GENTLEMAN Laurann Claridge FARMER checks out what One man who’s working hard to influence agricultural appreciation chefs worldwide at the table is chef Dan Barber. Three years ago, Barber received a $30 million grant from David were chattering Rockefeller to launch The Stone Barns Center in Westchester about at the County, New York — a sprawling farm with 6 acres of gardens, a Starchefs.com 23,000-square-foot greenhouse and pastures where lambs, pigs, International chickens, laying hens, ducks, rabbits and cows roam; honeybees Chefs Congress, pollinate; and diners flock to his down-to-earth fine-dining room, and learns more Blue Hill. Barber and his protégés supply the restaurant, its sister property in New York City and about America’s well-heeled neighbors who migrate to reap what the farmers next course. sow at the seasonal weekly farmer’s market. Reviving the art of animal husbandry, they’re breeding flavor- some fat back into the lean oinkers Todd Thrasher’s Dan Barber’s Stone Barn Center formerly known as pigs and raising MOLECULAR well-crafted cocktail a variety of lambs that enjoy a 100 GASTRONOMY percent grass-feed diet. Farmers also cultivate 35 varieties of greens, SCIENCE ON A SILVER PLATTER including cassava broccoli, the heirloom granddaddy of the Depending on your point of view, modern broccoli stalk. Dark green you can credit or blame brothers and misshapen, its like rabé with Ferran and Albert Adrià of El Bulli 10 times more flavor than ordinary in Spain for inspiring a rash of mad broccoli. “The challenge is to scientists in white chef coats — grow the most flavorful food and some, disciples of the most influen- ingredients possible,” Barber says. tial brethren of food today, others merely ardent admirers. Open six months a year (the remainder is devoted to experimental work), José Andrés’ savory olive-oil filled bonbons TOP DRAWER El Bulli has diners clamoring for months to secure a reservation. This COCKTAILS three-Michelin-star, fine-dining spot has plated up ethereal foams and I was never a gin-and-tonic girl until airs, and given the world “spherifi- I sipped one concocted by Todd cation” (the ability to jellify a liquid, Thrasher of Alexandria, Virginia’s producing sphere-shaped food in Restaurant Eve. The gin was top an array of sizes). Now El Bulli shelf, sure, but what astonished me wholesales the know-how to its was the tonic — made from scratch cohorts in a line of emulsifiers and with filtered water, cane sugar, jellifiers called Texturas (texturas honey, citric acid, yuzu juice and elbulli.com). … Spain is also home quinine, a South American dried to pastry chef Oriol Balaguer, and tree bark that’s ground into powder his eponymous chocolate shop in and a part of any authentic tonic. Barcelona. This protégé of the Adrià Wylie Dufresne’s edible pebbles Thrasher, a presenter at the brothers makes sweets to order, Starchefs.com International Chefs including chocolates filled with EQUIP A decade ago, Congress, is among a growing an innocent-looking ganache that, home cooks looked contingent of mixologists taking moments after indulging, fill your YOURSELF askance at chefs back the bar to prepare high-end mouth with explosive Pop Rock–like who whipped out drinks with the same care with sensation. Another Adrià acolyte, a welder’s blowtorch to caramelize sugar atop which chefs cook their fare. Andoni Luis Aduriz of Mugaritz, a crème brülée. Now Williams-Sonoma sells Thrasher’s couture cocktails are rigged his own kitchen contraption miniature torches to the masses. What’s next? crafted with fresh-squeezed juices, (along with experts at Spain’s Here are the tools our inventive friends behind fruit and vegetable purées and Azti Technical Center for Food and the swinging doors are tinkering with today. waters, house-made simple-syrup Marine Research) to create edible SILK SCREENS infusions, colas, sodas and the cocoa bubbles that, moments aforementioned tonic, as well as before serving, burst playfully over Channeling Andy Warhol, chef Seiji Yamamato ingredients such as complex bitters his decadent desserts. Fourth-gener- of RyuGin in Tokyo uses a silk screen to literally flavored with lemon, orange, mint, ation chef Elena Arzak, at the helm paint his eatery’s logo with a thin layer of choco- fig, cherry, kumquat and peach, of her family’s Restaurante Arzak, late sauce onto each serving plate. He’s even each of which he bottles himself which was built in San Sebastian in created a detailed copy of