‘I don’t think any of my dishes are offbeat or outlandish’: Chef Heston Blumenthal

An Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and awarded an OBE by the Queen, for services to gastronomy, the chef has now collaborated with Black & White to inspire cooking enthusiasts to ‘create and share their food and cocktail recipes which will be featured in this one-of-a-kind Journal of Sharing website.’

 

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In an exclusive email interaction, the celebrity chef talks about his mind-blowing dishes, his experiments with science in the kitchen, his latest project, and his love for the Indian cuisine. Excerpts:

‘Snail Porridge’, ‘Edible Fairy Lights’ and ‘Bacon Ice Cream’, your dishes are a beautiful combination of complexity and creativity. What goes behind conceptualising them?

My inspiration can come from anywhere really. Snail Porridge was about the absurdity of the name. My head chef at the time, Garry, had recently returned from a trip to Hong Kong and told me about a dish he’d eaten called congee which he described as being like a fish porridge. It just sparked off an idea in me. Snails were traditionally purged on oats, and I’d always served them at the Fat Duck but now saw a way I could do something very different but also played around with people’s expectations of a dish. It was something similar with ‘Bacon and Egg Ice Cream’, I realised the ingredients for a traditional English breakfast would work just as well as a dessert and I loved the idea of starting and finishing your meal with the same thing but differently. ‘Edible Fairy Lights’, well they are just fun and show you that things are not always what they seem and that you should question everything. That’s the motto of my coat of arms.

If you had to pick one dish that you feel is the most offbeat, outlandish or challenging, which one would it be?

I don’t think any of my dishes are offbeat or outlandish. Some can be seen as challenging, but I do think all of them are simply trying to illustrate that our relationship with food is tremendously complex. I don’t have a favourite, it’s like asking for a favourite child, but my most complete dish in many ways is one of my most recent and that’s ‘Counting Sheep’, which is an exploration into the smells and emotional connection of bedtime. It evokes the scent of baby powder and warm milk and part of it is served on a floating pillow to create that feeling of lightness and drifting away. It always seems to generate a reaction in the dining room and the whole dish is white so looks rather wonderful, too.

You have an extremely innovative approach to cooking; what led you to introduce elements of science to food and pave the way for molecular gastronomy?

I was never got on with science at school but always had interest in the way things worked. My real moment came when I read about the work of Harold McGee, the author of On Food and Cooking. I had been cooking for a few years and I read about Harold’s explanation that searing a piece of meat didn’t keep its juices inside. I had always read and been told the opposite, that searing seals in the moisture and flavour of the meat. I began to see that many of the rules of cooking I was adhering to were false. I wrote to Harold immediately and we became great friends. He was not a scientist either but was interesting in what was happening when we cook our food. It was a huge source of creativity for me: molecular gastronomy.

You also introduced theatrics concerning food. What had you envisioned when you had just started such experiments?

I just wanted to add elements of surprise and play around with people’s expectations at the dining table. We developed some techniques whilst making the televisions shows which we were also able to adapt and use in the restaurants to create the same experience. I also wanted things to be fun and exciting for our guests. I describe it as ‘feeling like a kid in a sweet shop’, it’s that feeling of excitement that you had as a child when you were allowed into the sweet shop with your pocket money. All the wonderful things to choose from and it’s a feeling I have used creatively all my career, at the Fat Duck we end the meal with a marvelous mechanical model of a sweet shop into which you put your unique coin. It encapsulates what I am trying to say perfectly, and the guests enjoy that moment.

 

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Your views on Indian cuisine and its place on the global culinary map.

I love Indian cuisine and have been lucky enough to travel to India many times to enjoy it. In the UK, the Indian food we understand is most likely, actually, from Bangladesh. Many families came and settled in England and brought their wonderful cooking traditions with them and adapted them to the British palate. So, my early experience of eating Indian food is more about the atmosphere of a classic British Curry House. Being with all your friends ordering lots of different dishes. I am very particular about my naan bread, and must have them straight from the tandoor, so they still have that charcoal flavor to the dough. It’s one of the great culinary nations of the world, not only in terms of skill but in terms of ingredients and variety.

