Rabaey's frog's legs or Pacaud's raw scallops with white truffles) are mind blowing, it is fair to claim that this school excels more in the preparation of main courses. I love both styles of cuisine and each has its place. (It is also hard to pigeonhole some chefs whose cooking combines elements of both, for instance Pierre Gagnaire and Hilario Arberaitz of Zuberoa near San Sebastian.) But it is hard to deny that the center of gravity nowadays is shifting towards Catalunya, San Sebastian, and the Haut-Savoie at the expense of more traditional places. Consequently, it is much harder for many skillful young chefs to resist the temptation of "creating" Post-Modern dishes. Economic considerations are driving this trend too. It is more profitable to concoct creative dishes based on cheaper ingredients and then top it off, say, with a frozen black truffle slice. It is also possible to name the dish after a sought after, rare ingredient, such as percebes (a barnacle fished off the Galicia coast) or abalone, and then use only a tiny bit of the rare ingredient in the final concoction and justify the practice in the name of "refinement." The overall problem is that as more and more young chefs are imitating the market leaders of the Post-Modern school because it is more economical and a quicker road to celebrityhood, the consumers are losing in three senses of the term. First, the results are often mediocre because it is not easy to imitate the likes of Adria and Gagnaire, and superficial resemblance of textures often conceals qualitative differences. Second, we all end up paying very high prices because the chef is supposedly at the cutting edge. It is understandable to pay $500 for two at the French Laundry, but do you think your $490 at Elisabeth Daniels when you brought your own wine for the "truffle" menu that gave you some crumbs of black truffle with chi-chi dishes has been well-spent? Last but not least, are we bound to end up in a state where biting into a whole black truffle en croute with sauce Perigourdine will strike the gourmet commentators as an illicit act committed by less refined souls of the 19th century? I am wondering if Renaissance cooking at its best will be able to hold its ground against the march of Post-Modernism. The cost of many dishes created by those chefs is simply going through the roof. Some of these time-tested dishes are very complex, and it has already been observed here that, as a matter of broad generalization, today's dishes in upscale restaurants are somehow less complicated and sauces are less ambitious compared to the gems of yesteryear. (See the thread started by Wilfrid: "Is Haute Cuisine Less Complex Than It Used to Be?" -- click here) Compounding the cost issue is the fact that some of the ambitious dishes, which require complicated sauces, can only be prepared for two or more people. Nowadays, it is getting rare even to have a couple agree on what to order. Add to this the trend towards "healthy" eating, and one may understand why many of these dishes for two or four are gradually disappearing from the menus. All in all, I am concerned that forces from different directions and industry dynamics are making it increasingly harder for the Renaissance chefs to hold their ground and prosper. For those of us how have been privileged to experience some dishes from these chefs, it would be a big loss if the most talented members of the next generation chefs all opt to go Post-Modern and do not follow the footsteps of more classic chefs. Let's hope that this will not be the case. ----- *Three defining characteristics of HC come to my mind: "harmony," "optimality," and "flavorful." These characteristics can apply to a single dish in an exquisite meal, or to the whole meal. Harmony refers to a chef having an impeccable sense of balance and he or she strikes a good mix between different taste sensations such as sweet, acidic, salty, and so forth. Optimality refers to a certain state where if one takes away one element/ingredient in a dish (or one course in a meal), your taste buds may still be scintillating, but less so. Conversely, if one adds an element, the dish may become more "chic" but the taste may suffer. Last, flavorful refers to the quality of ingredients used and techniques utilized to bring out the best in them.

Tony, if you had any taste at all you would know that L'Artisan's hot chocolate is objectively superior to bittersweet hot chocolate from Spain. The fact that you don't proves (objectively) that you are no gourmet. The fact that I know this without ever having tasted bittersweet hot chocolate from Spain proves the superiority of my gourmandise ... (you know the rest, just fill in from here). On a serious note, Anne-Françoise (the woman who usually staffs the stall at Borough Market) might adjust the mixture if you asked her nicely, or even consider offering a more bitter version.

Doctors generally advise parents not to give honey to infants because it can cause infant botulism. Click here for one national health department's take on this. Another support for LML's link between "disgust" and "danger".

