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On Sunday afternoon, I had a conversation with Grant Achatz at Chicago’s Steppenwolf theater having been a guest the night before at Alinea, the restaurant Grant opened with business partner Nick Kokonas in May 2005. Grant’s a long time veteran of The French Laundry, cut his teeth as executive chef of Trio. Alinea so intrigued the food world that it lured NYTimes restaurant critic Frank Bruni and Times freelancer and cookbook author Melissa Clark out of Manhattan for its opening night. Here was a restaurant that Pete Wells, then writing for Food & Wine magazine, now the Times Dining editor, called maybe one of the best restaurants in America—months before it even opened. And after it had opened, Gourmet magazine, lead by one of the most respected people in the business, Ruth Reichl, did in fact name it the number one restaurant in America. The restaurant had been open less than 18 months. Grant is 32 years old.
One of the dishes I had at Alinea on Saturday was “Apple horseradish celery,” pictured above, a shooter of celery juice carrying apple juice encased in horseradish-infused cocao butter.
While there were bigger dishes featuring beef ribs (beneath a translucent sheet of Guinness beer) and duck featuring rare breast and confited leg, the one-biters were my favorites. The chestnut puree partially frozen on the anti-griddle (from Polyscience), for example, served on a pin with some very fine maple syrup. Chestnut is so often washed out by its own starchiness, I felt like I’d never really tasted chestnut before.
My favorite was a dish Grant apparently can’t take off the menu, “Hot Potato Cold Potato.”
It’s remarkably simple: cold potato-truffle soup, served with a warm, poached potato topped with truffle—simpler better comfort food there never was. What elevated the dish beyond its component parts is its paraffin bowl through which a pin suspends the potato-truffle (and a chunk of butter). To eat it, you remove the pin, thereby lowering the garnish into the soup. It’s an ingenious mechanism paired with perfectly conceived and executed food. (Martin Kastner conceived and created the service piece—the guy’s brilliant—and these luxurious photos are all by his wife, Lara Kastner, courtesy of the restaurant; a gallery of photos can be seen at the restaurant’s site)
Each of these dishes contain elements of the so-called "molecular gastronomy" movement; every one of the 22 I had at the restaurant contained at least one such element—hot gel, foam, unusual textures, self-encapsulated liquid (not to mention one dish containing what tasted suspiciously similar to an ingredient that has been outlawed by the fearsome city council in Chicago).
And yet, Grant told me and four hundred other people the next day, he didn’t like the term; in fact, he didn’t feel "molecular gastronomy" described anything he did in the kitchen.
Grant’s not alone. In a letter originally published in the UK in The Guardian and published this month in Food Arts magazine, the godfather of this cuisine, Ferran Adria, along with Heston Blumenthal of the Fat Duck, disavow the term. Speaking out with Thomas Keller (and Harold McGee, who did the actual writing), these three-star chefs note that “molecular gastronomy” was a term used to name a workshop for scientists and chefs on the basic food chemistry of traditional dishes. “That workshop,” they say, “did not influence our approach, and the term ‘molecular gastronomy’ does not describe our cooking, or indeed any style of cooking.”
Grant further noted that at a recent conference, Adria explained how he had returned from travels not with a hundred new ideas, as he always had in the past, but with three. For his demo, he didn’t use liquid nitrogen or alginate and sodium choloride—he broke down a stone crab.
We are at a remarkable point in our culinary history. The burst of creativity that began at El Bulli and has carried on in places like Fat Duck and Alinea (among a handful of other notable American restaurants) has been thrilling. But I think the innovations we’ve seen have been more than enough for now. Now, like the innovations of Nouvelle Cuisine in the 1970s, techniques such as hot gels, unusual starches and gums, foams, and sous vide cooking, need to find their proper place in the evolution of those restaurants fueled by the creative spirit that are striving for innovation–without being dogged by the ungainly and inaccurate term “moleculary gastronomy.” It is the new new cuisine. But we stopped referring to Nouvelle Cuisine as such, after its essential mandates were fully incorporated into the fine dining idiom. In the hands of a chef such as Achatz, whose culinary fundamentals (how to cook a potato, how to make a chestnut puree) are so exquisite, I hope we stop calling the new new cuisine anything at all other than really good food.
Lucky you to feast at Alinea. I agree,calling it Molecular Gastronomy is not at all appetizing and makes the cuisine look sterile. I cannot wait to sample this kind of food.
I ate at Alinea last year, and also Homaru Cantu’s Moto, and while Alinea was great, Moto freakin’ blew me away. It was the best meal I have ever eaten (and I have been to some top top places)
I agree with you, the comparison to nouvelle is apt. You even get the same kind of complaints (It’s pretentious! The plates are tiny! Just gimme a ribeye!) and I do get the impression that these techniques will become part of the basic repertoire by 2025 or so.
I kind of like the term molecular gastronomy, I think a shorter term is needed though. Food 2.0!
In the early 20th century a bunch of scientists came forward and said, basically, that mankind had discovered all there is to be discovered and that the pace of scientific discovery would slow since so much had been accomplished in the past 50 years to formalize the scientific method and make new, fundamental discoveries. Of course, then Einstein came along a short time later and completely rewrote all of the theories on space, time, energy and magnetism…. really fundamental stuff that had been all wrong.
As soon as an innovator says they are done, the ideas are used up and it is time to look backward, I look for the 10 year old who will be on the scene in 12 years kicking their ass.
And I expect that while it may be disheartening to hear chef Adria say that it is time to look back, Grant ultimately will not buy into that. He is still too young and too full of energy.
It seems to me that what is really being said in the letter you cite, and by Grant and you during your talk at Steppenwolf, is that Molecular Gastronomy, a term that we can all agree is a gangly misnomer, is now accepted. It is the end of the beginning of the movement that embraced rapid and radical innovation in haute cuisine.
The idea that a chef or a restaurant can or should present innovative techniques, dishes and surprising flavors is no longer viewed negatively. A restaurant can take chances, so long as the end result is satisfying and delicious, in part (a single dish) or in whole (the entire dining experience).
As Grant said in the talk, this is all cyclical. I will be looking forward to further innovation from Grant and others precisely when we least expect it.
Gee, I don’t know. I can’t imagine that too many of the people who prepare this kind of food can pull it off without paying attention to the food’s molecular composition and the physics that comes into play during preparation and cooking.
Sounds to me like Chefs Acahtz and Adria may just be getting sick of hearing the term “molecular gastronomy” applied to what they do and having to explain it ad nauseum. Or perhaps they don’t want their work to be labeled by anyone but themselves.
In either case they are going to have to come up with a label that does a better job of representing what they do because this one is not going to go away just because they don’t like it.
I hope I don’t sound dismissive, I am sympathetic. But when you look at this food, it’s appearance does not tie it very firmly to any previously established culinary form. So it kind of makes sense to give it a unique name such as “MG.”
It’s a real problem.