a recent review during a 21-day process. Thrasher’s 1897, has played with liquid nitro- atop his china. Best yet, every letter is edible. “I’d go out of my way for them” gen and dehydrators in the past. drinks hopefully signify a growing Now she obsesses on the process of PAINT SPRAYERS trend nationwide. lyophilization (freeze-drying) to dry Once the domain of professional house painters, out, for example, a piece of squid, paint sprayers do double duty with pastry grind it to dust, then coat a fresh chefs, who use the noisy electric tools to spray OLD WAYS piece of squid with the powder a thin layer of tempered chocolate onto sweets. Parmigiano-Reggiano ice cream NEWS AGAIN to intensify its flavor … Stateside, and a proscuitto di Parma crisp Spanish chef José Andrés of Café BRITA WATER FILTERS Some things, like the little black Atlantico in Washington, D.C., is If those handy pitchers can clear nasty sediment dress, never go out of style. The another graduate of the Adrià acad- from tap water, imagine how they can clarify a SALT MINES culinary world’s equivalent: cow’s- emy. His savory olive oil bonbon sim- consommé of teeny particles that might cloud milk Parmigiano-Reggiano, aged ply astonishes. Made with isomalt the effect. two years and recognizable by (a natural-beet sugar substitute Chef David Burke of New York’s the pin-dot logo on its rind, and ideal for making candies), each DavidBurke & Donatella is the inspired SOUS VIDE prosciutto di Parma (Parma ham), olive oil–filled, caramelized sphere creator of Flavor Sprays, a line of You know it’s a full-fledged trend when superstar produced in Parma, Italy, with only is dipped in a bracing vinegar pow- zero-calorie tastes such as smoked chef Joël Robuchon gets on board. Devoted to the hind legs of specially bred der and Maldon sea salt and bursts bacon and peanut brittle that, with sous vide — a method of vacuum-sealing and pigs, sea salt and the air that flows with a fruity, extra-virgin Spanish one squirt, can boost the taste of a parcooking meat, fish, vegetable, even sweets — around them. Discerning chefs, olive oil when nipped. In New York dish without adding fat. His next goal: Robuchon swears he won’t feed a banquet any spurred by the Slow Food move- at WD-50, chef/owner Wylie to create a spray that would impart the other way. ment and aiming to protect food Dufresne is tinkering with hydrocol- flavor of a fine, dry-aged filet onto any artisans and safeguard their tradi- loids (used by American snack-food piece of meat. When the lab analyzed GEM SCALE tional preparations, have trained manufacturers to stabilize and alter the 300-plus components that make With science-minded chefs conferring with their focus on just such ingredient- the texture of food). Using konjac up the complex flavor of the meat Dow Chemicals’ tech support to learn about driven cuisine. For instance, Fabio flour, he serves soft tromp l’oeil peb- aged at Burke’s restaurant, they discov- ingredients, more rely on razor-sharp gem Trabocchi, chef/owner of Fiamma bles with the tastes like grilled corn, ered that the dominant taste was … scales to calculate minute measurements to the in New York, looks to his Italian brown butter bananas and pizza. cardboard. Realizing no one wants to 1/1000th of a gram. heritage for inspiration but tricks consume paper products, Burke pared it up making a subtle parmesan ice his walk-in refrigerator down to the HOMOGENIZER cream topped by a Parma ham and mere essentials: prime beef atop hazelnut crunch crumble, a savory It’s your trusty retro Waring blender on speed. metal racks, black lights and proper riff on cookies and ice cream, In the hands of a kitchen pro, a homogenizer ventilation in a cooler lined with tiles while Josh DeChellis with the originally used to manufacture toothpaste can made of pink Himalayan rock salt. Greenwich Village Japanese whip raw veggies to a mayonnaise consistency Yes, pink salt. By creating a “pure” tempura house BarFry sandwiches with vivid flavor. environment, Burke allows the top- raw kampachi fish with mirin and grade beef to age up to 80 days PACO JET yuzu juice between paper-thin without sacrificing texture or flavor, Splurge on this $3,450 machine, and slices of prosciutto di Parma and Presenting José Andrés’ slowly permeating the meat with a you can freeze sorbet and ice cream in lets the flavors marry for eight olive-oil filled bonbons subtle salt seasoning. mere minutes. hours before serving.

MARCH | PAGE 28 | 2008