Tony, I think the thread you are referring to is here. It's interesting to consider the origins of many of these dislikes. Some stem from childhood incidents (I know, for example, that I was forced to eat softboiled eggs as a child, and had a strong dislike for them for many years). Others seem to stem more from mental associations, e.g. Klink's refusal to eat chicken feet because of "the idea of sucking the skin off a chicken's toes". Others because they tasted a dish once, disliked the texture or flavour, and were unable to return. Isn't the difference between disgust and dislike just a matter of degree? The Concise Oxford defines disgust as "loathing, nausea, repugnance, strong aversion", and dislike simply as "aversion".

I have seen many of the same assertions regarding green vegetables. Given changes in the evolutionary landscape, our "natural" tastes are not always in our best interests and must therefore be overcome through culture. At least according to some evolutionary biologists, fats and sugars taste as good as they do because we have become wired to accumulate fats as a defence against periodic famine. In an environment where (for some countries, at least) famines or fasts are non-existent, the "natural" inclinations that would lead people to shun green vegetables for crisps and sweets are, perversely, adaptively dysfunctional. In the same way, fears of spiders, snakes and quickly moving small animals (e.g. mice), which some biologists believe are innate rather than learned, may once have been highly adaptive but may no longer be so, given changes both in the creatures themselves and in the ways we live. But I'd like to go back to LML's original assertion that "terrible" eating (sea urchin sashimi, pheasant that has been hung for a long time, blood sausage, brains) is pleasurable because of the fear element, rather like abseiling or fast driving. I can see this for something like Japanese fugu, the blowfish that kills several diners every year. But most of the other foods -- for me, at least -- have no risk element at all: they are just very tasty. In fact, for the first 10 years I lived in Britain, any beef, no matter how well cooked, had more of this fear element, because of BSE. It would be interesting to see whether we can develop a view on which foods are most "terrible", and where the line between sublime and forbidden is crossed. Korsmeyer provides the example of creatures whose lives are terminated by the diner's teeth. These, for me, would fall on the forbidden side, even though I am otherwise an adventurous eater. Yet at least one of our members is eager to eat such foods.

Yes, the element of trust is very strong. We put ourselves in the hands of others when we sit at their table as a guest. Children, for example, get very nervous about food on the stove and often demand to know what is in a dish before they will taste it. Their palates are very sensitive, especially to bitter flavours. I still remember the day when our youngest child first tasted puréed green beans. He was hungry, and he gave a big smile as the spoon approached his mouth. Then there was a look of disgust and betrayal, probably because he expected a sweet flavour and received a bitter one instead. His attitude to green things changed from that day on. Some adults ask probing questions about dishes that don't look familiar. I am not referring to allergy sufferers, where these questions could be a matter of life and death and are would therefore not be considered rude, but guests who want to know whether a particular dish contains, let's say, celery, because that is a flavour they don't like. I am guessing that most people would consider such behaviour eccentric at best, rude at worst.

How much of this thought has to do with the emotions and feelings one associates with eating this "traditional American food" in a home; the experiences one had as one watched this food being cooked in a home kitchen, consumed with family around a generations-old kitchen table? For example, no fried chicken, to me, will ever be as good as that cooked by my Aunt Laura, now deceased. A large part of that had to do with how she cooked it, but another part had to do with the experience of being with her, at her house, her standing on the front stoop waiting for us, the Franciscan Desert Rose dinnerware, the smells, etc., etc. My associations with "American" cuisine were, for many years, deeply negative. This was because I had grown up in a house where cooking was a matter of survival (just) rather than delight. When I learned to cook, largely in self-defence, it was French, starting with Raymond Oliver and Julia Child and then extending to Chinese. All of the great cooks that I knew as a child were immigrants: Chinese, Ashkenazi Jews, French, Italians. "American" food was McDonald's and macaroni and cheese from a box. I was at a boarding school near Boston, and with a friend from Falmouth, Massachusetts, tasted great New England cooking for the first time. In my second year at university I spent two weeks in Gulfport, Mississippi, with the family of a friend. The family was wealthy and deeply enthusiastic about food. They had a brilliant cook. We feasted on oysters cooked a dozen different ways, gumbo, jambalaya, crawfish etouffée, and all sorts of wonderful things. We travelled to New Orleans for beignets at the French Market and lunches at the best restaurants. I cooked a Chinese meal for 30 people. Even the iced tea was a revelation, since the cook prepared it with fresh mint from the garden. So great American cooking -- and the existence of deep culinary traditions, as in the South -- was a late discovery for me, and not associated with positive home experiences.

