Ferran Adrià

Ferran Adrià Acosta ( born May 14, 1962 in L' Hospitalet de Llobregat, Catalonia, Spain ) is a Spanish chef and restaurateur. Adrià has worked since 1983 in the restaurant " El Bulli " ( in his own spelling), located in the Cala Montjoi, near the town of Roses on the Costa Brava. From 1990 to 2011 he directed it together with Juli Soler. He became the co-founder of molecular gastronomy Through experimental food preparation, preparation and presentation. He describes his cooking as avant-garde cuisine or gastronomy ( cocina de vanguardia ), since the molecular kitchen making up only a very small part of it. Adrià is considered one of the most influential chefs in the present.

• 3.1 out of Ferran Adrià
• 3.2 on Ferran Adrià

Life and work

Adrià is the elder of two sons of the plasterer and painter Master Ginés Adrià and his wife Josefa Acosta. At 14, he attended the Institute Virgen de La Merced in Barcelona to complete a business apprenticeship as a preparation for the study of business administration. In 1980, he left the school for no particular reason ( "for no particular reason" ), but he dreamed of being able to take a vacation on the island of Ibiza. His vacations he financed as a dishwasher in a small hotel kitchen in Castelldefels. The local chef made ​​it to the El Práctico known, the Spanish equivalent of the cookbook by Escoffier. At age 17, he had already gained his first professional experience as an assistant cook in various restaurants of Barcelona. He worked his way up there to the prestigious restaurant Finisterre.

At age 19, he had to do military service and ship's cook was at the naval base in Cartagena, where he was a member of the kitchen crew of the Admiral of the fleet. There he received a recommendation to apply at the restaurant El Bulli, led by Juli Soler. Even back then, the El Bulli under the Alsatian chef Jean -Louis Neichel (1975-1980, now Barcelona) appreciated by gourmets (two Michelin stars), which came mainly from France and Germany, but also from Barcelona and the region. The former restaurant owners were until 1990 the German physician Hans Schilling and his wife Marketta, they called their bulldog van and took this name for the restaurant.

After his military service in 1983, Adrià at the age of 21 years together with Christian Lutaud chef at this restaurant was. Soler then sent him to teaching at Europe's top restaurants. From the master chef Jacques Maximin in Nice, he took over in 1986 the motto: "To be creative means not to copy. " Eighteen months later he was without regular training completion, the sole chef. For five years he cooked first by the courts, which he had learned during his training. After another five years, in which he had developed a conventional new Spanish cuisine, he began in 1993 with bold experiments. In the early years of its experimental phase, the restaurant suffered from lack of guests. The food critic Wolfram Siebeck made ​​Adrià known from 1995 to the German public. He was known nationally by a large report in the New York Times Magazine in August 2003 In the United States and became thus more international attention.

El Bulli

Adrià's restaurant El Bulli is located on a secluded bay of the Costa Brava, north of Barcelona, and has 50 seats. Each season was off and eventually booked in no time with pre-orders. Every year totaled several hundred thousand reservation requests up to two million requests at a capacity for only 8,000 guests in a half year. In the jointly operated by him luxury hotel Hacienda Benazuza at Seville the menu transitions of earlier years are offered. The restaurant was because of the high personnel costs not itself, in 2008 there were 300,000 euro loss. Books, advertising, appearances and a catering service had to make up the deficit.

