Hi-fi sci-fi food

March 4, 2005 1:17 AM

It's the future. Now where's my fucking food?
posted by Tlogmer (37 comments total)

It's only too bad it will be even further in the future before I could have such a meal myself.
posted by grouse at 1:41 AM on March 4, 2005

Only a 4-hour drive for me. Maybe it's the 5 a.m. talking, but if it anything short of astronomically expensive I might book for my birthday next year.
posted by Tlogmer at 1:50 AM on March 4, 2005

After seeing this thread, chicago is certainly starting to look like the epicenter of a food revolution. Now I just need to get over being so po.....


And i want one of those pb and j concoctions so bad i think im gonna have to make one myself just to try it.
posted by sourbrew at 2:41 AM on March 4, 2005

This is the most bizarre food-related anything I have ever read.

Welcome to postmodern cuisine. wtf.
posted by blacklite at 2:43 AM on March 4, 2005

Boil in the bag broccolli stems in the second link... um...

Did I miss the food revolution? Are pot noodles still bad, or are they good now?

[chews pen]
posted by NinjaPirate at 2:44 AM on March 4, 2005

No, we don't like pot noodles today. Ask again tomorrow.
posted by grouse at 2:49 AM on March 4, 2005

this kind of stuff makes me wish i was rich.
posted by neckro23 at 2:49 AM on March 4, 2005

This sounds like a ton of fun, you don't have to be rich to enjoy innovative cuisine, you just have to save up for it. Food inspires amazingly strong emotion, this made me wish death by Microplaning on the author:
All that reverence for seasonal produce got so boring after a while that I wanted to round up every heirloom-tomato salad on earth and set them all adrift on an ice floe.

If only I could afford to be such a spoiled snob!
posted by TungstenChef at 3:30 AM on March 4, 2005

I am speechless... and I desperately want to go to this restaurant.

Also, he's bloody cute. *plots marriage proposal*
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 4:46 AM on March 4, 2005

Did I miss it? Was there any mention of pricing for this place?

I don't want to get my hopes up if I'll have to drop several hundred dollars per person.
posted by MsVader at 4:52 AM on March 4, 2005

"Now is ze time on Schprockets vhen ve EAT!!"
posted by LairBob at 4:53 AM on March 4, 2005

Check out "Feast Of The Future" (the bus ride) at mrscruff.com (flash): the future of eating out Mancunian/Stockportian style.
posted by 13twelve at 5:01 AM on March 4, 2005

More seriously, though, this definitely part of a wider trend, led especially by folks like Ferran Adria in Spain who's been doing this sort of thing for years. Wylie Dufresne's also doing deeply experimental stuff in NYC, but he's working more with the combination of ingredients, from what I can tell, and not so much with food prep and serving technology, like this guy and Adria are doing.

All in all, I think it's interesting, but I've yet to see anything on this front that convinces me it's going to have any kind of direct lasting impact on the history of cuisine, like we'll still be eating food spiked on the end of wobbly wires 50 years from now. Like most avant-garde movements, it'll almost certainly open up new ways of thinking, but the long-term impact will be much less theatrical.
posted by LairBob at 5:12 AM on March 4, 2005

So you eat a grape smeared with peanut butter all sprinkled with bread crumbs. And how much does this thing cost?

Call me a Philistine, but thanks but no thanks. I'll get some chili at Wendy's.

No really.

/white trash
posted by zardoz at 6:00 AM on March 4, 2005

Does anyone remember the name of the guy in NYC who did weird ass stuff somewhat like this without the equipment? I ate at his restaurant twice and can't remember his name or the name of the joint, and it's driving me a little nuts. He was one of the first to use foams, and I remember an amazing beef with coffee sauce and also mushroom tea and tomato gumdrops.
posted by CunningLinguist at 6:05 AM on March 4, 2005

Also, he's bloody cute. *plots marriage proposal*

Ooh, he is, isn't he? I wonder if he could work himself into one of his recipes? How hip!
posted by ChrisTN at 6:09 AM on March 4, 2005

LairBob: Jose Andres in the Washington, D.C. area, is a former apprentice of Ferran Adria. Among his mini-empire of restaurants here is one called the Minibar, a tiny six-seater (inside a larger restaurant) which specializes in this kind of theatrical dining. I pretty much agree with your thesis on the long-term impact of this, although it is interesting.

I haven't been, but his more traditional restaurants (Spanish, Mediterranean, Mexican, and Latin American, each mostly specializing in small plates) are quite good.
posted by casu marzu at 6:12 AM on March 4, 2005

CunningLinguist - could you be thinking of the guy that LairBob mentioned, above?
posted by Karmakaze at 6:29 AM on March 4, 2005

awesome post! the only thing that's missing is the zero gravity!
posted by lucksmonday at 6:31 AM on March 4, 2005

Is this the same chef, the one who has that restaurant in Spain, who deconstructs food? The food foam guy?

