Another refugee troll from Abuzz?
Well, any discussion about Spanish haute cuisine would best be started off by a couple of differing opinions regarding El Bulli. As for Chucky, he needen't dine here:
http://www.foodtourist.com/FTGuide/Content/I432.htm
http://www.slate.com/Default.aspx?id=2094567
Ferran Adriá is not playing with his food, that's for sure, but I'm not so convinced. What about the old craftmanship of the chef, where it comes to having perfect products and then to know what to do with them. Not acting like the mad scientist in the kitchen like they do in el Bulli. You know, the way Bocuse, Alain Ducasse, and the other old skool chefs do.
An interesting point, BD. Personally, I couldn't sell that El Bulli stuff to any client I know, but it is intellectualy stimulating. Here is the thing: Beginning with Fernand Point, then moving to Bocuse, Ducasse, Robuchon, all the great chefs of Nouvelle Cuisine....that was, in it's time, considered a revolution in how one thought about food and dining. Now, it is considered standard fare. Getting to your thoughts though...what made it revolutionary is that the cooking itself was based in good ole' fashioned peasant cuisine, and elevated for the refined palate. Is it too early perhaps, to judge El Bulli? I will say one thing for Spanish haute....there are a lot of intriguing ideas going on, but I do wonder sometimes if they are sound, gastronomically.
Listening, especially on El Bulli.
Tony Bourdain's book, Cook's Tour, had some enjoyable - to me, I can't understand that he might not be everyone's favorite writer - segments set in Spain.
Well, Cook's Tour is about basic cooking, basically. The part that I liked the best was when he visited the home of his portuguese waiter, in Portugal. To slaughter a huge pig, use it properly, and bang! he got the best sausage he'd ever eaten! And lot's of other goodies.
But you're right, cav, when you say that Adriá is taking cooking a step further, just like the gang you mentioned. And it's correct doing so, but I think this is really show-cooking. I read an interview with Adriá where he said to enjoy his vacation just eating day-to-day fare, where he could also enjoy these explosions of taste. Not as strong as in his kitchen, but as he said, a well-cooked meal is a good meal.
Getting way back to the original premise of the thread, a world cuisine needs both the hearty basics of everyday cooking, peasant cuisine, as it's base, and show cooking, palace cuisine, to elevate it into the spotlight. I think most chefs eat quite simply when not on the job. Last night I just grilled a couple of trout and made a salad. I was happy with that.
Wouldn't that be perfect world food, cav? Grilled fish with a salad, you'd find that in all cultures, I guess.
Pea soup was palace cuisine in Sweden, as well as peasant cuisine. It was actually used to determine the a new monarch back in the old days... They served the bad king poisoned pea soup, and instated a new king! Whom they put to jail a coupla years later... Crazy bunch, them old swedes
I musta slept through that part of history class, because I can't remember the names of the two :-(
Sounds a bit like Hamlet, except they were Danes, and it was poison in the ear, rather than tainted pea soup.
In the summer, I make a chilled pea soup garnished with pea vines and a drizzle of creme fraiche. Simple but good, and spring green...no grey.
I had something very nice in a small restaurant not far from where we live, it was a chilled melonsoup wtih serrano ham strips, with some chili. A delicacy!
Sweet and cool, salty from the ham, and just a bit hot to top it off. Perhaps not world cuisine, but spanish fusion, I guess. Terrific with a white wine from Penedes, and again the name fails me...
This was typical Cav
cavfancier wrote:Getting way back to the original premise of the thread, a world cuisine needs both the hearty basics of everyday cooking, peasant cuisine, as it's base, and show cooking, palace cuisine, to elevate it into the spotlight. I think most chefs eat quite simply when not on the job. Last night I just grilled a couple of trout and made a salad. I was happy with that.
This was so typical Cav, don't you think?
BBB
wow, another neat threaad. I wish I could find his Sea Shanties thread, that was my all time fav , with cav, Edgar, and Setanta trading shanty for shanty.
This is the rack of lamb Chef Paul prepared for us when he catered a special meal on our visit to Toronto. I didn't know at the time I had black and white film in my camera.
Chef Paul won an award in a contest. The other dish was served with the rack of lamb.
peru.
i cant believe none of you people have mentioned peruvian cuisine...its definatly considered a world cuisin now a days...theres a cuisine tour the peopel in japan and korea that brings them to peru and only to peru only to eat there.It brings them to the finest restaurants there...we have soups,we invented pollo a la brasa (every hispanice person in USA loves it to death) we have plates with spaghetti..rice plates...plates with chinese flavor..and our best is our sea food(we have the world famous (CEVICHE)....and we have deicious deserts...all diiferent types..theres a saying in peru tha goes...if a peruvian has no food..give them a rock..they will season it to a delicasy
ive tasted spanish cuisine....peruvian has to be the best latino food in this planet..you people should go out and taste it
I have, at a couple of peruvian restaurants in Los Angeles. They served good food that I enjoyed, but those particular restaurants didn't serve the kind of food discussed earlier in the talk about high cuisine. But that was only a sampling.
Cav
I ran across an unusual recipe this week and had the urge to post it for Cav's opinion about it.
.......Than I remembered.
I miss Cav very much.
BBB