Each year, Adrià received 1,500 applications from chefs from all over the world, of which only 35 selected. Two -thirds of them also worked without pay. Also during the summer season, he tried out and a little " creative team " new recipes. This happened in the morning in a small group. In the course of a year, summed the attempts to create a new dish, approximately 6000 meals. In a large blotter Adrià is listed immediately all tests and reviews are the same. Only 40 dishes arrive in selecting a new menu sequence. " Around 90 percent of all major inventions in the culinary world today come from us," Adrià took 2010 for you to complete. He initially wanted to just continue this high expenditure on innovation until 2008 and then only make a small scale. He also considered a break of one and a half years. But from 2009, he instead wanted to experiment on changes to the existing structures. So the restaurant was now open until December and the menu sequence several times to be changed. At least until his 50th birthday he wanted to lead in this way his restaurant, he finally announced at the beginning of 2010, a provisional closure of: " First, I wanted to make with all the 2012 final. I work 15 hours a day, 333 days of the year. And for 25 years. " He must finally think of his family. On July 30, 2011, he closed the restaurant for two years in order to recover and to concentrate on the development of culinary creations can. 2014, the restaurant El Bulli is then transformed into a foundation and expanded to develop the chefs, sommeliers, restaurateurs and other professionals new gastronomic products and concepts. A selected number of guests is to continue enjoying the new menu. In addition, Adrià plans for about 20 to 25 young people from around the world offer scholarships. El Bulli is to become a " think tank for creative cuisine ." In April 2013 Adrià made ​​of Sotheby's wine store of El Bulli auction. Economists expected a revenue between 1.1 to 1.6 million dollars to be his El Bulli Foundation supplied.

His approach Adrià explained as follows: at the beginning of a new season, he determines to be worked on which products with which techniques. That was the hardest part of the work. The handling and processing of the products takes over the experimental group in the cooking lab, a small group of the best employees ( with Albert Raurich, Oriol Castro and Eduard Xatruch as Chefs de Cuisine ). These usually go before intuitive, but vary with promising results, a combination in a systematic way. Every attempt is finally recorded with photo and assessment. Adrià limits his activity to the taste and logging and therefore compares himself to a director. The techniques are not ends in themselves, but serve him the optimization of the taste sensation of flavors and textures. The aroma and taste of natural products will thereby remain as pure as possible. A sideline of El Bulli is the production and distribution of texturas, tools for Sphärisieren, gelling, emulsifying and thickening dishes and concentrated natural flavors ( Surprises ).

Molecular gastronomy

The idea for molecularization food came Adrià at the sight of fruit foam of the pressed juice in a bar The principle of foam generation ( " espuma " ), he then transferred to other foods until he gave up this idea again, as he too often copied so had been. Adrià offered no classic menus at his " menus " were differentiated, sophisticated, highly complicated 30 to 35 small courses: Raw vegetables are processed with high technology in medical technology, fills salt cellars with fragrant artificial fog, he spices vegetable gelatin strips with charcoal oil, formed gelled olive puree olives with olive extract liquid inside, squid stuffed with a mixture of ginger and coconut, served a mousse made from mussel meat in a coat of wafer-thin pork fat and injected eggs before cooking caviar paste. Techniques from the food industry are used here: for example, the method of " lyophilization " ( freeze-drying under vacuum) of fruits and vegetables. The meticulous effort was spending so high that he always offered only this one menu sequence per season. In 2008, a menu of 32 courses cost 230 euros. With his cookbooks, he had more than earned in 2004 with his restaurant. Adrià was " not interested in the business " at El Bulli and therefore looked at his restaurant not as a business, " but as our stage. Some call it concept kitchen, but I think it is something else. Food is the oldest form of communication, thousands of years old. And we have found a new language. "

One of its new cooking techniques, the " sphering " this is a controlled gelation of liquids thereby take the form of "spheres" - a spherical outer shell with a liquid core. Examples are melon or apple caviar, tomato spheres or Olive, firmly gelled olive puree in olive shape and color envelops liquid olive extract and retrieves the guests produced a very intense taste experience. The flavor contrast between the solid shell and liquid content can be made partly on fruits and other products, the first freeze-dried, then ground and finally gelled.

Although Adrià like the term molecular gastronomy, but it holds for its cuisine as " inaccurate ". It was " ridiculous ", " to cut down on the use of liquid nitrogen, freeze-drying or the like. " His kitchen This part of his work doing " in the overall picture maybe three or four percent. " Decisive is rather a high level of versatility.

Criticism

The then editor of the Gault Millau Kohnke designated Adrià's career jump to the world as " hyped ". Objectionable substances such as transglutaminase, methyl cellulose or xanthan were used masssiv.

