Go back 10 years and the world of food and gastronomy was completely different to what we know today. The World's 50 Best Restaurants was not as influential as it is today, high-end restaurants were still extremely formal, social media and sharing was in its infancy and many of the world's top chefs were still obsessing with trying to 'copyright' their creations. But influential Italian chef Fulvio Pierangelini and Andrea Petrini had other ideas. They saw the opportunity of bringing chefs together from around the world to share knowledge and collaborate on a global level and had the foresight to do this way back in 2007 at a time when food was still not mainstream as it is today. The start was slow but over the past two years, the ambitions of the Gelinaz! collective of chefs has grown despite the fact that it is not a business. Gelinaz!, has made a name for itself over the past years for its creative gastronomic events and for pushing the boundaries every time an event was … [Read more...]
Archives for October 2016
Bean to bar Belgian chocolate maker Benoît Nihant opens store in Dubai
Belgian bean to bar chocolate maker Benoît Nihant has opened his first store in the Middle East. The shop is the second opening this year following the inauguration of a second store in Brussels in the Fort Jaco area in Uccle. The store (photo above) was inaugurated on 1 October at the City Walk complex in Dubai. The opening of the store in Dubai is part of Benoît Nihant's strategy to expand with the opening of more shops while retaining the artisanal approach that makes his chocolates so special. All the chocolates and products are produced in the workshop in Awans, close to the Belgian city of Liege and distributed to the five shops in Belgium as well as Japan and Dubai. The Belgian chocolatier is one of only a few chocolatiers worldwide who starts his chocolate making process buying his beans directly from different plantations worldwide. In an interview with Food and Wine Gazette he had said it was not an easy journey because he had to start from scratch … [Read more...]
La Paix: Respect for ingredients and slow cooking at its best
La Paix in Anderlecht has been on my to do list for many years now. But the opening times (Monday to Friday lunch and Friday evening) meant that it was never easy to visit this restaurant and that was the case until a few weeks ago. The restaurant is located in a Brussels neighbourhood that is most famous for its football team and the 'Abattoir'. With a location opposite the most famous meat market of Brussels, there is no question that the restaurant La Paix, a brasserie since 1892 is famous for its meat. I've known and read about chef David Martin and had tried a few of his dishes in previous events around Belgium but had never actually visited his restaurant until a few weeks ago. That was indeed a pity as I discovered when I visited for lunch in September. It is one of those places which keeps getting mentioned whenever I meet chefs and ask them where they like to eat so a visit had been on the cards for a while. It is a case of better late than never. It is a restaurant … [Read more...]
Weekly roundup of great reads on food and wine #91
The World's 20 Best Restaurants 2050: DA’ SOLO – Italian Chef Giuseppe Ciabolongo’s remote one-seat restaurant, nestled away in the hills of the Marché, has the distinction of being this year’s top restaurant. Reservations must be made ten years in advance since Da’ Solo only serves a single diner per night—a solitary feast which often lasts over fifteen hours. Eager gastrophiles must be patient since the restaurant is only open four days a year, on the Summer and Winter Solstice and the Vernal and Autumnal Equinox. Michelin: A Friendship That Went Sour: “Hi Rogelio (Rogelio Enriquez), my wife and I are going to spend five days in Asturias. Any restaurant we should not miss?” It does not have to be Asturias, of course. Substitute Loire Valley, San Francisco, Galicia, Puglia, Piemonte and what not. My wife and I always rely on our trusted friends, such as Rogelio; on the chefs of restaurants we value; on the native and discerning palates whom we meet accidentally while dining in … [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 restaurant Bon Bon is headquarters for ambitious Gelinaz! event
Bon Bon Restaurant is the Headquarters for ambitious Gelinaz! event taking place on 10 November 2016. The restaurant of Christophe Hardiquest, two Michelin stars and a 19.5 score in the Gault & Millau guide, will be buzzing with activity around the clock on 10 November (till the early hours of 11 November) as he is set to welcome 19 chefs from around the world for what promises to be a one of a kind event. On that day, 20 chefs will join forces and cook consecutively for over 15 hours (excluding preparations) as they join another 40 chefs around the world who will be involved in the largest ever restaurant shuffle. In total, they will be creating four different menus for four separate seatings which start at noon and finish at 3am in the morning of the next day. How will the event work? The 20 chefs will be paired into 10 teams of 2. Each pair of chefs will interpret a dish that is going to be prepared by one of the 40 chefs during the shuffle that takes place on the … [Read more...]
San Degeimbre to open second San restaurant in Brussels next week
A year after the opening of the first San Restaurant in central Brussels, two Michelin star chef San Degeimbre of L'Air du Temps restaurant in Liernu, Belgium is opening his second San restaurant in Brussels, this time in the Sablon area. The restaurant opens on Thursday 13th October on Rue Joseph Stevens, just a few metres away from Place Sablon. The restaurant will follow the same concept as the first restaurant in Rue de Flandre in the Place St Catherine area which serves food in bowls. The concept had been tried and tested for lunch at the two Michelin star restaurant L’Air du Temps in Liernu, Belgium and has been also successful in Brussels. Despite the difficult times that the city has faced after this year's terrorist attacks, there have been a number of interesting restaurant openings in the city this year including the bistro by Brussels two Michelin star chef Pascal Devalkeneer, Amen this summer as well as the opening of Humphrey's by former Noma sous-chef Yannick … [Read more...]
Interview with Andrew Borg: A vision for Malta’s dining scene
The life of a passionate chef is not always easy, particularly when he or she needs to fight against tradition and a dining scene that is not necessarily ready for a new approach. Tradition and habit may be the hardest things to fight against because few people may understand what you are trying to do. Then there is also the business side of running a restaurant. Do you follow the crowd or do you try to persist in creating something different even if that comes at a huge expense? Andrew Borg, the chef patron of Black Pig Restaurant in Valletta, the capital city of Malta, not only had to fight tradition and habits, but also against a bank manager in order to convince him that he did not want to open a takeaway instead of a fine dining restaurant. That restaurant, unfortunately closed last month. A few days ago, Andrew announced that he had closed his restaurant and that he would be taking a sabbatical before coming back with a new exciting project next year. The intention to … [Read more...]
Weekly roundup of great reads on food and wine #90
How Restaurant Blogs Redefined Dining Forever: For those of us who fritter away our days (and nights) dreaming up catchy top-ten listicles, posting images of our cocktails and half-eaten desserts on Instagram, and obsessively trawling the online galaxy for the latest viral food sensation, it’s easy to forget that the chaotic, maddening, constantly expanding online food world is still in its relative infancy. This month marks just the tenth anniversary of Grub Street, which went live on September 18, 2006, with a post promising hourly updates that would cover “everything from the cult street vendor, nameless yet venerated, to the latest temple of gastronomy, awash in renown,” written in an Adderall-fueled lather by our first editor, the late, great Josh Ozersky. Grub Street was a “blog” back in those dim, pioneer days (it’s a “vertical” now), founded in response to other local, restaurant-centric sites like Chowhound, eGullet, and Eater, which were popping up around town and fast … [Read more...]