The sun is glistening and shining on the snow that is covering the fields in Liernu. Spring is still far away and the vegetable garden at L'air du temps is still resting. The first shoots from the garden will only come in late February though San Degeimbre is already preparing his February menu called "Waiting for the Green". January is not necessary the best month to visit a restaurant. It comes just after the holidays and is the month when you normally try to detox from the excesses of the previous month. And it is not the best month for fresh produce. But a friend who happens to be a Maltese chef is in Belgium and we have planned to visit Wallonia's culinary cathedral. San Degeimbre is a chef in evolution. Today, he has reached a level of maturity that one would expect from a restaurant that is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year. But that maturity is not stopping him from experimenting or trying new things. The creative streak is all the more visible even if it does … [Read more...]
Recipe by Merlin Labron-Johnson: Grilled spring and winter vegetables with wild herbs and a hay-smoked egg yolk sauce
Merlin Labron-Johnson is a chef who can be considered a fervent fermenter, pickler and curer, and this passion comes from his time at the cult Belgian restaurant In de Wulf which closed its doors in December 2016. Everything was done in house; all the pickling, smoking and charcuterie curing, using only traditional and old fashioned methods of preservation. These influences are clearly visible on the menu at Portland, London. This dish was inspired by Merlin's time spent working in Belgium, where he noticed that during the asparagus season, white asparagus was often eaten with hollandaise or ‘mousseline’ sauce. He has added other young vegetables that are still available as winter morphs into spring to give a more interesting variation of textures and flavours. Merlin decided to smoke the butter used in the hollandaise over hay to add an element of ‘farm’ and terroir. He uses wild herbs to add freshness to the dish which would otherwise be quite rich, and the sorrels add a … [Read more...]
Lunch with Fulvio Pierangelini: The main ingredient of a perfect tomato sauce is love
The main ingredient of the perfect tomato sauce is love. It is love for the main ingredient, the tomato, and love of the process and what it takes to make a perfect sauce. The colour, texture and taste of a tomato varies. It depends on the variety, it also depends on the sun and the season when it is picked. Making a tomato sauce might sound like the most trivial thing to do. Most would not even hesitate to open a tin of tomatoes to make a sauce. Spaghetti with tomato sauce is the food of childhood memories. If there is one dish that takes us back in time it is this. And today, it is also a staple on children's menus in restaurants. The spaghetto al pomodoro by Fulvio Pierangelini is legendary. Some years ago, when his restaurant Gambero Rosso was still open, he had lectured university students in Bologna about the significance of a great tomato sauce. He had told students that he had a responsibility to cook a great tomato sauce because ultimately everyone could cook a … [Read more...]
Vladimir Mukhin (White Rabbit): The future of gastronomy is glocalisation
Vladimir Mukhin, Russian chef of White Rabbit, the Moscow restaurant that has taken the gastronomic world by storm over the past years is on a mission to make Russian tastes known globally. Born to a family of chefs, he jokes that he was born in the kitchen. Both his mother and father were chefs and so was his grandmother. His grandfather was a teacher in a culinary school and the Russian chef recalls how he started to cook with his grandfather from 5pm to 7pm after school. Mukhin is on a mission to showcase the best of Russian traditions. "The national culture for chefs is the future of gastronomy. We will be going towards what I call glocalisation," he says. "The cooking techniques may be global but we need to find the best recipes and the best tastes of Russia and share it," he says. That is not easy for a young chef born in 1983. "The taste of the Soviet Union in the 1980s was mayonnaise. The people of the Soviet Union only remember this one taste and it killed Russian … [Read more...]
Monica Galetti to open her first restaurant: Mere
Monica Galetti, who rose to fame in the UK when she joined the BBC competitive cooking show, Masterchef - the Professionals as a judge, is to open a much awaited restaurant together with her husband David Galetti, a French sommelier. The couple's first restaurant is to be located at 74 Charlotte Street in London's Fitzrovia and will open in partnership with Westbury Street Holdings. The restaurant is a long-term personal dream of the Galettis and the emotion of that is captured in the name. Mere – pronounced Mary – pays homage, not only to the French for ‘mother’, but also to the Samoan for ‘Mary’, Monica’s mother’s name. “For many years, it’s been David’s and my dream to open a restaurant together. In Mere, we want to deliver a restaurant that’s relaxed and casual, but with no compromise on comfort, or the quality of the food and wines on offer. The kind of place we both like to visit and one that’s personal and welcoming.” Monica explains. A Samoan, Monica has a career as a … [Read more...]
