Culinary Chronicle

Dear readers, in an interview, Harald Wohlfahrt, one of our greatest chefs, once expressed an opinion which is as noteworthy as it is sobering: "For a good chef who takes his work seriously and keeps in touch there really is nothing left to be discovered. We know all products - there may be the odd new breed every now and then, but it is mostly redundant anyway. We really already do know all spices and all modes of preparation." And not only do top chefs know everything important to their profession, they also, if they wish, are in a position to procure and obtain any product they like. Even more, the members of the world elite behind the stoves know each other well; most younger chefs have studied with older ones, or have been inspired by them, and a few of them have even become friends. To name only one example: Mikuni, Japan's number one, has worked, among others, with the Haeberlins, Troisgros and Chapel. Notes are compared, opinions exchanged - it seems that the world of top gastronomy, too, has become one large boundless merry-go-round. Is this now veritable proof of the belief - widely held and often expressed that everything, also the creations of great chefs, are becoming ever more indistinguishable, more and more uniform and internationally exchangeable? That this view is, in fact, not merely a prejudice but the simple, even if somewhat irritating, truth? Luckily, the very opposite is the case. You will find it here on the next 500 or so pages - as always lavishly presented in opulent pictures, insightful texts and a generous, innovative layout. Simply let these collected recipes and portraits of chefs from Spain, Japan, Italy and France work on you and you are likely to experience quite any number of sensations: a delight in the good things in life, the spontaneous desire to recreate a recipe, the urge to book a table at a certain restaurant - or just to sit over a glass of wine and enjoy musing about the culinary heights top gastronomy has to offer. There is only one thing, however, that you guaranteedly will not feel: a sense of uniformity or boredom. How so, with all these international connections and dependencies? For an explanation we may again resort to quoting Harald Wohlfahrt: "With chefs it's quite like with composers. All have the same notes to work with, but one makes his composition the stuff of world renown, another only of considerable ear ache." Any questions left? Quite unlikely, and all that is really left to do now is simply to invite you to visit the Catalonian avant-garde, to look at Japan, where a lot of things, if not all, are done differently from Europe, or to take a glance at Italy, where, as has always been the case, pure culinary joie-de-vivre reigns. And we are extremely pleased to note that there are now again top chefs who have rediscovered the unmatched enjoyment of "les grosses pièces", the large pieces of meat cooked in their entirety, owing to Marc Haeberlin. Burgdorf, 2004. Bound in boards, with slipcase and dvd, colour photographs, 478 pp., recipe index, 25x32x4,5 cm.