If only there were a catchy, two-word phrase for “playing with your food!”
bob delG,
tell me how foam is anymore “molecular” than stock, how calcium chloride is any different from sodium chloride, kosher or otherwise. when i salt my food, am i practicing moleculuar gastronomy.
“molecular” is irrelavent. “gastronomy” is so general as to be meaningless.
I would suggest that MG came about because it’s almost like science combined with cooking since you have to know the properties of everything you’re working with down to a very precise level. To make gels, foams, all these strange things is almost like a chemistry experiment, isn’t it?
I don’t know where the term originated (nor am I fan of it) so that’s just a guess, but I’m afraid that, like “foodie,” whether it’s an appreciated or even appropriate moniker isn’t the point, it’s one that is now branded in much of the public’s mind.
What strange things?
Lovely little edible vignettes, refined, sophisticated, ethereal. Beautiful to photograph. Food art. What philistine attached the odious appellation “molecular gastronomy” to this nouveau culinary preciosity?
By “strange,” I mean, stuff that doesn’t look like normal food that you’d see prepared in an average person’s home, or anything you could easily buy or prepare at home without a lot of special equipment and extremely specialized cooking knowledge. Eating something off a pin, for example, isn’t something I would call “normal.” I don’t mean strange with a negative connotation, I mean it with an innovative, different and positive connotation. But, I mean, foams and gels and eating off sticks and pins, it’s kind of strange to the average person. I wouldn’t even know how to begin eating most of the things presented at these types of restaurants without specific instruction, never mind not being able to recognize what the foods are that make up what’s in front of me. Before actually tasting even the couple of items pictured above, if one didn’t have a menu or a description, would the average person, even a smarter than average person with a decent palate be able to accurately guess at what exactly is in each item? They’re not easily recognizable. That’s what I mean by strange.
Molecular gastronomy is just a modern word for cooking. Simple as that. We’ve been exercising molecular gastronomy ever since Lady Elinor Fettiplace (for example) separated an egg, whipped the white, dropped in some sugar and created the Meringue! How bizarre would that texture have been when it was first created!! Was Lady Elinor Fettiplace (c. 1570 – c. 1647) a ye olden day molecular gastronomist…too right.
http://www.inmamaskitchen.com/FOOD_IS_ART/meringue2.html
Beef ribs with a translucent sheet of Guinness beer – great idea! Think I’ll try that some time!
Speaking of weird looking eating instruments, I’d say a few asian or islander peoples would have a bit of a giggle at us westerners using our funny looking 3-4 pronged metal things to eat with. What’s wrong with your bloody fingers, they’d say! Did anyone ever see the episode of Red Dwarf when they went to an alien guests for dinner. The eating implements (magically) made the food hover in front of the diner, who then had to guide the morsal into their mouth. Needless to say, the food went everywhere!
The pin idea is just a variation of ‘fondue’.
How about tightrope cuisine?
Taking risks, planning assiduously, executing flawlessly. Oohs and Aahs for dessert.
Here’s the link to the Memosian anti-matter chop sticks.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bB5izV79nps
Indeed — we certainly knew the term was dead after listening to Marcel blather on about it on Top Chef 2.
Exactly my point – whether or not Asians would giggle at us (I think most of them know what a fork and knife look like unless we’re talking REALLY rural here), I understand what you’re saying. And yes, Lady Elior and the Asians giggling at us are good examples, and also both speak to my point. By strange I mean “unusual, extraordinary, curious,” which is the dictionary definition of strange. I never said strange was bad, but what’s being done in MG is surely not just to serve “normal” food, but to be different, that is, to be strange, no? And while I think it’s a bit of a stretch to liken eating off of a pin as a cousin to fondue, who knows what will be “normal” 50, 100 years from now, right? I’m all about innovation and trying some new things, but Lady Elinor was indeed probably looked at as strange the first time she made a meringue if that genesis is true, and ergo I think the whole MG thing is strange too. As Bob said above, “…its appearance does not tie it very firmly to any previously established culinary form.”
I think the desire to give this particular style of cooking and presentation a name like “molecular gastronomy” may come from the effect the dishes may have upon the lay people who get to experience them. You have to admit that between the use of various gelling agents, “anti-griddles” and high concept dishware the completed items look a bit like something out of a science fiction story. The unknown being a bit frightening, we want to name the demon – so we give it a “tech-y” name, hence the “molecular gastronomy”. Is the name necessarily apt? No. But naming the unknown to feel in control is part of human nature, I think.
I wonder, now that you can get things like the Texturas line from La Tienda and home cooks can experiment with these sorts of preparations at home, if that will help ease the term out of the general lexicon and make it easier to for everyone to just call it “good food”.
I think “molecular gastronomy” makes it sound like the people working in this particular culinary discipline are more concerned with the science and the “weirdness” (for lack of a better word) than they are with the food itself. Maybe that’s why so many of the top progressive chefs don’t like the term. The food *is* still the focus; they’re just finding new ways to prepare and serve it. Nothing wrong with that at all. If you’re a good chef, then you’re going to be producing good food, whether you prepare it on a traditional stove or in a vat of liquid nitrogen.
What, maybe shorten it to MoGas?
How can anyone have any sort of animosity towards an artistic spirit who can create, not only visual victual beauty, but the sublime, almost gossamer, wisps of delicatesse that an “apple horseradish celery” engenders?
What inspires one to create those exquisite “amuse-buches” such as “hot potato, cold potato”? Could it be a viscious sense of humor?
ruhlman:
I’d have to agree with sorcha on this one. Seems to me that the term invokes images of the occasional oddball on Iron Chef that uses all sorts of weird chemicals and apparently inappropriate equipment (like a belt sander) to generate their culinary wonders. What’s interesting is that the last time I saw one of them on ICA, the challenger won. Go figure.
If anything, I would suggest that this is simply the next generation of nouvelle cuisine. The wikipedia entry for “nouvelle cuisine” actually provides an alternate term for molecular gastronomy: postmodern cuisine. I’m not a huge fan of relating food to art, since I consider it more of a craft. (If it’s too beautiful to eat, why bother making it out of food?) However, this descriptive phrase seems more appropriate to me.
i know these guys are genius. i still feel that in a world where good food product is often ruined by shitty technique and foux progress it would be great to see what grant and adria could do if they put away thier lab coats. what did bourdain say of scott bryan so many years ago? he never get his third m star because he ‘didn’t like to play with his food that much.’ here’s to red beans and rice!
These are just guys using a scientific approach to invent/discover the next world famous cooking technique/taste. As I see it, there are three types of cook/chef.
1. The one that accidentally stumbled across a technique/taste (like the caveman that stubbed his toe on a rock and dropped the leg of meat he was carrying in the saltwater, only to discover it tasted better salted)
2. Will make small, interesting variations of the above. Nothing more.
3. Will do all of the above plus push the envelope for that eureka moment (the scientist, mechanic, engineer, molecular gastronomist, technician).
Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!
I’ve been waiting for a glimpse of the light at the end of the tunnel for so long, I’ve forgotten what to look for. And, voila!
Most psychologists will tell you that we fear what we don’t know.
Thus, when food is presented as if it is science or invokes the notion that it is created in a lab and not a frying pan (or something a customer has in his or her own home), diners tend to get nervous.
I think the problem with the term “molecular gastronomy” is that it implies teeny-tiny portions of the unfamiliar, and in America (and many other cultures around the world, I suppose), we’ve been taught to believe that the definition of a good dining experience or a good meal is that makes you feel full, or sated. And let’s be honest: the notion of feeling sated for most is incongruous to a gram of chestnut puree served on the tip of a pin.
To be honest, I don’t really care what people call it because at its core, it’s really just food. And, as long as it makes people continue to think, talk, cook and eat as a way to contribute their own experiences to the many ways in which food shapes our culture, I’ll be happy.
We’re all very different, and each one of us has individual tastes, preferences and desires when it comes to food. But the one thing we all have in common is that we’re human and we need nourishment in some shape or form. How we choose to meet that need is what I find most interesting in people. I think what Grant is doing continues to build on what I hope every chef wakes up hoping to do: meet the basic human need of nourishment, and hope that it feeds not just the body, but also the mind and the soul.
I very much like Herve This’s attitude that it MG is not so much a cuisine, but more like an understanding of the nature of food during prep and cooking. So I think the question really shouldn’t be “Is this Molecular Gastronomy we’re eating?” so much as, “Is our host taking into account the chemistry/physics of our food when he/she is cooking?” It’s just that people and Cantu and Adria call attention to this more scientific approach to food than someone who flips burgers at the local McDs. Mind you, the people behind McDs are pretty much masters of MG, but they don’t want you to think about it as you’re biting into one of their re-engineered meat patties.
While I could really enjoy eating at one of these forward restaurants, given that someone else would pay for it, I agree that any forward movement depends on methods possible to cooks and at least good home kitchens. Nouvelle cuisine was easy, if sometimes time consuming. This is not. Even those I know who have equipped themselves for part of it are throwing out a lot of failures.
Of course anyone who ever cooked bones understands molecular gastronomy, or mums who threw chicken feet into soup, or people who pureed avocado to replace oily other things. The idea is as old as the kitchen. It’s the use of scientific equipment and edgy possibilities that intrigue, but if a family dies from someone trying to use low temperature vacuum cooking it will bring us up short.
Food that can be done only at restaurants few can afford can pique the curiosity, but it can alter little in the food world until it gets out of them. It’s like making a blockbuster movie but making only 10 copies of it for world release.
‘Postmodern’ is the only word I can think of that seems to fit. Because ‘Post-nouvelle’ just doesn’t work.
Those dishes look and sound amazing, anyway.
Michael you wrote
“tell me how foam is anymore “molecular” than stock, how calcium chloride is any different from sodium chloride, kosher or otherwise. when i salt my food, am i practicing molecular gastronomy.”
First of all drop the attitude. Do you always address senior citizens in such rude prose?
Now to answer your questions (above) and assertions that “molecular” is irrelevant and “gastronomy” is meaningless.
As it was originally defined by the guy who coined it -Herve This, in his Phd thesis of 1969- the term “molecular gastronomy” refers to an approach to cooking that, like the more general discipline of food science advocates looking at what food is made of, and how those molecules interact during cooking. This also advocated that the tools of science be used to develop new dishes, and that food and cooking be used as a vehicle to bring scientific knowledge to the general public.
So Michael, I think that This for one, would say that if you or your chef friends are looking at the molecular composition of stock or foam in an attempt to understand what they are (using the tool of science called the scientific method) before turning them into some new dish, and then telling the public all about what you did you are doing molecular gastronomy.
Now my sense of you is that you are not someone who practices molecular gastronomy. But the work and words of Adria and Achatz leave no doubt that they most definitely do. They might not like the label and the expectations it imposes on them, but it applies just the same.
As for your assertions that the term molecular is irrelevant: it is only so if you don’t consider molecules when you cook. And the word gastronomy, far from being meaningless, has always referred to a way of looking at food ,cooking and eating that is investigative, promotional while emphasizing aesthetic enjoyment. If you would like to review what it means go back and read Brillat Savarin, he makes it pretty clear.
maybe i should go back to notes from a certain class, “Intro to Gastronomy”–?
Gastronomy isn’t meaningless, it’s meaningless when applied to a style of cooking. When i consider the importance of the molecule lecithin, the half-fat-soulable, half-water-soluable wonder that stabilizies an emulsion, i’m not doing molecular gastronomy. Molecular gastronomy isn’t something you “do.” And it doesn’t define a style of cooking. Maybe it does at Moto, I don’t know, and yes it might describe an approach to the behavior of food, but it doesn’t accurately reflect the food or the service at Alinea.
So why do we need to define it? Why should we care if something’s named molecular gastronomy (I do like the MoGas thing, though), because ultimately, food is food. The preparations may vary, the ingredients may vary, but it’s still food. Since the cavemen were gnawing on sabre-tooth tiger burgers, someone’s always been out there trying to figure out new and interesting ways of making food taste good, and combining ingredients in innovative ways, or trying new ways of preparing food. Thankfully, it’s been neverending, and I hope it stays neverending. The problem is when folks on the sidelines feel the need to name what is going on, to define it, and cast it as a trend or “new movement” in food. Why bother? Just shut up and enjoy it. And whether you’re dining on a sublime bit of foam on a special fork made from the bones of a baby wildebeest ritually slaughtered during a full moon, or a slab of ribs you bought at a roadside stand, it’s all good. Why get in the way of that enjoyment by getting your undies in a bundle about whether it’s a “new movement” or not. Sure, there may be something in MoGas that eventually translates into a mass movement, and maybe someday I’ll walk into Mickey D’s and get a nice big order of McFoam that tastes remarkably like pheasant under glass … but by then, there’ll be something else that’s new out there that all the food critics and writers and online foodies are foaming (pardon the pun) over. Food, like most of humanity, continues to evolve. And we should be thankful for that, because in the end we all benefit, and we all get to enjoy where it’s going … so long as we don’t forget where it’s been, and don’t turn our noses up at some of the old methods and old recipes.
Michael you wrote
“Molecular gastronomy isn’t something you “do.”
I agree, I think.
I’d call MG an “approach to” or “system of” cooking that is different enough from other systems that it deserves it own name. The food that comes out of this system could be called almost anything the chef wants to call it. But for whatever reasons Adria
et al failed to define what they were making in any other way that made sense to others, so the label “Molecular Gastronomy” was applied by default.
Okay, so if the term “molecular gastronomy” is a system or perhaps a way of thinking, then what do you call the food produced by the people who follow this approach?
