I got Ferran Adria fatigue and can only now face answering those questions. It’s not as bad as my Gordon Ramsay fatigue. Anyway I’m over it now. My main task was to ask questions for other publications so not everything was answered in full.
In case you missed it Adria was launching his book “A Day at elBulli” and gave a talk put on by the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival.
Here we go:
Phil: Can I please have a reservation?
No. See my rejection as well.
Phil: But more seriously, I’d be keen on asking about the interrelationship between the food that he serves and the work that he does for Pepsico-owned Lays.
How does the corporate patronage change what he cooks at El Bulli? Does it give him better access to cutting edge food scientists and industrial techniques? Is his Tortilla Espagnole (made with potato chips) or his “3Ds with ras el hanout and lemon basil shoots” a clever product placement for Lays or is there no possible unbranded ingredient that can be substituted?
He laughed and despite being jaded after over 30 interviews got excited about the “3Ds with ras el hanout and lemon basil shoots” dish. He says that El Bulli is the only place in the world that can serve this dish as it is the only restaurant that has access to the raw (uncooked) product. The recipe is in his book and people won’t be able to cook it. He says it is controversial and gets people talking which I think is part of what he does.
One of the maxims he repeats is “creativity is not copying” and nobody can copy this.
He also says 3Ds is a very good product made from only corn and water.
He started to diversify out of the need to do other things from 1998 until 2008. He’s giving them all up because he doesn’t personally like business. But it allowed El Bulli to create a certain financial structure. “There is no secret behind it.”
And with this financial recession now he is not sure which he will keep. They have set up a kind of foundation where money can be drawn from as the restaurant rarely makes a profit.
He wants to concentrate on the El Bulli food side without any distractions. There will be no more consulting to manufacturing companies unless it is a really interesting project.
Country Bumpkin: Has he heard about the work being done in Hungary using sensors implanted on the tongue that can transmit the 5 basic tastes via bluetooth technology? Will he adapt this breakthrough into his repertoire?
Only five?
Another outspoken female: My fallback question to ask all parents is what values do they want to impart to their children (and whether they think their current lifestyle does that). As for his wonderful food, by his standards I am a total heathen. So much so it makes me want to have a lentil burger and chips for dinner 🙂
Would that me a deconstructed lentil burger and chips?
Dave: I have loads of questions on drinks:
What does he think of the use of oak in Albarino and Verdejo?
What does he drink at home (is he ever there?)?
If I came over to Casa Adria with a bottle of 1966 Fonseca Vintage Port and insisted that we drink it with the first course what would you serve up?
Do you consider contrasting wine matches relevent? (e.g. Grand Gru Chabis and Wagu beef)?
I didn’t get to the individual wines. In his lecture he described that he had developed a new alphabet that creates a new language for food. I asked him perhaps if there should be a new language for wine and what he thought about food and wine matching.
“It is very complicated but it something we are thinking about because for most Western civilisations they don’t conceive a meal without wine.
“We haven’t gone into this subject deep enough but if we get there it is going to cause quite a stir.
“A good dish and a good wine will always work. You have to live up to the standards one way or another.”
“If it is a good wine any wine can be matched to a dish. The other question is: what is a good wine? An extra-ordinary wine. But then you could also ask what is an extra-ordinary dish? It is very complex. There is not one single solution there are many different as long as we are talking about restaurants.
“If you were referring to a place where there you have only one single table and you are allowed to be more radical then you can have a different approach.”
He doesn’t think there will ever be a time when the restaurant will give up its cellar as his business partner Juli Soler is passionate about wine.
Oday: For a young twenty year old aspiring chef , passionate about this new type of cooking, what is the best path to follow? Would it better to study a science degree a university, work in a lab or try to find an apprenticeships in restaurants working in “molecular gastronomy”? Basically, how can young aspiring cooks specialize in this type of cooking?
He says that you should stick in the kitchen and cook and downplays the science. “We are seeing a new generation of Australian chefs trying to find an identity. He is interested to see what will emerge of the identity of high end Australian cusinine He says that Australia invented fusion cusine. “It probably has the same significance in Australia as novelle cusine had in Europe,” he says.
He says that the kind of cuisine he specialises in is really open viable in developing countries because it is so labour intensive.
Neil: I’ve got a couple.
– Despite the overwhelming popularity of your restaurant, do you think that perhaps people are tiring of your food movement and are turning back to real olives, not engineered ones?
Apparently not.
– With reports that some people are leaving hungry from restaurants serving your style of food, has anyone ever left your restaurant hungry?
Best ask the punters.
– Can you describe the feeling you have when you come up with a new dish, taste or texture that absolutely no one has ever had or tried before?
Not in English.
Pat: Can he recall a great “Eureka!” moment in his culinary experimentation?
No. He was just a normal kid.
What do the staff have for dinner?
They cook the kind of food you can prepare quickly for 70 – the sort of food the rest of us eat.
Which chefs does he regard as innovative?
Sorry, didn’t get to this one.
ut si: Mmmm, does he have a brother?
It’s very very complicated. Actually he does and he works as a chef in the business.
Another outspoken female: LOL ut si 🙂
When I read that, my next thought involved a cross between molecular gastronomy and body product. Um best not go there Ed 🙂
Simon: I’d be asking when he’s opening a restaurant in Sydney!
It’ll never happen. He only wants one El Bulli and is selling everything else.
Maria: Ask him his opinion on celebrity chefs like Gordon Ramsay or Jamie Oliver, and their entire world domination. Does his have any desire to be a household recognised name?
He respects what they do and Adria seems to find it bizarre that people are even interested him. When I said almost as many people came to see him as came to see Jamie Oliver a few years ago he nearly fell off his seat and was so shocked he accidentally started speaking English.
David: Ooh… ooh… I know this is late, and I’ve been racking my brain all week and coming up blank, but I only thought of it this morning while trying to figure out what to have for breakfast:
“What is Ferran’s favourite thing for breakfast?”
He just has a normal breakfast.
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