We have discussed the adaptive value of disgust -- to "high" foods, for example, or to aubergines (eggplants) or tomatoes, plants that have toxic relatives. But I am equally curious about learned disgust, distaste for foods or parts of the beast that go beyond our cultural norms. Three examples: (1) Many years ago I bought a piece of horsemeat at a French boucherie chevaline, a specialist horsemeat butcher. I sliced it thin, pan-fried it and finished it with a red wine reduction, shallots and some brown sauce that I had made previously. The family gobbled it up. Delicious, they said, let's have that again. Then I told them what it was. Cries of disgust. Consumption of horsemeat in France, by the way, has remained steady since 1996, despite an outbreak of human Trichinellosis in 1998. (2) Even longer ago, a group of work colleagues at a conference had a dinner at Harbour City, a restaurant in London's Chinatown. The menu had been selected by our guest speaker, who was a friend of the restaurant's chef. The first course was a dish of red-cooked duck's tongues. Delicious, people said, but what are they? When they found out, there was general upset: why had we not been told we were being served duck's tongue? Similar reactions will occur with things like chicken feet or fish maws. (3) Many cooks will be familiar with this one: bring home a duck or chicken with head and feet attached. Instant reactions of disgust, especially to the head. My wife says, "I don't want to know what the meat looked like when it was alive". In all three cases, the tastes are good, but learning what the thing is provokes a disgust reaction. It is hard to see this as having survival value. Nor are the disgust reactions taught as such. Yet they are very strong. Why? And why do some of us either overcome or never experience similar reactions?

The error could have been worse: some Brits pronounce Mougins "Muggins". In any event, I hope your friend has a great time. If she is shopping locally, La Grange du Val, in Tournamy, the newer section of town, has superb fruit, vegetables, truffles and cheeses; Boucherie Alain, right across from the Grange, has some of the finest meat I have tasted, and a great charcuterie range as well.

Lisa, here is is a quick run through some of the restaurants in or in striking distance to Mougins. Mougins is something of a restaurant town, because of Roger Vergé and the Moulin de Mougins. At one point Vergé had two restaurants in town, the Moulin and one called L'Amandier; the former had three stars, the latter one. Unfortunately we found the Moulin an expensive disappointment: with the exception of one course, the famous truffled and stuffed squash blossom, the food was mediocre and the service dreadful. It fell from 3 stars to 1, and last year climbed back to 2. L'Amandier was not much better, though Vergé has now sold it and it may have improved under its new owners. If you are looking for traditional food, I highly recommend Le Bistrot de Mougins, in the old village. It's in an old cellar, and the food is very good and includes things like daubes and civets that you don't often find nowadays. La Terrasse, on the edge of the village, is more modern. They have a prix-fixe lunch that is good value, and their menu often includes roasted game birds. The room is beautiful, especially if you get a table near the window, looking down toward the Med. La Ferme de Mougins is a very short drive from the village, and the food is good, though we found the service a bit cold. Le Rendez-Vous de Mougins is in the village, and they have a "market menu" that changes seasonally. Brasserie de la Méditerranée, in the village, has good fish. Finally, Les Pins de Mougins, on the back road towards Cannes, looks dreadful from the road but has a pleasant garden and some very good dishes. The new place in town, and the most ambitious, is Le Mas Candille. We have had some good dishes there, but it is expensive for what you get. Once you leave Mougins, you have the whole Côte d'Azur to taste. In Cros-de-Cagnes, try Loulou, for superb fish soup (not bouillabaisse, but good all the same) and magnificent slow-grilled steaks. Go the other way to Grasse for Jacques Chibois's two-star Bastide St Antoine. For bouillabaisse, drive down to Antibes to the Restaurant Bacon; try to get a table near the window for lovely views of the water. In Cannes, try La Cave for simple, traditional dishes, beautifully prepared. In La Turbie, there's the Hostellerie Jérome; in Menton, Chibois's Le Mirazur. In Nice, try La Petite Maison and Terres de Truffes; the latter features truffles in each and every dish, including dessert. And, should your friend be feeling very wealthy indeed, she can drive to Monaco for Alain Ducasse's Louis XV. I don't think she will go hungry.