Big problem here Michael -and mostly from a marketing perspective. While it’d be intellectually honest to just call the food coming out of WD50, Alinea etc, “good food” or “post nouvelle cuisine abstractionism” you aren’t going to get the public to embrace a new name until you can come up with something that’s catchy.
I’ll also add that it’s be pointless for anyone to even try and shake the label “MG” until they stop talking to the press about the scientific equipment they’ve co-opted for cooking. They also need to talk less about the physical principles involved in making the food and spend more time talking about aesthetics.
In other words, there needs to be an adjustment of the brand identity before they introduce the new label.
I think the type of cuisine should be identified with a name. It is a class all it’s own and because it can branch out to influence the way traditional dishes can be made, it really should have a name to identify it.
Talk about what is done to the food and how it’s presented to figure out what the name should be. I agree…molecular gastronomy really does nothing to describe what the food is all about.
Chris, Chris, Chris. You wrote
“The problem is when folks on the sidelines feel the need to name what is going on, to define it, and cast it as a trend or “new movement” in food. Why bother? Just shut up and enjoy it.”
Why bother? Because Chris, thinking about what things are and what they mean is what humans beings do. There is nothing you can do about this so why not just go along with it. It won’t hurt to do so and you may learn something in so doing.
Now as for Michael and many of the other people who write here “being on the sidelines” I think you must be reading us from left field.
Michael has some serious professional culinary credentials and has been out there cooking and writing about cooking for a long time. And me well, I’m not going to trot out my professional credentials, but I will say that I have certainly earned the right to respectfully critique anyone who chooses to put them self out there in the public forum.
So I don’t see any problem here Chris.
Now if you would like to retract your suggestion that we “shut up” I’m sure that I speak for Michael when I and many others when I say that we will forgive you.
What this group of chefs do falls under the category of food experimentation. If they want a new term maybe it should be “Experimental Cuisine”
I would think in NYC that would go over better than “Molecular Gastronomy”.
As a scientist and the daughter of a language teacher, I certainly have my opinions on this. But I do not cook, so please correct any culinary misconceptions I may put forth.
Using tapioca starch to make olive oil into a powder seems to just fall under the category of “mixing” food, (regardless, is powdered olive oil even safe to eat??) but if the molecular structure of food is changed in a NEW way, that most certainly makes it unique.
Changing the chemical nature of a food (for example with liquid nitrogen) if done for the first time, that certainly falls under the category of a science experiment; it’s all a matter of degrees.
Changing salylic acid from the bark of the willow tree gave us asparin; foxglove was chemically mimicked to give us the heart medicine called digitalis. Bark and plants, to some extent, fall under the category of food.
So is WD-50 technically making medication? (joke.)
I do think that this is a unique craft. But since I have never tried this style of food, I just wonder if the experience is any different than, say, trying a new fruit on an exotic island.
If a metal pin is in any way involved in my meal, then I’m sorry – that is not cooking, it is not “molecular gastronomy,” and it is certainly not something to fawn over. Rather, it is somewhat ridiculous. Achatz et al. may be perceived as “innovative” by some, but are these uber-chefs not just serving up novelties? How much farther away from the relatively straight-forward craft of cooking a good meal are they going to try and take us? Example: Achatz once served some type of edible paper containing various powders that mimicked the flavor of freshly-baked pepperoni pizza. But why not just eat a perffectly cooked piece of pepperoni pizza, enjoying all of the senses and textures offered by the real thing? By this simple example, one can fully appreciate the absurdity produced by those that have strayed just a little too far away from the knife, fire, and quality ingredients.
Maya
As it was originally conceived by Herve This, Molecular Gastronomy is a subset of food science designed to raise public awareness about science through food.
Now I don’t know if the people who have had their food labeled MG ever knew this or, if they did know, ever took its mission seriously. My guess is that most of them simply thought it’d be cool to apply what they knew about the physics and chemistry of food and cooking to their cooking, see what they could come up with and try to make some money in the process.
You know this discussion brings me back to the days when chefs who had been identified as preparing “nouvelle cuisine” began to get pissed off when that label was applied to what they did. Then there were endless arguments about the meaning of the term and how it did or did not apply to one or the other.
What finally happened was that the term “nouvelle cuisine” began to disappear having been replaced by terms like “New American,” “Neo Classical,” and so on.
But did nouvelle cuisine disappear? I think not. You can still see it in virtually every starred western-style restaurant in the world.
The philosophical conceits of the nouvelle cuisine were so radical and so effective at changing the look of haute cuisine, and the socio-economic context for its adoption so favorable and long lasting, that a lot more than the name would have to change for it to be gone for good.
But try telling that to the people cooking it.
Come to think of it, the food that comes out of Molecular Gastronomy, looks like a form of nouvelle cuisine just a little bit better informed by science than its predecessor.
Hey Michael how about “Science Diet” as a replacement for MG?
No wait, isn’t that a brand of pet food?
Now what chef in his right mind would want his name associated with pet food?
I think if we see a book titled “You Might Be A Molecular Gastronomer If…”
we can be confident that molecular gastronomy is officially kaput.
Ruhlman:
Do you think this type of cuisine (whatever one may choose to call it) has long-term staying power? Will there be a growing demand for this type of dining experience, or will the public’s demand only be enough to support a handful of restaurants in major metropolitan areas?
I’ve often wondered if people will return again and again to a place that is centered, in large part, around the element of surprise? Yes, the dish may taste good, but will the “hot potato cold potato” or “apple horseradish celery” be as thrilling (or even satisfying) on the second, or fifth, try? Granted, the best restaurants will constantly create and serve new dishes to their patrons, but to some degree, I suspect many of these dishes will play off of the same techniques or taste sensations (e.g., hot and cold, encapsulated liquids). Many people tend to describe meals at Minibar, WD-50, and Alinea as great “experiences” — but how many times will people return to re-live the experience?
Weighing in on this discussion, I’d like to add that the unfortunately named molecular gastronomy is, alas, niche cuisine, clearly food art created by passionate chefs expressing their artistic spirit. Rushing to embrace the movement of the moment are, few as they may be, the capricious flock ever on the search for the next food fad. Let it not be feared that foams, gels, and sprays will ever challenge what everyone really wants from food: lots of taste and satiety.
“Many people tend to describe meals at Minibar, WD-50, and Alinea as great “experiences” — but how many times will people return to re-live the experience?”
Good question. I had dinner at Alinea last year and really enjoyed it. And yes, I would go back as many times as they would let me to enjoy the hot potato/cold potato because it tastes. so. damn. good. The experience of surprise and wonder was nice, however when I remember my favorite items, its not that it was presented in a funky way, it’s that it tasted good and made me feel a certain way. Taste and emotion. That’s what I remember. At the end of the day, I think that’s what Alinea, and places like it, are going for…and I think that’s what will bring people back. Those who can afford it, anyway. I’m a working-class diva. The only “re-living” of the experience I have comes from the pictures I took of the food.
And all this time I thought an MG was something you drove with the top down.
