10 years ago I was enthusiastic
about the high end dining scene in Spain. Juan Mari Arzak was still cooking great dishes;
Zuberoa was in top shape; Berasategui had not forgotten his Basque roots;
and, Feran Adria was cooking some real
food and tasty dishes at El Bulli. One
could then even eat well at Akelare.
Now it is a much changed
landscape. Most of the high end dining in Spain is dominated by a synthetic,
artificial cuisine based on generic ingredients. It is no wonder then that these multi starred
Michelin chefs are usually devoid of a domestic client base. With the exception
of a small clique in Spain
organized around “Lo Mejor de la Gastronomia” and R. Garcia Santos, very few
Spaniards seem to be lured by the avant-garde cooking and/or the so called
“creations” of young chefs who learn about fancy plating and a panoply of
experimental lab equipments and various chemical stabilizers before they can
tell the difference between a rock bass and a farmed one. Unfortunately these chefs don’t even know how
to properly quarter a whole hog or cow, and they are at the behest of those who vacuum pack teeny-tiny cuts of fish
and meat to be sous-vided in the restaurant and then artistically plated.
The irony is that Spain is still
a great destination for dining, but for a different reason. The reason is that Spain has
arguably the best seafood and ham in the world, and, some of the worst,
overoaked, over the top, international style wines in the world….
