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Restaurant Magazine: Top 20 Chefs of All Time


Marlyn4k

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But many of the critics seem to agree that the food at Fifteen is excellent, its just the service and the prices that people complain about. I'm not in a position to say whether or not Olivers style has influenced other chefs or if dishes that originated at Fifteen have started popping up on other menus, but I wouldn't be suprised if either or both of those things was already happening. I'm not saying that's a particularly good or bad thing, just that he is so well known that there's a degree of inevitability about it.

maybe,

but from I understand is that at present it's quite the opposite. There was quite a run on early, but it's been downhill since.

though I might be wrong.

A meal without wine is... well, erm, what is that like?

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And Thomas Keller. Will no-one stand up and defend him.  While he's not classicaly trained, nor has he "paid his dues" in old world classic haunts, his French Laundry is widely regarded as possibly one of the most innovative restaurants in the world.  All he merits is an honourable mention?

This list is has overtones of figure skating judging. :blink:

as far as an all time list goes, do you feel he rates above a short listing?

A meal without wine is... well, erm, what is that like?

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It's no so much the list that I like/don't like or agree with/disagree with but the research in the narratives by Joe Warwick, along with the other informative sub-articles in the piece. Without wanting to advertise the magazine, you really need to see the article to appreciate the effort...

Someone say something about Thomas Keller? Did he not spend time in a number of Parisian 3 star kitchens? Although english peas? Please.

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And Thomas Keller. Will no-one stand up and defend him.  While he's not classicaly trained, nor has he "paid his dues" in old world classic haunts, his French Laundry is widely regarded as possibly one of the most innovative restaurants in the world.  All he merits is an honourable mention?

While I'm not his biggest fan - I think you'll find both those points to be wrong. Keller was both classically trained, AND spent a year in France in old world classic haunts (Taillevant, Guy Savoy to name but two).

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What criteria would you have used for a "greatest chef" list?

I guess it depends what the goal of the list is. E.g., most important historically - or chefs whose food you'd want to eat now - or something else. Since this seems to be a list of historical importance - perhaps it might be useful to limit the list to people who've been dead for at least a while. Just like you don't want to name streets after the living - or put them on stamps (at least that's the practice in the US) - lest they turn out to be unimportant - or worse - 10 years down the road. And if you're dealing with chefs in terms of things to eat - well I think it's hard to evaluate the cooking of someone who died 100 years ago. Robyn

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  • 2 years later...
Wolfgang Puck is important because - in my opinion - he was responsible for the "invention" of "New American" cuisine - which in turn spawned a lot of sub-categories (Nuevo Latino, Floribbean, etc.)

I think Puck's ultimate influence will derive from him being the american chef who started the whole phenomenon of celebrity chefs leveraging their brand into something more commercial that reached a wider american audience. He was also the first big name chef that heraleded a new culinary era for Las Vegas, and his success there opened up the doors for other chefs to follow. He's set up a model and protype that we're seeing other celebrity chefs follow today.

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I think Puck's ultimate influence will derive from him being the american chef who started the whole phenomenon of celebrity chefs leveraging their brand into something more commercial that reached a wider american audience. He was also the first big name chef that heraleded a new culinary era for Las Vegas, and his success there opened up the doors for other chefs to follow. He's set up a model and protype that we're seeing other celebrity chefs follow today.

Maybe, but wasn't Bocuse doing pretty much the same thing (albeit more in France) some time before Puck?

And I'm sure he had a restaurant in Disneyworld before Wolfgang had one in Las Vegas...

J

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  • 2 weeks later...

if you're entitling an article "the 20 greatest sculptors of all time" what i would expect is a list of the most talented and gifted artists in that category. talent not measured by their financial success but for the art itself, its expression.

antoine careme, he's easy irrespective of what his food tasted, during his time on earth he shone as a culinary artist because he pushed and took the art of food forward. whatever one's opinion of adria or his cooking is, one can't argue how far he's taken food in the years he's been alive. who else has been at the head of a kitchen resposnible for so many new cooking techniques, who else has written so much about his own philosophies and approach to reinventing and progressing gastronomy? if we see a change in food over the next century it will be because of his work, not that of wolfgang puck.

if you look at more traditional artists, the great ones are those that shock and inspire because their works break with conventions, they express themselves in radically new ways - surrealism, britpop - generally they do things no one at the time was doing. by doing so their art evolves.

an english literature professor who insipers his students to write is of great value to society; however that does not make him a hemingway.

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This was 2004. I wonder if the Eurocentric nature of the list would have changed in the past nine years with greater understanding and recognition of Japanese ingredients, techniques, and chefs.

Nick Reynolds, aka "nickrey"

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