Herve This wins for the coolest name known to food. He sounds like a muppet character or a member of Devo.
Ah yes, Bob, good old Hill’s Science Diet. Used to feed it to my cats. Their Z/D formula for allergies breaks up the proteins in the ingredients known to cause reactions. Molecular Gastronomy for cats? Don’t get me going.
Again, my mom’s a linguist so I’m intrigued by the descriptions of “New American” cuisine – I always thought that meant that it was French inspired American food. I do think labels are great as long as they complement the product and there is some level of consensus as to what they mean.
IMO the word “Gastronomy” belongs in a hospital ward, not in food.
I think rustic cuisine should remain rustic, but MG will be popular as long as it finds some soul and finds new ways to interest people.
MG is meant to push the boundries of how we view and think of food.On the other hand, there are many chef’s out there who push those limits and their food is not labled MG.
BTW, Michael you mentioned that NPR might be taping the discusssion for air at a later date. Any idea if that happened and when it will air?
And, by the way — those photos are beautiful… Especially the apple-horseradish-celery shot. Thanks for including them.
Maya you wrote
“Again, my mom’s a linguist
Well then, we have something in common; linguistically at least. I’m interested in language too, but have never been able to master the linguistics because of an accident of birth.
See, I’m from an Italian family and my mother was a linguini-ist. I’ve never gotten over it.
You also wrote
“New American” cuisine – I always thought that meant that it was French inspired American food.”
Yes, that’s what it is in most instances. The use of the French word “cuisine” gives away that part of its nature right away.
To see the nouvelle cuisine influence in “New American” you’ve got to first define “nouvelle cuisine” in juxtaposition with its French antecedents and then look for evidence of its presence the next time you go out to eat at say, “The Gotham Bar” or “Chez Panisse” et al. But not before you get a handle on what the word “cuisine” actually means.
Now I’m no linguist, but I think I can say with some authority that the word “cuisine,” prima facie means “kitchen.” However, it also means the food that comes out of a kitchen, the kitchens of a particular region and the kitchens of a particular systematic approach to making food. And, now that I have your attention (yawn?) the word cuisine can also refer to the rules, ideology and aspirations of a specific system for acquiring, preparing, cooking, serving and eating food.
It’s this last definition that is the one you need to use when you are analyzing a term like Nouvelle Cuisine or comparing any one cuisine to another (Actually, I think the people who object to the term Molecular Gastronomy might cool off a bit if they could substitute the term “cuisine” for “gastronomy.” But really, unless you are doing science or law, I think it’s little silly to get so hung up on whether or not a word or words accurately describes what something is or isn’t. If the sum of the parts adds up to something distinct, then it is distinct and could be called almost anything and still be recognized for what it is. In fact I think that discussion might be more about the aesthetics of the term than the term itself. I think some of the people who practice MG may not like the sound of the name and want a label that’s more attractive. There may be money issues too. And I’m not buying the lines in Michael’s essay that Adria et al were not influenced by the work of This -not for a minute. If you read enough history you read this kind of dissimulation all the time. The fact is that the way This suggested working looks enough like the way Adria works to suggest a causal, not casual connection -and This’ work predates Adria’s. Of course there is the remote possibility that we are looking at a case of parallel-evolution but that’s be pretty hard to argue given how connected we all are so I doubt it. I wonder, Michael, did Adria claim to have never heard of This before he developed his idiosyncratic style of cooking?)
Suffice it writ for now that if you want to satisfy your urge to know what “New American Cuisine” actually is, you’ve got your work cut out for you.
There is an excellent discussion of the nouvelle cuisine in Raymond Sokolov’s “Why We Eat, What We Eat” pp.217-240 (?)
kristin — NPR has taped all of the Traffic Jam events that Steppenwolf has put on over the last several years and will be creating a radio show based on those tapes. I have been told that it will begin to air sometime in Fall 2007.
We did, however, video the event with the kind permission of both Steppenwolf and NPR. The sound quality is not great, but we will eventually stream it on the web and I will send Mr. Ruhlman a link to post here once we do.
a few replies to comments:
Tag’s wrote:
I think if we see a book titled “You Might Be A Molecular Gastronomer If…”
we can be confident that molecular gastronomy is officially kaput.
I got this in my email inbox yesterday (from Daily Candy):
”
Fear not, freak. Every situation has a silver lining.
Literally. Est. 1887Ag, a new line of tees, is the fashion equivalent to molecular gastronomy. Combining 95 percent Supima cotton with 5 percent pure silver (Ag on the periodic table), the collection has style down to a science.”
So it has entered the fashion vernacular, I guess. And Tag’s may well be correct!
Connor wrote:
“I’ve often wondered if people will return again and again to a place that is centered, in large part, around the element of surprise?”
95% of the Alinea menu changes completely every 12 weeks or so. Achatz’ creativity is central to the experience — surprise is only one element. But it is an element that even frequent diners experience (and we do have regulars). I see the food every day, but sit down to eat rarely. After Steppenwolf my wife and I dined at Alinea for the first time in 4 months or so and the experience felt new.
david wrote:
“Achatz once served some type of edible paper containing various powders that mimicked the flavor of freshly-baked pepperoni pizza. But why not just eat a perffectly cooked piece of pepperoni pizza, enjoying all of the senses and textures offered by the real thing? By this simple example, one can fully appreciate the absurdity produced by those that have strayed just a little too far away from the knife, fire, and quality ingredients.”
I ate the “pizza” as a diner at Trio before I ever met Grant. The waiter would arrive with a covered bowl and announce in mock formality “pizza!” and would open up the top to reveal the postage stamp pizza. The first time I saw it I laughed out loud. Yes, it did taste remarkably like a pepperoni pizza, but the point was actually to mock the tiny portions served at some haute restaurants — a bit of self-referential humor. Were it not followed by substantial food that tasted great and satiated appetite, then the joke would not be very funny at all. Achatz walked that tightrope well. Taken out of the context of a 24-course meal, your charge of absurdity is accurate. Within that context, it works on many levels.
The danger, of course, is that someone doesn’t get the point and starts using these techniques willy-nilly. It is bound to happen, but that is not unique to cuisine — it happens everywhere. Why, just look at the Microsoft Zune…
Hello,
I have a question in the matter.
First let me say that I apologize for having not made it to the discussion, living 2000 miles away was a bit of an obstacle. It sounds as though it was a fine one, I look forward to the video stream.
Also let me say I regret not having dined at Alinea before leaving Chicago, the dishes ChefG prepared at the pre-opening demonstration at the Chopping Block (poached broccoli stem, grapefruit, steelhead roe as well as lobster, chestnut, bayleaf vapor) were interesting and delicious.
But – I, for one, am confused as to why “Molecular Gastronomy” has suddenly become something everyone wishes to distance themselves from.