Our first thread on Symposium started with a passage from Carolyn Korsmeyer's Making Sense of Taste: Food and Philosophy. It provoked a lively debate. Professor Korsmeyer has recently published an article, "Delightful, Delicious, Disgusting: Eating Sublime and Terrible", in the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism. Because of copyright restrictions, it is not possible to make an online copy available, so Prof. Korsmeyer very kindly prepared a shorter abstract for this forum. As a matter of background, Carolyn Korsmeyer is professor of philosophy at SUNY Buffalo, where her chief research areas are aesthetics and emotion theory. She is presently at work on a study of disgust as an aesthetic response. Her book Making Sense of Taste: Food and Philosophy (1999) explores the neglected gustatory sense of taste and its claims for aesthetic status. She also works in the area of feminist philosophy and has recently completed a book, Gender in Aesthetics: A Guide to Feminism and Philosophy of Art. She is now working on a new book, Encounters with Disgust: Essays on Difficult Emotions and Aesthetic Pleasures. Over to you for comments and reactions. * * * Carolyn Korsmeyer, "Delightful, Delicious, Disgusting" Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 60:3 (Summer, 2002) Abstract How did something like a snail, a clot of fish eggs, a leech, or an animal's brain ever end up on a dinner plate? What induces someone to overcome the rotting smell of decay and cultivate a taste for "high" meat? Those who attempt to understand sophisticated eating and culinary artistry usually approach these subjects by considering the pleasures of taste, but it seems there is more than simple sense pleasure at work here. One might assume that we can distinguish that which pleases because it tastes good by looking for the opposite of that which disgusts, for disgust is usually understood as an aversion reaction to that which is foul and toxic. (Many emotion theorists surmise that the function of disgust and other aversions is to protect an organism by inducing recoil and revulsion.) Paradoxically, however, that which disgusts can also appeal -- a phenomenon we find in art. Moreover, a good deal of recondite and sophisticated eating actually seems to be built upon that which disgusts, endangers, or repels on first exposure, offering not invitation but repulsion. Of course, what counts as disgusting varies considerably according to cultural norms. But even within a single, familiar culture, one can find examples of highly cultivated eating that seem to be based on testing the limits of the edible. A taste for "high" meat just this side of rotten, for example, which arguably heightens the taste pleasure even as it verges on the toxic; or for creatures that are still living on the plate, whose lives are finished off with the diner’s teeth; or for items with complicated textures and flavors that demand studied cultivation to enjoy. Many people won't go near such things; to others, they are the pinnacle of gastronomic experience. This suggests that certain kinds of food preparation and eating originate not only in the search for pleasure but also in the meaning of extreme and difficult emotions as they are exemplified in foods. An attraction to the disgusting element in eating echoes other paradoxical pleasures that have been explored in the philosophical literature, most notably the experience of the sublime -- traditionally understood to be founded on terror that is transfigured into thrill and awe. This essay explores the extent to which "terrible eating" can be compared to the experience of the sublime, arguing that both serve to call attention to death and mortality. If terrible eating is grounded on disgust and its transformation into gustatory depth and pleasure, then it would seem that segments of the borderline between the disgusting and the delicious can be slim indeed.

L'Artisan du Chocolat ... and they often have killer hot chocolate on offer, as well as the same superchocs served at GR, Petrus, British Airways Concorde, etc.

Don't we need to distinguish between a learning effect (open 1st joint, learn from mistakes, open 2nd) and the problem of a chef being spread too thin between restaurants? In Ducasse's case, for example, did the quality at the orginal establishment in Monaco suffer after he opened ADPA? ADNY? My guess (but I don't have the data to substantiate it) is that it did not. Ducasse apparently went to some lengths to cultivate and recruit Franck Cerruti for Monaco, and to ensure that the founder's standards were maintained. The cookery school must contribute to this, as must Ducasse's codification of methods in the numerous cookbooks he has produced.