All I can say about mini-food is, "I'm still hungry."
posted by ScaryShrink at 6:39 AM on March 4, 2005

Fabulous post, Tlogmer. And very inspiring. Time for some creative cooking this weekend! Does anyone know of any "cookbooks of the future" that might walk a relative novice to these types of cooking technologies through the steps/tools needed? Are there any classes out there on cooking by flame torch and seal-a-meal methods?
posted by tidecat at 6:40 AM on March 4, 2005

Info about El Bulli:
- Inside the mad professor's lab
- Adria's cookbook
- A visit to El Bulli
- What happened when five great writers dined at the world's five best restaurants?
- 'The best restaurant in the world'
- How the pursuit of novelty has caused haute cuisine to go mass market
posted by growabrain at 6:53 AM on March 4, 2005

No, wasn't him Karmakaze......I'm going nuts on google and nothing so far.
posted by CunningLinguist at 7:13 AM on March 4, 2005

Does anyone remember the name of the guy in NYC who did weird ass stuff somewhat like this without the equipment? I ate at his restaurant twice and can't remember his name or the name of the joint, and it's driving me a little nuts. He was one of the first to use foams, and I remember an amazing beef with coffee sauce and also mushroom tea and tomato gumdrops.

You don't remember because this kind of crap is nothing but a trend. Let the 'in crowd' blow their dough on this shit...you'll have to go to Wendy's for that chili anyway afterwards cuz I guarantee it won't fill you up. Long after places like this are gone, Mario Batali and the like will still be turning out the best, down to earth, filling food. Keep your atomizer, I'll take a nice fat bouillabaise any day.
posted by spicynuts at 7:23 AM on March 4, 2005

I'll pick a bouillabaisse over an atomizer almost any day, but now and again, it's fun as hell to try something weird. I'm dying to go to the Chicago place. It's got nothing to do with being in the "in crowd" - oh please - it has to do with being adventurous. Don't you want to know what aerosolized shrimp tastes like? I do. I still remember the tomato gumdrops at that NYC place, even though I can't remember the name of the restaurant.
posted by CunningLinguist at 7:32 AM on March 4, 2005

I so want to eat there.

And Grant Achatz is hot. He can cook for me any day of the week. : )
posted by SisterHavana at 7:34 AM on March 4, 2005

Do they serve Pepsi Blue?
posted by ChrisR at 8:03 AM on March 4, 2005

Did I miss it? Was there any mention of pricing for this place?

If you have to ask, you can't afford it. Though one of my friends who certainly couldn't afford it (since his sole source of income was a lousy research assistant job) went to Moto and seemed to like it. Seems a little too conceptual for my taste but what the hey.
posted by kenko at 8:12 AM on March 4, 2005

casu marzu, I posted an account of my visit to MiniBar in the earlier thread.
posted by MrMoonPie at 8:24 AM on March 4, 2005

Between this and the "Pimp My Burger" thread, I'm starving. While hi-tech cusine sounds tastier, something tells me that the burger is more filling.

Of course, thirty courses of peeled grapes and single serving scallops could be potentially filling, but it seems like it would also be incredibly time consuming. I guess I am one of those people who just misses the point of fine dining.

Call me when my burger in pill form is ready.
posted by grapefruitmoon at 8:34 AM on March 4, 2005

Sounds like a more extreme version of what Heston Blumenthal is doing at the Fat Duck.
posted by dmt at 10:03 AM on March 4, 2005

I'm betting if Wendy's could work out a cheap way to recreate the 'Smoked bacon and egg ice-cream' off the Fat Duck menu, they'd have it on theirs.
posted by liam at 10:45 AM on March 4, 2005

You are entitled to ask: What's going on here? You had fun picking up the PB&J. But now they want to take away your hands? And put a sharp spear in your mouth?

Here you have reached the core of what Achatz wants to accomplish at Alinea: You are feeling something. You're not judging the technical execution of the food anymore. The food may, in fact, be judging you.

Achatz, for all his interest in chemistry, physics and mechanics, only views them as means to an end. And that end is you. When he manipulates a shrimp or a tomato, what he's really thinking about is how that manipulation is going to play out in your head.

Ooooh, S&M dining.
posted by jokeefe at 11:36 AM on March 4, 2005

I want my People Chow.
posted by bbrown at 12:27 PM on March 4, 2005

Those of you who are blithering on about Wendy's are missing the point entirely. Food like this is not about being full, just as drinking a really good wine is not about getting drunk. This sort of cuisine is solely about flavour and texture, and nothing more.

Also.. ladies, back off. Achatz will be bringing me deconstructed french toast and frozen chips of orange juice in bed. I've decided it shall be so :D
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 5:00 PM on March 4, 2005

sharesies, dirtynumbangelboy... sharesies with stonerose too!
posted by gesamtkunstwerk at 5:52 PM on March 4, 2005

I called dibs. It's just that simple :P
posted by dirtynumbangelboy at 8:06 AM on March 5, 2005