Blumenthal, back in 2002, even described it as an “approach to cooking” here:
http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=11876
And speaking of Trio, back in 2003 when ChefG was asked about Molecular Gastronomy with this question:
“ Do you have a view on the value of the “molecular gastronomy” school of thinking, including how it may interact with the solid/liquid/vapour/other state of food products?”
His answer back then was:
“As food evolves and becomes more creative the need for a better understanding of foodstuffs will become necessary for cooks to manipulate ingredients further. Trio finds this approach to food very exciting, as it opens many new doors to not only the way we cook but the way the guest eats. This movement, in combination with the highly creative movement, will redefine high level dinning in the years to come. New techinques will be born and food will become more thought provoking and entertaining. The days of putting a piece of protein in a hot pan are almost over. Observent cooks will continue to incorporate tools and techniques from other professions into the cooking arena. Some examples include the isi foamer, liquid misters, paco jet, wine press, centerfuige, bag cookery(sous-vide), nitrous freezing the list goes on. It will continue to make dinning exciting, both for the cook and the guest.”
http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=15451&view=findpost&p=206054
What exactly is it that has changed between then and now?
It seems Mr. This has put a great deal of his life and work into the subject, published books on it even, and seeing that he is the creator of the practice and he places within it’s confines not only the research of food and cooking but also the creation of new dishes with the new found information – I’m not sure that anyone has the right or ability say otherwise. Especially since, as BobG pointed out – his work pre-dates everyone.
It seems as though the “creative” faction of the movement and the “research” faction of the movement once overlapped and collaborated – and I’m not sure one is of much use without the other – as the creatives need the science to create and the science needs someone to use it.
I think it might be time to kiss and make up.
I don’t perceive any hostility toward molecular gastronomy itself, just the name. Just like “More Than Just Cooking,” it seems wide of the mark.
That’s a good point Tags, thank you.
Though it seems to me that the term “Molecular Gastronomy”, much like Molecular Biology or Ornithology or any of the numerous scientific names for animals, vegetables etc are simply that – the scientific name for something that is called numerous other things as well.
Mr. This named the practice, it belongs to him and just as the people who cook any type of cuisine – he is free to call it whatever he chooses.
Though I believe that the negative connotation that others speak of attached to the term has nothing to do with Mr. This. If anything he seems to come off as extending the work of people like Savarin. If anything his term was adopted by others who brought the negative connotation to it – though obviously not true of everyone practicing this type of cuisine.
Still, if the bass line at the beginning of a Queen song brings to mind a mockery, it is most definitely not any fault of the band, rather the people who sampled it and turned it into such.
If “Molecular Gastronomy” has become a mockery – I don’t believe much blame lies on the shoulders of Mr. This. He seems to be a respectable man doing respectable work.
And though I am not one that is innocent of disrespect in my past, to imply otherwise by associating HIS work and HIS term with anything negative that he, himself did not do – seems disrespectful and irrelevant.
bob delG, for the record, i agree with you that it’s crazy for adria to say he wasn’t influenced by This, and I’ll bet that was imprecise due to the difficulties of a man who only speaks catalan working with a writer who doesn’t.
nick and others noted the element of surprise. that does remain important to grant’s food. when I finished my meal at Alinea, I said, “i’ve got a lot to think about.” Grant said, “That’s part of the point.” when you’re served something on a pin that looks like blotter acid and it tastes like pizza, it makes you think.
nathan, thanks for calling up those past comments from grant. i’d like to know if he still thinks sauteing protein is a thing of the past. no doubt most of what he said then holds true now.
Nathan
Forgive the presumption but I think that you, like I, think there is something that our host and the others who fomented this discussion have either chosen not to say or do not yet recognize.
BTW Has anyone looked at the web site of Alinea? If you blink you might mistake it for a scientific instrument supplier’s site.
And what about that logo? It’s a stylized model of an atom.
http://www.alinea-restaurant.com/pages/about.html
My point here is simply that if Chef Achatz wants to distance himself from the MG label he’s going to have to do a lot more than simply say that his cuisine is not pushing science. By comparison Chef Adria’s site for El Bulli seems to be saying that his cuisine is largely about luxury and provoking an existential experience -very traditional 3 Star aspirations
http://www.elbulli.com/menu.php?lang=en
And if you look at archived pages for El Bulli it appears that Adria has not played the science card much, if at all.
http://web.archive.org/web/*/www.elbulli.com
Earlier I used the slogan “More Than Just Cooking.” I meant to say “Way More Than Cooking.”
The management deeply regrets any confusion this may have caused.
Bob delG wrote:
“Forgive the presumption but I think that you, like I, think there is something that our host and the others who fomented this discussion have either chosen not to say or do not yet recognize.”
Indeed sir, and for those reasons I am obligated to spell it out and we will simply let the people decide for themselves – though you and I may be speaking of slightly different aspects of the same thing – “a rose by any other name….”
First let me point out a couple of more pieces of evidence in the case:
Adria on Molecular Gastronomy in 2004:
“There’s a molecular movement, the molecular gastronomy, where some scientists cooperate with the world of cooking. Clearly, the move acts upon cooking, but I don’t think it’s a cuisine per se.
In twenty years, we could look back and see how many new techniques, more than concepts, were introduced thanks to this movement. Having said this, whoever says that this movement doesn’t have a future, only has to pick up a phone, turn on the TV or log-in the internet. Science has changed the world.”
http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=57363&st=0&p=792233&#entry792233
McGee on Mr.This from 2004:
I’ve known Herve This for more than a decade, have spent several days with him at each of the half-dozen Molecular Gastronomy meetings at Erice, and admire him very much for the energy and gusto with which he collects observations, questions, and theories, and spreads the gospel of kitchen science. Maybe predictably for an Anglo-saxon, I find that some of his work gets pretty abstract and removed from real cooking, but there’s also a lot to be said for any approach that gets us to think freshly about things. Herve does that.
http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=54992&st=0&p=760979&#entry760979
I don’t know how it works everywhere in the world but generally I believe that you do not get credit for ideas that are in your head until you record them in some way, shape or form and in some contexts – publish them. That publish date proves your ownership. Once you do, if someone else uses your ideas they are at the very least – plagiarists. As any judge will tell you, ignorance of the law is no excuse – nor is ignorance of the existence of prior work. That is why they have copyright and patent searches – because you have to find out if someone has already done what you are doing – before you take credit for doing it.
Kurti first presented his work in 1969 and Mr.This started in 1980 – they became partners and “Molecular Gastronomy” was coined in 1992 – though the term existed before that as “Molecular and Physical Gastronomy”. That means their work predates the work of everyone, and that means they are the originators of this type of thing – and though others have built upon it – they are the foundation. Though I agree it was being done even before them – they are the ones that formalized it and gave it a name.
Though Adria disavows the influence of science on foams, the first foam was not served at El Bulli until 1994 – and that marked the beginning of his metamorphosis.
