PARIS, Sept 9 — The gourmet restaurant of the Plaza Athénée hotel in Paris officially re-opens on Monday, September 8. Alain Ducasse, the illustrious French chef at the helm, agreed to introduce us to the concept behind this brand new restaurant, which celebrates naturalness and a return to the basics, without frills, all while showcasing French savoir-faire.

You chose to place your new menu at the Plaza Athénée under the banner of “naturalness.” Can you tell us why?

It’s the consequence of an approach that has long been important to me. I decided with this reopening to concentrate on getting back to basics. Early on, in Monaco on May 27, 1987, to be exact, I introduced a grains and vegetables menu option which has been maintained since thanks to its success. Today, this option accounts for 20 per cent of the menus sold. I have also published books advocating a back to basics approach. It seems important to me that consumers eat more healthfully. I wanted to bring naturalness to the plate, to its contents, but also to the restaurant’s setting. Fat and sugar are plagues when used in excess. I prefer taking a tone-on-tone approach, creating harmonies with the condiments. But keep in mind that naturalness does not preclude luxury and presentation, as seen in the crystal glasses, the tone of the silverware and the uncovered oak tables.

At the entrance to the dining room, a space is defined by the convex sides of three stainless steel cloches like those used to cover dishes. On the concave side, each ‘cloche’ surrounds a table, and one of them forms the back of a bench seat. — Picture courtesy of Pierre Monetta

What do you seek to bring to your clients?

I would like to give them a different emotion. A subtle relationship between the tangible and the intangible. The tangible is the outside world, everyday life, while the intangible is a delectable moment the client should remember for the rest of his or her life. We are like purveyors of happiness who create an ephemeral sensation, but one that must also leave a lifelong impression.

Grains, vegetables, fish... Is meat really absent from the new menu?

No, not entirely, of course! I wanted to spotlight this trilogy, which makes up the essence of our menu, but we also serve butcher cuts and poultry depending on market availability and in limited quantities, according to our mood and to the offering of the butcher Hugo Desnoyers. The menu includes six starters, six fish courses and six desserts.

Can gastronomic excellence bring together turbot and mackerel, caviar and lentils? In other words, can it combine humble ingredients with more high-end ones?

Absolutely. I wanted to show through this new menu that there is no hierarchy among foods. Excellence can also be found in the most humble ingredients. By cooking them differently, by honouring slowness, for example. Each dish was created so that the object is in harmony with what it contains. I advocate for just the right seasoning, since when everything is removed and there is nothing left, it has to come out right. I want to show that in combining the most humble and the most high-end ingredients, one can practice haute cuisine.

Is it ethical cuisine that breaks somewhat with current trends such as molecular gastronomy?

Molecular gastronomy has brought plenty of good things to gastronomy, but we still don’t know whether it is truly beneficial in terms of health. It is a cuisine that is more about affect than meaning. I wanted a cuisine that is without affect, simple. But I am convinced that we will return to more modesty. The reign of the fatty, the sweet, the crispy and the spicy has come to an end. We must reorient all of that, but I do not intend to do it alone.

Is there a dish that could become your signature offering?

As far as which dishes will make it into the “best of,” we won’t know until three months from now, and it will be the clients who decide. But I already have my favourites, like the lentils with farmed caviar or the Anjou-grown quinoa with root vegetables and shellfish, which is a very strong dish.

Why did you decide to bring in Japanese chef Toshio Tanahashi?

I met Toshio Tanahashi at a meal in Kyoto and I did not want to leave his restaurant until he accepted to come to Paris with me for a few months and teach Romain Meder and his brigade shojin cuisine, which involves treating vegetables with care. Asia offers a more erudite cuisine, but the approach varies from one country to the next. It’s the world’s richest. Next year I hope we will open our first restaurant in China.

Is the restaurant at the Plaza Athénée the first in a series of other restaurants extolling naturalness?

First we’re going to make this one work! But yes, this approach could be rolled out worldwide.

Can the fare still be considered French cuisine, or should we speak instead of international cuisine?

It is still French cuisine, namely because we present French savoir-faire and technique. And without cutting and cooking techniques, for example, there can be no haute cuisine! This is even one of the ways naturalness is expressed: ingredients selected for their quality and prepared with technique—such as bleeding a bar that is then cut on the plate with a steak knife, because it is what the flesh calls for when prepared this way.

And where do wines fit into all of this?

We worked with the chef sommelier Gérard Margeon to offer nice red wines with fish, a combination that works well. Our wine list is half reds, half whites.

Do you think your approach at the Plaza Athénée will influence other leading chefs?

I don’t want to be preachy. I think that as a chef I have a responsibility in my restaurants. We must learn to share, to consume better and more ethically, to eat less but better. I am thoroughly convinced of this. And I’m not the most progressive [restaurateur] when it comes to naturalness. For example, Dan Barber in the US offers dishes in which 80 per cent of the ingredients are produced on his farm. I haven’t invented anything new, but now I intend to act.

Are you afraid of risking your standing with the leading restaurant guides and critics? (Editor’s note: the restaurant was listed in the Michelin guide with three stars before its closing.)

I will simply do my job as chef and they theirs as guides. That said, our ambition is clearly to obtain three stars. — AFP-Relaxnews