Fat Duck vs Riverside Brasserie

[Jonathan Day]

I have eaten at the Fat Duck but have yet to try the Riverside Brasserie. I understand that the menu at the latter is more traditional.

Could you tell us to what extent you are using your innovative methods (low temperature cooking, flavour encapsulation, distilled flavours, etc.) at the Riverside Brasserie? What "niches" or "spaces" do you see the two restaurants as occupying? When would you want to eat at one as opposed to the other?

[Heston Blumenthal]

Some of the techniques used at The Fat Duck are also involved in the cooking at The Brasserie, notably the low temperature cooking and a little bit of flavour encapsulation.

There were three reasons for opening a Brasserie;

!/ To eventually be profit-making enough to be able to support The Fat Duck and help it grow to the level that I want it to get to

2/ To have a restaurant cooking food that is designed more for the purpose of satisfying a hunger and tasting good than food that sets out ot challenge and thus appeals to a narrower band of people. The Fat Duck is not designed to eat at on a regular basis whereas the brasserie is.

3/ To show that the scientific approach can also be adapted to any kind of cooking

Although both restaurants are still developing, I plan to keep quite a large gap between the two in terms of cooking style and service