Amanda, many thanks for your generosity in making time to join this Q&A. You spent some years in Europe. Could you tell us a bit about what you did and how this expanded your culinary horizons? In general, do you feel that people with a deep interest in food and wine need to spend time away from their home country in order to develop a rounded appreciation of food? Would someone coming from a cosmpolitan place like New York, Paris or London find everything they need to become "well dined" in their home territory? Is the "grand tour" an important development step for young people?

Martin, my preferred shopping site in London is the Northcote Road, which has become an extraordinary high street for food: two butchers (one of them of superb quality, the other above average), artisanal baker, very good cheesemonger, two fishmongers, good to very good wine shops, two Italian food shops (including Stefano Cavallini's place), organic produce, plus a fine street market for fruit and veg. This is where I go on the weekends, though sometimes I go to Borough Market. But daily life requires large purchases of what I sometimes call "chemicals": washing powders, paper goods and the like. And with three children, two working parents and a busy household, my wife and the nanny tend to head to a supermarket. Our local M&S has a small food section, and there isn't a Waitrose in easy striking distance. We also use Tesco home delivery. I mention all this not to defend my foodie credentials but to illustrate the problem of the "back story": it just doesn't fit the pace of modern life. I see much of the same in France. People are living faster and busier lives; for many, there isn't time to stop and smell the haricots verts or find the perfect peach. The result is that phony stuff does appear, whether in "industrialised" bakeries or supermarkets pushing tasteless Dutch peppers. The average quality in France is still better than in the UK, as is the quality at the top of the range. The trend, on the other hand, may be negative in France and positive in England.

I would prefer to think of myself as hopeful, rather than hopeless; and a classicist rather than a romantic. I find myself increasingly drawn to Bach's preludes, fugues and inventions. Those who earn their living from fine food and wine, whether as producers, salesmen or critics, must necessarily pursue an upward-spiralling complexity and grandiosity. Steingarten's latest book is a case in point -- the exquisite verging on the pretentious. EDIT: Jonathan - I should have added that I was very impressed with your reportage. John, isn't this going a bit too far? There are farmers, cheesemakers, restaurateurs and chefs who manage to maintain a degree of simplicity and balance in their lives; they live what the French call une vie bien equilibrée. They don't live in the limelight, but they exist. Not easy to do, of course, in a time when food is increasingly valued for hype. Today's Times features an article, not on Gordon Ramsay's cooking but on his cars: fast and expensive. I am glad that he has done well, but he does seem to be more focused on the public results (Michelin stars, press coverage, television shows, money) than the means by which those results are achieved. Ducasse, from the radio interview, struck me as different altogether. This was the voice of someone who was serious about food and committed to excellence in each of his restaurants, whether or not he spends much time at the stove.

One step forward, one back. We've returned to where we started. "Reasonableness" of course implies shared context, some shared set of criteria. In the kitchen of the culinary school it is reasonable for the chef-instructor to say that the student's stock is "wrong". The statement is being made in the context of a teacher-student relationship, with clearly identified and accepted authority. In this community, it is probably not reasonable to say that JAZ is "wrong" to dislike blue cheese, or that someone who prefers medium steak to rare is "wrong", or that cooked peaches are always better than uncooked. (The latter statement seems eccentric and unreasonable in any context I am aware of, but let that pass.) We don't have a clearly accepted authority here. Nobody has even suggested how that authority might be identified or constituted. "The food industry"? What is that? Dieticians? Chefs? Food writers? Marketing managers for McDonald's? The well-dined? Frequent posters on food and wine boards? Paradoxically, the deepest problem I have with this absolutist language is that it gets in the way of our moving past total relativism. It inhibits our ability to create intersubjective agreement, and to find where we disagree. With that I exit this thread, followed by three squabbling food experts.