BRUSSELS FROM/TO at Bon Bon: Deconstructing Brussels classics and modernising them along the way
What happens when you take Brussels and Brabant classic dishes, deconstruct them and then reinvent them? Can tradition meet modernity? Can humble ingredients steal the show in a top class restaurant? And what happens if you get two foreign chefs from France and Portugal to help you reinterpret these dishes at a six hands dinner. That is what happened last Tuesday at Bon Bon restaurant in Woluwe Saint Pierre, a commune in Brussels.Two Michelin star chef Christophe Hardiquest invited the inventive Inaki Azipitarte, chef of the famous Parisian restaurant Le Chateaubriand and Leonardo Perreira, formerly at Noma and now about to embark on a new journey in Porto as he prepares to open his restaurant there. Bon Bon was recently in the news as it will host 20 of the world's best chefs at the first ever Gelinaz! Headquarters event taking place on 10 November. Inaki certainty needed no introduction. He is famed for starting off the bistronomy movement in Paris which was considered one … [Read more...]
Humphrey Restaurant (Brussels): A welcome addition to the Brussels restaurant scene
Many of today's most influential chefs have one thing in common. They have all spent time working in Ferran Adria's kitchen. Massimo Bottura, Rene Redzepi, Grant Achatz to mention just a few of the most creative chefs around have spent time with the Spanish genius of el Bulli fame. Most of these chefs have gone on to develop their own style, their own philosophies and their own cuisine. There is no question that being mentored by a great chef has a lasting impact on your cooking style and also your philosophy, even if you depart from that approach. The new generation of chefs is also moving around from one restaurant to another gaining as much experience as possible benefiting from the 'globalisation' of haute cuisine. Just like the previous generation developed their own style and approach to cooking, the new generation is also making good use of the experience they have gained to take completely new directions. Chefs who were inspired by the inventiveness of Ferran Adria … [Read more...]
Q&A with Kurt Micallef: ‘I am at the point where I appreciate simplicity in food’
Kurt Micallef is an up and coming Maltese chef who is currently working at The Arches. He has gained experience working outside Malta at In De Wulf, the world renowned restaurant of Kobe Desramaults in Dranouter, Belgium. In an interview with Food and Wine Gazette a few weeks ago, the Maltese born chef said he was taking inspiration from old Maltese recipes and was working slowly and quietly to try to reinvent and modernise Maltese cuisine. You can read the full story here. Unlike other chefs who try and work in different Michelin star kitchens, Kurt took the opposite approach and went twice to train at In De Wulf. This enabled him to gain further experience and also to be inspired by Kobe's unique approach and style. This is our traditional rapid-fire question and answer session with Kurt What was your best meal ever? L’Arpege by Alain Passard in Paris. What is one tool that you find in a professional kitchen that should be in any home kitchen? I believe that what is most … [Read more...]
Kurt Micallef: Working to reinvent and modernise Maltese cuisine
I got to know about young Maltese chef Kurt Micallef in the least expected place. I was at In De Wulf, a restaurant on the border of Belgium and France when after an excellent meal I stopped to speak to chef Kobe Desramaults. He told me a Maltese chef had visited a few weeks before for dinner and had trained there before. I tracked him down and wanted to meet him while in Malta not only to see why he chose to go and train twice at Belgian restaurant, In De Wulf, but also to see what inspires him and how he is trying to reinvent Maltese cuisine. Kurt is a chef in transition. As a chef who studied and worked in top quality restaurants abroad, he is limited in his creativity by his work in his home country. "It is disheartening to come back to Malta and feel that your work is not appreciated. Unfortunately many people still prefer quantity over quality." "I don't want to sound negative but you have to face reality and you have to go through it. You try to push to make the scene … [Read more...]
Black Pig Restaurant (Valletta): Where innovation meets seasonality
Time passes and with it some say also comes nostalgia. While there are certain things which take you on a trip down memory lane, there are some memories which are best forgotten. Go back to the 1980s and early 1990s and my memory of most restaurants in Malta is of them serving the same thing. With friends we remember the ubiquitous tortellini with fresh cream, ham and mushrooms or the shrimp or prawn cocktail from those retro years or a steak diane. Everyone seemed to serve the same things. There were few speciality restaurants which were really worth the detour because they were doing something completely different. Maybe they specialised in fish or were serving French classics. At the time, these restaurants were doing something different to what was the norm. Maybe it was hard at the time to go against the current but with the benefit of time, they managed to not only survive but to be successfully copied. What used to be specialised those days is now mainstream. That … [Read more...]