" In truth, he is just the most famous lab technician under the kitchen Stars, his restaurant elBulli is a Showroom of the Spanish chemical industry. "

These statements were a response to the revelations article " Dünnpfiff for five people " in the star, in which Jörg Zipprick the assertion Adrià's laboratory have gellan, Iota or Glice invented disproves and notes that it concerns regular food additives in it. The title is an allusion to the use of 100 grams of isomalt (E 953 ) in the recipe " olive oil spiral " which can have a laxative effect from just 20g. Furthermore, criticized the author, Adrià did the EU taxpayers' money ( € 500,000 ) and funds from the chemical industry ( "Project Inicon " € 600,000 ) receive and wear now at due to its sponsored, paid for by taxes Popularity to Increase Sales industry.

Science and kitchen

The IESE Business School of Barcelona examined in 2008 in a research project on innovation Restaurant, find out how to come up with ideas there.

In a lecture at Harvard University in late 2008 Adrià expressed the desire to create again teamed with Harvard scientists an encyclopedia of cooking and science. In the fall of 2010, Adrià participated together with his Washington colleagues José Andrés and other chefs at a 13-week series of lectures with demonstrations and exercises in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University for students and also for interested chefs. It related to the basics of culinary physics with examples from Adrià's test kitchen, such as the properties of an emulsion stabilization of foam in a liquid or the composition of liquids with different densities due to different temperatures.

Cookery

By 2009, his restaurant remained during the second half of the year closed and he tinkered with other innovations in his cooking laboratory in Barcelona: El Bulli taller. The "workshop" (Spanish: taller ) is close to the Boqueria market; here Adrià buys and holds for new food out. Together with scientists, designers, food technologists, chemists and artists, he creates new recipes, cutlery, plates, interior, even the light show and musical accompaniment are planned to the smallest detail and converted into a work of art. In 2007 he was invited to participate in the art exhibition Documenta 12. Instead of the expected general cooking show he offered two daily visitors and artists of the documenta, selected by curator Roger Buergel to host as guests at El Bulli. Their reactions when consuming the menu sequence documented a published in autumn 2009 art book of the painter and co-founder of Pop Art Richard Hamilton, who was also a regular at El Bulli.

Beer creation

In 2009, the Spanish brewery Estrella Damm created in collaboration with Ferran Adrià and the sommeliers from El Bulli and Juli Soler, Dan Barber wine experts Ferran Centelles and David Seijas the Inedit beer brand. Inedit is a Blend of malted barley and wheat, which is flavored with spices such as orange peel, coriander and liquorice. The new beer to be drunk out of white wine glasses. The primary target group of the new beer is haute cuisine.

Family

Since 2002, he is married to Isabel Pérez Barceló. His brother Albert Adrià ( born October 20, 1969) is a pastry chef, he worked at El Bulli since 1985 and was also the manager for the El Bulli taller during the winter season. 2008 Albert left in agreement with his brother El Bulli and opened in Barcelona's Old Town district of Eixample, the tapas bar Inopia. In January 2011, Ferran and Albert Adrià opened another tapas bar (tickets) in Barcelona's Paral • lel (Spanish: Paralelo ) at the theater Avinguda del Paral • lel with dishes that were created in El Bulli as well as more conventional tapas. In May 2011, the immediately adjacent cocktail bar followed by 41 ° (Spanish: cuarenta y uno grados, English:. Forty -one degrees ), supplemented with snacks from the El Bulli kitchen. The selection of tickets based on local produce and seafood. Gourmet kitchen will be offered at affordable prices in a relaxed atmosphere for families and travelers.

Awards (excerpt)

• French old master Paul Bocuse tribute to him: " Ferran Adrià makes the most exciting things in our profession. "
• 1996: Clé d'Or de la gastronomy, Gault Millau
• 1996: Restaurant of the Year, Club de Gourmets
• 1998: third Michelin star for his restaurant " El Bulli "
• 2002, 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2009: " World's Best Restaurant " Restaurant Magazine
• 2004: " TIME 100 " "List of Most Influential People" (list of the hundred most influential people of the year 2004) Time Magazine
• 2005: International Eckart Witzigmann Prize of the German Academy for Culinary
• 2006: Adrià was the first chef to Lucky Strike Designer Award.
• 2009: Gran Cruz de la Orden del Mérito Civil ( Large Civil Merit on the cross )
• 2010: " Chef of the Decade", awarded by the British magazine Restaurant Magazine