I see "wrong" in this context as a pragmatic shorthand, a reasonable way of explaining a broadly accepted standard for how something should be done. Imagine yourself a novice cook, in your first week of culinary school. You are learning how to make brown stock. The chef-instructor explains that you should cook the stock at a slow bubble, so that it stays clear and so that the fat isn't emulsified into the stock. You bring the instructor a bowl of stock for evaluation. She notices that it's cloudy and that it tastes a bit scorched. "That's wrong," she says, "you cooked it over too high a flame." Now at this point you could engage in a discussion about how you prefer your stocks cloudy or scorched and that therefore the instructor was using "wrong" in the wrong way. And from one perspective you would be justified. But you would learn more about cooking if you accepted the authority of the instructor and got on with the course. That said, the "Smith, Jones and Wilson" problem I posed earlier is still with us. Unlike culinary school, or any institution, this is a conversation where the basis of authority is far from clear. We have no simple way to distinguish the gourmets from the non-gourmets, or to rank one gourmet above another. And there are sharp disagreements, even among the experts -- recall the long debate in Ruhlman's The Making of a Chef over the "right" way to make brown sauce. So if we must use "right" and "wrong" here, it may lead to a more productive conversation if we put them between inverted commas.

Of course it is. But we need to avoid the error made above in comparing the $10 and $100 bottles of wine. It would be "wrong" to put that much salt on a dish, just as it would be "wrong" for a restaurant to give its customers nothing raw food and a stove and tell them to cook it themselves. The extreme cases are easy. The difficulty lies in subtler comparisons. Is it "wrong" to order steak medium-rare? To serve a perfect peach, when this is the most suitable dessert after a complex dinner? (I don't think it would be "wrong", in either case).

In December, while driving in France, I switched on the radio and heard an interview with Alain Ducasse. What follows is a summary report, constructed from notes I scribbled later on. Several startling things: first, that the French would broadcast any single interview lasting an hour. Second, that a chef would be the subject of such an interview. And, finally, that Ducasse spoke calmly, articulately, in complete and complex sentences without a pause. His radio persona is educated, relaxed and confident, a man clear about who he is and what he is trying to accomplish. He spoke at some length about the development of the many chefs he needs to run the restaurants in his empire. Had I not known the subject of the interview, I might have guessed that this was an executive of a top professional services firm speaking. Ducasse selects his chefs with care -- "we look for those who would stand out in any profession, leaders, people who are determined to reach the top of their metier. We want those who are always seeking to move up, not to stay in one place. And that is one reason we have a wide range of restaurants and hotels, from the very simple to the very grand." In every profession, said Ducasse, there are those who work harder, who succeed where others fail, who have a greater breadth of spirit. These are the natural leaders, those whom he seeks out. He emphasised chef-as-leader/manager rather than chef-as-cook. The interviewer tried to draw him on the hierarchical and somewhat militaristic atmosphere of a top restaurant kitchen, but Ducasse insisted that the conditions under which his chefs and cooks work apply to any serious profession. He maintains an extensive database on all of his chefs, not only those in current service but also those whom he might want to hire and those who have worked with him and gone on to other restaurants – in the event that they might choose to return. For example, Ducasse tracked Franck Cerruti (formerly at Don Camillo in Nice) for many years before bringing him to the Louis XV in Monaco. He described the school for chefs he has just opened, an important part of which involves bringing experienced chefs up to the state of the art in an intense 5 day process. The school brings about a complete reorientation, since the chefs work in comfort (air conditioning, good lighting, etc.) and use the most modern equipment and technologies. (Incidentally, the school also offers one day courses for culinary amateurs). The Ducasse group's motto is "Savoir Faire, Faire Faire, Faire Savoir", which I would roughly translate as "Know the state of the art, Make it happen, and push the limits of knowledge (our own and others)" – words that could have been lifted from the operating principles of a top law or consulting firm. Ducasse said that he attempts to keep each restaurant "rooted" (enraciné) in its particular style or locality, but in each one to strive consistently for superior quality. Yet he spoke enthusiastically about globalisation and the global spread of knowledge, and he claimed that techniques he develops in his top restaurants are transferred to the smaller restaurants and auberges in the empire. This is one reason he has put a lot of energy into writing detailed cookbooks. He described his approach as "glocal" -- a term somewhat hackneyed in business circles, but perhaps appropriate for a chef with such a widespread empire. The "Spoon" restaurants (in Paris, Mauritius, London, Tokyo, St Tropez) bring together techniques and ingredients that Ducasse has encountered in his trips around the world, "without mixing them up". This last comment seemed odd, since I thought the philosophy of Spoon was that customers could compose their own dishes, selecting from a wide range of ingredients and cooking methods. Nonetheless, Ducasse stressed the importance of not combining different culinary traditions on one dish or one restaurant. The interviewer (who seemed knowledgeable about and interested in cuisine and restaurants) asked Ducasse how he set the menus in his various restaurants, especially in the top 3 in Monte Carlo, Paris and New York. Ducasse replied that he worked hard to ensure that the three were different in style and in menu composition. The Louis XV, he said, emphasised Provençal ingredients (especially olive oil) and cooking styles. The restaurants in Paris and New York appeal to the lovers of "international haute cuisine", cooking at the highest state of the art, with the New York restaurant using the very best American ingredients. At one point the interviewer asked whether Ducasse had any desire to return to his native Landes. Indeed he did: the Ducasse group had just acquired a small restaurant in a tiny town in the area (I do not remember the name) whose owner was struggling and needed to sell out. The newest member of the group will price its main courses at €18; these will include confit of pork and game birds (alas, he did not mention ortolans) roasted on the spit. "Quality and rigorous execution can be applied to the simplest of cuisines," said Ducasse. The interview ended on a seasonal note, since it was broadcast on 31 December. "This evening," said the interviewer, "many people will be enjoying a festive dinner. What would you advise them to prepare?" "Most people will have eaten lots of luxury foods by now," said Ducasse -- "foie gras, chocolate, and the like. For this evening, I would counsel very simple foods, but they should be shared, eaten with family and friends. Don't worry about elaborate cooking, but share the dishes you cook." * * * Given comments elsewhere on the board about chefs "selling out" and sacrificing quality for quantity, how convincing do members find Ducasse's vision? Has he found an authentic way to combine big business with gastronomic integrity?