Molecular Gastronomy by its very definition is “the application of science to culinary practice and more generally gastronomical phenomena” – if you are doing this in any form – you are practicing Molecular Gastronomy. That includes debunking culinary myths, researching information on food and creating new techniques to create new dishes. They all fall within the published criteria of the work – and even if this does not evidence the whole of this New New Creative Cuisine – it IS a part of it, irrevocably.
That means the origin of the scientific element, one of the very basis of the cuisine – is not from Spain – but from France.
We are talking about a man’s life’s work here and most likely his livelihood that are being destroyed by new artists sampling his music – and the people don’t realize that bass line is much older than they ever realized.
So many powerful people with so much influence over so many media outlets should understand the affect of collateral damage, I know very well that it sucks when someone takes what you’re doing and attaches it to all kinds of negative perception – especially with which you had nothing to do and as far as I can see – does not deserve it.
That is why I have some sympathy for Marcel, because I don’t believe he was trying to cause any harm – he was just imitating his heroes – who often come off sounding just like him.
Nathan
Dude. That last post was one nifty piece of rhetoric. I’m impressed.
(I am not being glib, I mean it.)
Michael,
I’m still wondering what the real problem is here. It seems to me that these chefs have got nothing to apologize for and wonder why they care at all what people call what they do. Are they losing business because over this MG label?
They all seem to be producing very high quality food, full of pleasantly phrased challenges to diner’s expectations of how food should look. And I’m in awe of how they position elements in a dish to effect specific sequences of sensory experience.
This is very serious, exciting and important stuff -no matter what one chooses to name it.
I don’t get it.
In being sincere I will simply trust that you are applying the favorable definition of rhetoric.
It is simply to say that there are 2 opposed yet complimentary elements, the creative and the scientific, each is it’s own yet each is a part of the other.
If you were to draw it on paper it might look something like this (yet another symbol stripped of it’s honor by misuse):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yin_yang
Which might be appropriate because it seems the Confucianists with their influence on the aesthetic elements of cuisine and the Taoists with their influence on the research of food stuffs – probably beat everyone by a couple of thousand years anyway.
We’re all just ripping off the Chinese.
I have to out myself as an apparent cretin. I’ve read Michael’s post and the linked letter, and have slagged through the endless comments. My question is what is molecular gastronomy? Chemistry? Because I don’t know what a chestnut on the tip of a tip has to do with chemistry. Silly presentation? Witty food? I don’t want my food to amuse me. I promise I came here with an open mind. Actually, I was thrilled. I was hoping I could finally understand what MG is. Can someone help this mother-trained home cook who still thinks a dinner of roast chicken, roasted vegetables and homemade bread is the best damned this on earth?
“The days of putting a piece of protein in a hot pan are almost over. Observent cooks will continue to incorporate tools and techniques from other professions into the cooking arena.”
I’m not so sure about this. I hope it’s not true. And it leaves behind millions of people who are neither insiders nor attuned to trends in cooking. It leaves behind people who barely have enough food, or don’t have the resources to engage in these techniques. It leaves behind people who aren’t looking for an exisential experience. To suggest that this will be the only acceptable way to cook and eat is elitist. What would Julia say about that?
Maura wrote:
“My question is what is molecular gastronomy?”
———–
Molecular Gastronomy, New Cuisine, Traditional Cuisine and Mother Nature walk into the kitchen to make apple pie:
MG: What happens when you make apple pie, and if we know this can we make a better apple pie?
NC: We need to find a new way to serve apple pie, I’m bored with this – hey MG – what happens when you make apple pie?
TC: NC I don’t understand why your apple pie looks so weird – it kind of scares me – but I have to admit it tastes good. I love my mom’s apple pie – she never even wrote down the recipe or even knew what temperature the oven was – but it always turned out perfect. MG and NC, your apple pie will never replace my mom’s apple pie, the things you do are not necessary.
MN: An apple need only be picked and eaten – apple pie is not necessary.
I’m trying to take the long view—in terms of food history. And I’m an amateur food historian, enough of one to plunk down over $200 for the El Bulli cook book.
What I really care about is “how we got to here from there.” And for better or worse this chapter in the history book will always be remembered as “molecular gastronomy.” Sorry, can’t change that. Of course Keller gets his own chapter too.
“MG: What happens when you make apple pie, and if we know this can we make a better apple pie?”
What if people do it just because they can? Then it becomes… what. Performance Art? I’m not sure the world can handle any more.Can it become a political or a sociological statement? Food is rife with political and sociological undertones.
People doing revolutionary work are always mocked, scorned and misunderstood. I’m trying to understand this. But it all seems so precious and passionless, which is the exact opposite of what food should be.
Maura
I’m a mostly retired professional chef and associate professor at The Culinary Institute of America where I taught -among other things- a course called “Introduction to Gastronomy.”
I’m also the guy who plans, shops, and cooks all of the meals for my family of 4. The food I cook is mostly very simple. Tonight, for example, I’m making roast leg of lamb which I will serve with cannelini beans (I couldn’t find any flageolets, damn it.) and string beans.
So I think I’ve got a pretty good idea of the where you are coming from when you express dismay over the “elitist” tone of the discussion here. But you should not let it bother you over-much. Because this discussion is not about you, or me, or anyone who labors to put food on the table for their family.
Rather, it’s about the concerns of a small group of extremely hard working, talented and thoughtful professional chefs, who are doing what all professionals do: trying to define what they are doing for themselves and anyone who cares about what they are doing viz., people like me, Ruhlman et al.
I can imagine why this discussion would seem precious to you, but to many of us who have devoted our lives to cooking and the subject of food and cooking well, it’s an important part of what we do and who we are.
Nathan
I’m not sure when and how the word rhetoric got that negative connotation, but I almost never use it that way. When I write rhetoric I try to create an engaging well-reasoned argument, supported by evidence.
Trouble for me is, I’m not very good at it. But you are.
Bob delG,
I don’t think anyone here was being elitist or precious. I think you’re all just trying to figure this out as much as I am, although you have more knowledge about it than I do. It was the quoted comments of some of the chefs that put me off. Particularly the comment that putting protein in a pan is not long for this world. However, I think this is important:
“it’s about the concerns of a small group of extremely hard working, talented and thoughtful professional chefs, who are doing what all professionals do: trying to define what they are doing for themselves and anyone who cares about what they are doing viz., people like me, Ruhlman et al.”
This group of people works at a level that I never could nor would want to work at.I appreciate that, more than I’ve been coming across. I admire their willingness to be innovate and take chances. But sometimes it does just become about the show and the shock. And that bothers me.
I think about food and cooking a lot. I’m a damned good cook, according to my friends, who are also damned good cooks, but always want me to have the dinner parties. In the past decade or so, food and cooking have been marketed the same way fashion and beauty have been marketed for a very long time – through messages saying 1) this is easy. Anyone can do it; 2) look at this perfect strawberry. Your food has to look like this. They’re selling a fantasy.Then, if you buy the hype, you end up feeling like a loser if it doesn’t come out right the first time. That also bugs me.
