I think it’s genius what Alain Passard does. Not necessarily because he was the first (or one of the first) to explore salad leaves and root vegetables while other high-end chefs were still heavily relying on animal products.Or that since many years his restaurants L’Arpège (84 rue de Varenne, 75007, Paris; tel. 01 47 05 09 06 ) has 3 Michelin stars and Passard’s apprentices like Pascal Barbot have their 3 stars of their own.
The reason why is very simple and personal. Alain Passard turned the fish I don’t like into the best fish dish of my life. The fish is called red mullet and I don’t like its muddy taste and its texture. I find it’s appearance a little bizarre too, it reminds a giant goldfish, don’t you think? Anyway, when two fillets of red mullet arrived in front of me, I experienced something new I would never expect from a red mullet. It was shockingly good. It was served with vin jaune sauce and some chopped parsley and chives on the side. The texture of the fish was firm and it didn’t taste like mud at all. There was a side dish too – some smoked boiled potatoes and cabbage. Have you ever tried smoked boiled potatoes? Me neither, not until this week. One word – a-ma-zing. This dish was so simple, yet I will remember it for the rest of my life.
Speaking of the rest of the menu, it was obviously inspired by Middle Eastern and Northern African specialities like hummus, samosa and couscous. Maybe at some point, I thought I had enough of boiled turnips, but the salad with pralinée was ingenious, so as gnocchi or ravioli. ( purely vegetarian, of course!)
The summer menu in images…