Publications

By Ferran Adrià

• El Bulli 1983-1993 ( with Juli Soler and Albert Adrià )
• El Bulli: el sabor del Mediteráneo, 1993, ISBN 84-7596-415- X
• Los secretos de El Bulli, 1997, ISBN 84-487-1000-2
• El Bulli 1994-1997 ( with Juli Soler and Albert Adrià ), ISBN 978-3-936682-47-2
• Cocinar en 10 minutos con Ferran Adrià, 1998, ISBN 84-605-7628-0
• Celebrar el milenio con Arzak y Adrià ( with Juan Mari Arzak ), 1999, ISBN 84-8307-246-7
• El Bulli 1998-2002 ( with Juli Soler and Albert Adrià ), Conran Octopus, 2003, ISBN 1-84091-346-0; Ecco, 2005, ISBN 0-06-081757-7
• El Bulli 2003-2004 ( with Juli Soler and Albert Adrià ), Ecco, 2006, ISBN 0-06-114668-4
• El Bulli 2005 ( with Juli Soler and Albert Adrià ), ISBN 84-7871-607-6
• Ferran Adrià, Albert Adrià, Juli Soler: A Day at elBulli. Insights into the world of ideas, methods and creativity of Ferran Adrià. Phaidon, Berlin 2009, ISBN 978-0-7148-5895-1
• Food Art - Artwork from the kitchen of Ferran Adrià. A photographic work of Francesc Guillamet. Hampp, Stuttgart 2010, ISBN 978-3-936682-89-2
• The family meal. At home cooking with Ferran Adrià. ( Original title: The Family Meal, Home Cooking With Ferran Adrià ). Edel, Hamburg 2011, ISBN 978-3-8419-0119-4

About Ferran Adrià

• Manfred Weber Lamberdière: The revolutions of Ferran Adrià: As a Catalan cooking made ​​to art. Afterword by Ferran Adrià. Bloomsbury, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-8270-0742-1
• Till Ehrlich: The retreat of Ferran Adrià. In: chief -owned stove. No. 31, Edition Vincent Klink, Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 978-3-927350-29-8, pp. 87-95.
• Richard Hamilton, Vicente Todolí (ed.): Food for Thought. Thought for Food. Thoughts on the creative universe of Ferran Adrià, the avant-garde cuisine and its relationship to the art world. Actar, Barcelona 2009, ISBN 978-84-96954-69-4
• Colman Andrews: Ferran. The Inside Story of El Bulli and the Man Who Reinvented Food. Gotham, New York 2010, ISBN 978-1592405725
• Lisa Evening: The Sorcerer 's Apprentices. A Season in the Kitchen at Ferran Adrià 's elBulli. Free Press, New York 2011, ISBN 978-1439175552
• Peter Stolz: " The Dalí among cooks " in: Kitchen - The Magazine for Food, Beverage and Technology, 8/ 2003. pp. 12-16, ISSN 0344-4376.

Movies

• El Bulli - Cooking In Progress. Documentary, Germany, 2010, 108 minutes, Written and Directed by Gereon Wetzel, production: if ... Productions
• Cooking and Creativity. Lecture, United States, 2009, 4:25 min, Production: Harvard University, February 18, 2009, online video.
• Google presents: chef Ferran Adrià. Conversation, USA, 2008, 64 min, production: Google Oct 13, 2008, online video, interview with films from elBulli, Adrià who commented.
• Anthony Bourdain - A Matter of Taste: Cooking with Ferran Adrià revolution. (OT: . Anthony Bourdain - Decoding Ferran Adria) documentation, USA, 2006, 46:28 min, Director: Anthony Bourdain, Production: Travel Channel, TV series: Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations, German Original Air Date: July 1, 2007 to DMAX.
• Kitchen from another planet. Documentation, Germany, 2004, 45 min, written and directed by Stefan Quante, Production: WDR, first broadcast: August 7, 2004.