Can you tell us about ‘The Journal of Sharing’ and your idea for the same?

I believe food and drink can be about bringing people together, connecting them with themselves and others in a way no other activity can. The purpose of the Journal of Sharing was to provide people with a means to do just that. It has some ideas from me and the team, recipes, but we also wanted to encourage people to participate. I want people to let us know what they are doing together and share it with others through our website so we can bring people together around the experience of Black & White.

 

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Have you tried a lot of Indian food? If yes, what do you like the most, and what do you wish to try?

I have eaten Indian food many times but would love the opportunity to travel around India itself. On my visits, I have tried some wonderful dishes. The huge variety of vegetarian dishes is something I particularly enjoy. At my restaurant, we have used vegetables as the main ingredient in many dishes since we opened 25 years ago, and I believe that they are just as valuable an ingredient as any meat. My experience of Indian food has shown me that vegetables can be used in so many delicious ways and I would love to explore this side of Indian cuisine further. Down from the road the Fat Duck in the next village is a restaurant called Malek’s which has been my ‘go to’ Indian restaurant for many years. What I like most about going there isn’t one dish it is the whole experience: the room, the music, the variety of foods, the freshness of the naans. An Indian meal is all about a group of people sitting eating and connecting around the table.

How challenging is it to infuse elements of science in food? Was science your favorite subject in school?

Firstly, no, science was not my favourite subject at all, I failed most of my exams in it. My favourite was art. I now realise I have a deep interest in how things work and what is happening at the very smallest level of focus. It is often these invisible processes that make some of the visible things we observe happen. Once I realised this and found ways to observe this world, I found it a very valuable creative tool. As I was the first chef doing this kind of cooking, the challenge initially was getting hold of the equipment. The things I wanted were not in your usual restaurant catalogue. I had to go to scientific ones and was ordering equipment that had not been designed for the kitchen. That’s why people would often portray my kitchen as a lab as it did look like one. But this was simply because the kit looked that way I was still cooking. Everybody’s kitchen is simply a chemistry lab by another name. This has all changed nowadays and through my career, I have seen many chefs the world over adopts the techniques I created and that is hugely rewarding. It also never fails to surprise me that despite not having a single science qualification I have been awarded a Fellowship to the Royal Society of Chemistry for my work. It makes me very proud and hopefully demonstrates that we often educate people out of science, and we should look again at how these subjects are taught in our schools, as well as how we value the importance of food and cooking as a skill for our children to learn.

You are the man behind some extremely well-known dishes, but what do you enjoy eating the most — your comfort food?

That’s an interesting question! What is comfort? Comfort is such a personal and specific emotion, and it changes all the time. Sometimes I want to eat in a beautiful, elegant restaurant and feel that way and find it comforting. Other times I can eat a certain burger and feel satisfied and comforted, too. At home, I like to take time and cook over a day and living in the South of France I often make ratatouille. The process takes a whole day and means I am mindfully in my kitchen with my phone off just engaging with the dish and looking forward to sharing with someone later. I find that very cathartic.

Which cuisines are still get their share of recognition, and one cuisine you feel is overrated?

I think all cuisines have their great dishes and parts that I find less appealing. No one cuisine can be called overrated. I have always been drawn to French food since I began my journey in food. Through my work with the Royal Palaces, I uncovered the greatness of historic British cuisine. I am now finding a lot of exciting discoveries in Asian food, particularly in South Korea and Japan.

How often can we find you cooking at home, and the one dish you keep going back to?

I cook often at home. It’s very different, of course, from being in the restaurant. I love taking time and getting deeply involved in the process. The recipes can be as simple as making cereal, but I enjoy the conscious experience of cooking and eating more when I am at home. I make things like ratatouille as I mentioned above or tarte Tatin. A tarte Tatin only has 5 ingredients, so it is all about the attention you give it as you cook to turn it into something wonderful. As I am lucky enough to live where the sun shines a lot, I can cook outside, and I also adore using a barbecue. I have developed one with a company called Everdure and it allows me to enjoy how the charcoal burns and connects me back to man’s very first experiences of cooking over a naked flame. It is also highly easy to use and can be lit in just 7 seconds so take all the hassle out of outdoor cooking.

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