Anyway, if I post again tomorrow I’ll probably have a different idea about subject. This has been on my mind for a while. Maybe that’s a good thing. It certainly has me thinking.
Thank you Bob and Nathan for your responses. You’ve given me something to work with as I try to open my mind.
Maura you wrote
“In the past decade or so, food and cooking have been marketed the same way fashion and beauty have been marketed for a very long time – through messages saying 1) this is easy. Anyone can do it; 2) look at this perfect strawberry. Your food has to look like this.”
Huzzah!
You have hit upon the very reason why I despise most of the programming on the Food NitWitWork
and have no use for cookbooks that are not focused on technique and time honored methods of composition.
You also wrote
“They’re selling a fantasy.”
To this I would like to add that many seem to be trying to sell their programming and publications by associating food and cooking with sex. I find this mostly dumb, offensive and misleading. While there may be certain situations where the acts of cooking and eating can inspire or facilitate the process of sexual reproduction, any serious cook knows that these moments are the exception and not the rule.
This is one of the reasons why I cringe whenever there’s a post here about TV chefs. So many of the comments center around the secondary sexual characteristics of the (mostly female) personalities that I have to wonder if the writers would bother to care about cooking at all if there wasn’t some bimbo or bimba guiding them through the process.
First of all, these culinary fathers and innovators are leading the industry, changing the way we think about food, about the experience, and it’s just a matter of evolution.
If they are unsatisfied with the terminology in which the general public has coined this cuisine, than they should have every right too, and they should change it.
I agree with Blumenthol about the greedy scientist who needed a name to fund his science projects in order to receive funding??? – utterly ridiculous.
I say name it “Conceptual Cuisine”, because after all it’s just a pursuit for new ideas and concepts to be applied to food and the experience.
After all it’s just food my friends, they are the professionals not the general public.
foodie13
It was interesting reading the “anti-manifesto” of Adria and others last year (so long ago now?) trying to discard the MolGas nomenclature.
Its ironic coming from people who had worked very hard to capitalize on the the tension that arises from playing with the semiotics of food.
As a scientist, I welcomed their forays into the lab world. They stepped outside of their own comfort zone, taking the “food world” with them, into a deeper exploration of the physical and chemical aspects of food. They not only were curious about the First Principles behind the substances that make up what we eat, they chose to provide experiential education to their customers and admirers. I have always liked MolGas on this level.
MolGas, something that is multifactorial in it’s communication (to the palate, to the conscious mind, to the subconscious, simultaneously), if not understood that way, becomes a fad and derivative.
As a foodie who is of very modest means, the fact that MolGas has been almost exclusively expressed in the setting of Extreme Cost Cuisine disturbs me deeply (foodie13 – who is greedy? The scientist who coined a term at a conference [had to put some name to it ] or the chef who is a part of a restaurant that charges a half a grand to eat 22 small dishes?). That is what I have found offensive about MolGas.
Do not get me started on the cotton candy patent pending slips of edible paper (its all such a pedestrian exercise in getting free media). Talk about greed.
Of course, there are plenty of foodies who take matters into their own hands and create their own MolGas type foods for their own consumption and for their friends and family.
Whew, longwinded.
The primary reason why MolGas is important (and which is wasted when it is locked away behind the swinging door to the kitchen) is because it is about the Joy Of Play. Playing with the meaning of food, interacting with food on new levels, it is all a wonderful way to tap into a powerfully deep-seated experience we all “know” on an intuitive (gut? I hate puns) level.
Call me part of Culture 2.0, whatever, but I think food should be open source.
If people are into a food style or food way because they are getting off on it’s perceived obscurity and elietism, then I have little respect for them. I also think that everyone should have the sense to learn to cook for themselves, I know, that’s revolutionary.
BTW, the photo at the top of this post, truly fantastic. I am now a food photographer because of photos just like this.
If you want to see what open source MolGas or Progressive American cuisine looks like visit the “Ideas in Food” blog by chefs and husband and wife team H. Alexander Talbot and Aki Kamozawa (http://ideasinfood.typepad.com/ideas_in_food/)
In the end, all this Process Queen talk on the semantics of MolGas is so much more free press.
Nika
http://nikas-culinaria.com
Your info why utterly fascinating my friend, is missing the point entirely. The public is simply looking for answers to what the hell is going on with this movement of uber science application of food and it needs to be addressed or the media is going to exploit in the direction, because a large majority of cannot comprehend why we do what we do.
So when the media gets confused or paranoid about someone using foreign, long winded chemicals to cange the strucure of an entire dish, changing it’s entire principle – peopel need answers.
Molgas? kinda sounds like a term used that would be used if you heard a hedgehog pass gas my friend.
This progression right now is phenomenal, iam sure we will see food floating soon, and the elimination of front of the house employees.
I think a committee of some importance needs to be formed and some real decisions need to be made in regards to the develpoment and progression of this industry.
Cheers mate
*yes i already know – ideasinfood rocks
There are a lot of things I would like to say on this subject, because it is close to my heart. I have disliked the MG moniker since I first heard it and have defied its constraints at every turn. The reason these chefs dislike the term is because of the barriers it implies. Adria, Keller, Blumenthal, Dufrense, Atchatz are ultimately seeking a cuisine without contraints.
The media requires a tag to describe the approach, and MG has stuck for better or for worse (my guess is the latter). The term, in my mind, implies a loss of soul or spirit. If you have dined at Alinea or El Bulli etc., it is clear that they are probably more focussed on the soul, spirit or essence of their work than any other aspect. This may seem counter-intuitive to those who have not gone down this road, but being analytical and precise does not necessarily mean the absence of passion or emotion in general.
I am always dismayed when I read the comments of other professionals slagging the work of these visionaries. I have the deepest respect for the work of those who came before us, what Alice Waters did was revolutionary 20 years ago…does that mean we stopped trying to evolve the profession? I love simple, rustic food…is there a reason the two cannot co-exist?
To the question of greed, those who make such claims are clearly ignorant of the amount of work that goes into the preparation of any version of “haute cuisine.” The ingredient costs, the china, the stemware and so on. Although I have not spent time in Alinea’s kitchen, and I feel sure they are making a profit, Grant is not nearly as well compensated as other food figures and still spends damn near every service, 6 days a week, in his restuarant. On occasion I can see why some take offense at some of his remarks, but they are really missing the spirit of his search. Grant is the most important American Chef since TK, and to dispute the validity of his work by claiming he is greedy is just lame. Ultimately these restaurants need to turn a profit to continue their exisitence, but there reason for existing is not solely financial…if it were, do you think they would be spending thousands of dollars developing one of a kind service pieces?
You have hit upon the very reason why I despise most of the programming on the Food NitWitWork
and have no use for cookbooks that are not focused on technique and time honored methods of composition.
Why Molecular Gastronomy? I agree, it is not appealing to be used in a food industry.