France

As I write, 24 national teams have presented their final dishes at the Bocuse d’Or, the equivalent of the chef’s Olympics, or World Championships. This biennial competition typically begins with 60 national competitions to find a champion for each competing country {though this year the US team was selected following the submission of resumés, – the winning candidates worked at The French Laundy for Thomas Keller, the President of the US team}.

Once selected, the teams enter the three continental regional competitions in Latin America, Asia-Pacific and Europe, whittling down the numbers to 22. There are two wild-cards for chefs selected by the governing body {which this year includes Grant Achatz} – this winnowing process takes 18 months.

Those awarded a place at the final have two month’s notice of the ingredient selection – and new for 2015 – on the eve of their allocated day they are notified of a mystery vegetable ingredient which has been drawn from a hat {which turned out to be fennel}. The competition runs over two days, with twelve teams competing each day, and each team has 5 hours and 35 minutes to complete their menu. Theoretically teams can prepare for the ‘mystery ingredient’speed bump by practising extensively with different vegetables beforehand, but with so many teams working right up to the last minute in their restaurants, it’s much harder to achieve than it sounds. As always, it’s a question of funding.

The US team managed to secure a very substantial budget, some say $1million +, and as a result were able to spend over six months preparing for the event, and refining their dishes. On the other hand, the UK team carried on working in their restaurant kitchens, under-funded, and relying on the goodwill of all involved. They’ve even initiated a crowdfunding page to help support their efforts.

Whilst the teams from Japan, the US, and other countries are lauded for their efforts, our team is barely known back home. In the ‘vote for your country’s poster’ competition, we were on a shocking 7 votes when I last looked – by comparison the Hungarian poster won the competition with 1,841 votes.

And when it comes to practising, the UK’s Adam Bennett completed 11 trial runs – one wonders just how many the US team completed? If I sound as though I’m being critical of Adam and the UK team, I’m very definitely not! However I’m not critical of the US team either, they played the game, their food looked stunning, and they performed on the day.

I’d just like to think that we can get behind our team, and give them all the support they need for 2017!

Check out the UK’s beautiful dishes…

The UK came in 10th place – our chaps did an outstanding job, and we need praise them for all they achieved. I missed most of the opening day but the stand-out dish of day two, for me, was the Japanese fish course. Served in a stunning net covered cloche, as though you were catching your own fish, it came with a heating element below the plate, with a verbena scented mist. It looked beautiful, and the judges certainly seemed to be tucking into it with gusto… It wasn’t a surprise then that Japan won the Fish Prize this year. Finland won the meat price, and the podium places were awarded as follows:

1st Place Norway

2nd Place USA

3rd Place Sweden

The photographs are from the Bocuse d’Or Flickr feed, and are copyrighted according
https://www.flickr.com/photos/bocusedor/

l‘Arpège is the tiny Lalique-panneled restaurant owned by the legendary Alain Passard. In 2001 Monsieur Passard declared that he would be be focussing on a more vegetable driven menu, but more importantly a seasonal, home-grown menu.

This statement seems to have lost something in translation, because in 2012 it seems perfectly reasonable, indeed appropriate. But in Paris a decade ago, turning your back on a very protein-heavy menu, seems to have caused considerable ripples. Alain had held three Michelin stars since 1996, but maintained those stars after swapping over to his new style – clearly the inspectors felt that the standards were maintained.

Alain does offer protein on the menu, but the objective is to strip dishes back to showcase ingredients grown in the restaurant’s gardens North of Paris.

I can still ‘taste’ certain dishes in my mind – most notably the incredibly simple gratin of parmesan, onion and candied lemon… When Alain popped up to ask which dishes I liked, I said this one, because I had wanted to lick the plate clean (I mimed this to him – after all it was an umami addicts dream!) – he became very enthusiastic, nodding vigorously – clearly I had understood…

Also sensational was the lemon puree served with the roast beetroot – exquisite earthiness and smooth citrus. Tiny details make the difference, and Alain ran into the room to grate fresh horseradish over the veal, running back out again to dress another dish. The horseradish added a sharp, fresh piquancy which lifted the dish.

Though my photographs are appalling, you can see his minimalistic style clearly. Never before have I been served a quarter of a lobster tail – but Monsieur Passard is right – I didn’t actually need any more than this.

A small note of caution – the prices are a little eye-watering, even for us. Care needs to be taken with alcohol: two gin and tonics came in at €50, though two glasses of dessert wine were €17… Having said that, we would definitely return. Eye-watering prices or not, some of those dishes were amongst the most memorable dishes we’ve eaten, and I defy you not to want to lick that parmesan gratin from the dish…