cuisine evolution

Chef K had recently forwarded a copy of a David Rosengarten ariticle called "Coming Home to Le Cirque." (I would love to link it, but it is not available freely on the web as of yet)  Although the article is centered around the carnation and reincarnations of the Sirio restaurant in New York, it is also an editorial about the evolution of dining out.  He focuses on how cuisine has shifted over the past 2 or 3 decades towards the bizarre and sometimes ridiculous.

This has always been a huge area of interest for me.  Ever since reading "The Last Days of Haute Cuisine" by Patrick Kuh years ago, I am fascinated with the turns that the food industry has taken.  It is also true that the older we get and the more time we spend in this business the more we gain perspective on what this all means.  If anyone can remember working in kitchens only 15 years ago, you know what it means to be a line cook... to be the shifty Bourdainesque character sweating it out on the bottom rung of the food service hierachy only one step above the dishwasher.  Being a player in that role, we all sort of became in one way or another that character in the big picture.  I remember being looked down upon by waiters.  Then... slowly... things started to change.

Maybe it was working in New Orleans that made the stand-out so much more drastic.  New Orleans kitchens are old.  When I say this, I mean old-fashioned and old... old ideas, old equipment, old attitudes, etc.  Only very recently have things begun to change there.  I was just lucky enough to be doing Trotter-style food (as was the national influence at the time in the nineties)... or at least Trotter-style presentations.  Working in different cities afterwards broadened my scope and gave me influences from Spain and Asia and other great world cuisines.  It wasn't until the late nineties that I had even heard the name Adria in a conversation with a chef friend of mine in Santa Fe.  He had taken inspiration there to make an appetizer composed of foie gras and pop rocks.  Wow!  My mind was blown and I have not been the same since.  Afterwards, I would on and off spend time studying new ideas in food, broadening my understanding of the cooking process, and learning how to run kitchens and organize (it really all ties in together).

So where have we gone from there?  Rosengarten glorifies the days when restaurant menus were all the same and a chef only set himself apart by cooking one classic dish better than the next guy could.  He all but condemns the modern menu movement of combining uncommon flavors (or as he mentions several times... adding lemongrass to dishes).  I cannot say that he is wrong.  There are a lot of efforts out there that do not deliver what we want... good food.  There are also a lot of new things that work.  This is still a new time in cuisine.  We have gone buck wild and mixed everything we could.  We were blinded by foams and orbs, but the old rules of cuisine still apply.  If the food is good, then it doesn't matter if that sauce was in the form of a butter-mounted marchand de vin or a foam.  If it works, and if the dish is interesting and good, then we succeed.  The guys that we admire out there are no different that the Michelin-star chefs from 40 years ago in comparison.  In fact, it is only in comparison that the food of today seems so bizarre.  We should be thankful of this.  There are many industries in the world that go through amazing revolutions.  This is why I am thankful.  What an amazing moment in time to be a chef.  We have finally climbed up that ladder, and imagine how different "Kitchen Confidential" would be if written by a cook who started his apprenticeship today.

Comments

[logicalmind]

I see the food changes as more of an evolution. To me, old style food used to be purely about taste. Nowadays a more holistic approach is taken in food preparation. Ranging from buying food that is sustainable and in-season, to making an effort to feed all of the senses. Beautiful presentations for the eyes, wonderful aromas for the nose, crunching or popping for the ears, etc.

I see odd combinations as a way to attempt to counter the typical experiences of the eater. For example, make something that looks like a sunny side up egg, but make the yolk of mango and the white of a coconut milk jelly. This is yet another way to stimulate the eater, via the mind.

To me, the evolution has been to incorporate more of the senses during a meal. It isn't solely about taste anymore.

[chadzilla]

You are 100% right. Old style food is about taste. It is also about tradition, and the origins of different foods. i. e. duck confit is a traditional dish based around the intention of preserving duck. It also tastes damn good which is why we still make it, and eat it.
Your comments on buying sustainable food are a reflection on our modern food system. We have to seek out these products because we have been removed from them. Our food system today is a result of agricultural industrialisations as well as those in the meat industry. Things are not as ideally based as they were after WWII.
I agree with the movement to get back to the basis of tastes... the flavors that eminate from the ground and the sea and natural processes. The texture variances and new concepts are very very important and necessary... unless we ignore the anthropological and biochemical foundations that define what we eat.