John, I would only observe that most people who start restaurants (chef-owners) work very hard and make very little money. This is not a profession to take up if money is the first objective. The odds are against making any profit at all; many chef-owners keep their businesses afloat by paying themselves, and family members, subsistence wages. Yet a few chefs "make it to the big time". For those more knowledgeable among us: how likely is it that this was the initial plan? Or was it more of a lucky break for a few cooks who never expected to make more than a meagre income?

Actually, Steve, I agree with LML on this one. This is a comment I had intended to post on your pasta thread, but it may fit better here. There are flavours that are simply too intense to be enjoyed in the state in which they arrive. They need a medium over which they can be diluted. A carrier. Last December I bought a smoked duck breast (magret fumé) from an artisanal producer at a market in Théoule. The flavour was good -- richer and deeper than the usual smoked duck -- but it was very intense and rather salty. It was simply too strong served in thin slices, as a salumi. I ended up shaving off a number of slices, then cutting these into tiny ribbons, sort of a chiffonade, and serving this in a sauce with pasta. It was outstanding. You needed the pasta (it could have been rice, or another starch, but pasta worked well) as a vehicle over which that intense flavour could be distributed. Anchoiade (anchovies and garlic) is another example: in its natural form the tastes are too intense; they need to be spread over pizza or pasta or something like that. You can use a vegetable for this purpose -- broccoli à l'anchoiade is very good -- but sometimes a neutral carrier is better. Some tomatoes and tomato sauces are also too bright, too intense to eat on their own. This is a positive use for pasta! This is a great aspiration. And I'll take it a step further: we would have more of a common language for describing tastes, words that we can use to describe flavours, and menu composition, and the like, so that when one person writes about a meal the other has a better chance of understanding what it was like. Intersubjectivity again. The third "i" in Plotnickiism.

I will grant that. And I would guess that wine pricing is somewhat more efficient than restaurant pricing, owing to things like auctions, wide geographic distribution of some brands and the like, not to mention the existence of comparative wine guides, Robert Parker, etc. But the example is still flawed, because it is based on extremes. The more common and more practical issue is whether a restaurant meal that costs $40 could be a lot better than one costing $60, or even $80. And this happens all the time. It happens more frequently when you do your research on this board before dining out. I am using "better" in the sense of Steve Plotnicki's latest post, "reasonableness" rather than "objectivity".