Research in Hospitality Management 2016, 6(1): 107–111 Copyright © The Authors Printed in The Netherlands — All rights reserved RHM Open Access article distributed in terms of the ISSN 2224-3534 EISSN 2415-5152 Creative Commons Attribution License http://dx.doi.org/10.2989/RHM.2016.6.1.15.1303 [CC BY 4.0] (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0) Food on the Edge: The future of food is a sustainable future Máirtín Mac Con Iomaire School of Culinary Arts and Food Technology, Dublin Institute of Technology, Dublin, Ireland Email: [email protected] This article is a review of “Food on the Edge (FOTE)”, a symposium which ran in Galway, Ireland in October 2015 on the theme of “the future of food”. The aim of FOTE is to create a benchmark for best practice, in terms of food, its culture, and the people who produce it. According to the Symposium’s founder and organiser, J. P. McMahon, “chefs everywhere have a responsibility to be the avant-garde of food education, whether in the context of fine-dining or street food”. The focus of FOTE seemed more on fine dining than street food, however, from a cursory glance at the panel, three-quarters of whom had been awarded Michelin stars at some time, and one quarter of whom currently feature in the 2015 world’s top 100 restaurants. Only five of the speakers were women, the majority being white males. There was a real international flavour to this gathering, however, with representatives of 17 different countries speaking. This article provides an overview of the 39 presentations where the key themes emerging include sustainability, education, creativity, the need to know about your history, the links between chefs and producers, food and health, family dining, and the shortage of chefs. Keywords: chefs, Ireland, sustainability, education, creativity, Michelin Introduction the white male speakers, points out that in America, despite only being 31% of the overall population, white males hold Take one theme, forty top international chefs, three hundred 95% of the top chef positions. There was a real international and fifty symposiasts, and put them together in a large tent flavour to this gathering, however, with representatives of in the middle of Eyre Square in Galway City in the West of 17 different countries speaking. McMahon extended invita- Ireland for two days and what do you get? Answer: One of tions to over 200 of the world’s leading chefs, of which 41 the most exhilarating, dynamic, provocative and enjoyable agreed to attend. Only one chef named on the programme events I have attended in quite a while. Food on the Edge (Mads Refslund from Denmark) actually failed to arrive, and (FOTE) is the brainchild of J. P. McMahon, chef, restaura- it is believed that at least 20 chefs have already committed teur, and food columnist, who was so exasperated by not to speak at next year’s symposium. One of the themes to being able to secure a ticket to the MAD Symposium in emerge from the two-day event was the democratisation Copenhagen he decided to set up his own event and invite of fine dining and the death of the stuffy old fine-dining a host of international chefs to come and talk in his own paradigm. Indeed many of these award-winning chefs are backyard on the theme of “the future of food”. He was now getting involved in food trucks and trying to make fast completely overwhelmed by the response he received and, street food tastier, healthier, and more accessible to marginal- as a result, the Food on the Edge Irish food symposium is ised communities. planned to continue annually for at least two more years. The This article provides an overview of the 39 presentations event ran on the 19th and 20th October 2015. made over the two days where key themes have been identi- The aim of FOTE is to create a benchmark for best practice, fied using content analysis. The main themes discussed were in terms of food, its culture, and the people who produce it. sustainability, education, creativity, the need to know about According to McMahon, chefs everywhere have a responsi- your history, the links between chefs and producers (farmers, bility to be the avant-garde of food education, whether in fishermen, butchers, etc.), food and health, family dining, the context of fine dining or street food. We all need to eat and the shortage of chefs. A number of these themes are better and in order to do this we need to debate this on an cross-cutting and will be discussed below. A list of speakers, open platform. We need to create an international community their nationality and country of current employment, and the that can rely on each other to feed our own future develop- themes that emerged in their talks is shown in Table 1. ment (http://www.foodontheedge.ie/). But the focus seems more on fine dining than street food, from the panel of Food/Chefs symposiums speakers, three-quarters of whom either have or had been awarded Michelin stars at some time, and one quarter of There has been a growth in recent years in the number of whom currently feature in the 2015 world’s top 100 restau- food symposiums around the world, with events happening rants. Only five of the speakers (12.5%) were women, the in Oxford, Leeds, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Dublin, New majority being white males. Indeed, Daniel Patterson, one of York, Toronto, Adelaide and Lima, to name a few. The Research in Hospitality Management is co-published by NISC (Pty) Ltd and Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group 108 Mac Con Iomaire most well-established and longest running is the Oxford Sustainability Symposium on Food and Cookery, which has been ongoing since 1981 (http://www.oxfordsymposium.org.uk/). It was Sustainability was the overarching theme of the many talks co-founded by Alan Davidson and Dr Theodore Zeldin. at Food on the Edge (FOTE2015). It is a broad umbrella The Terroir Symposium has been run annually in Toronto, and there were many aspect of sustainability discussed, Canada since 2007 (http://www.terroirsymposium.com/). ranging from sustainable farming to biodiversity, sustain- In 2008, the Peru Mucho Gusto fair was first run, which able fishing, food supply (retailing/wholesaling), food waste, was renamed Mistura in 2009 and has become the biggest and the sustainable supply of labour. There was a cross- food fair in Latin America (http://mistura.pe/). The MAD cutting theme between sustainability and the link between Symposium in Copenhagen, Denmark was founded in 2011 chefs and farmers or local food producers. It was suggested by Rene Redzepi of NOMA restaurant and is an annual event that each chef should spend some time on farms and that which holds associated events in the USA (http://www. farmers should spend some time in kitchens. Indeed, Tom madfeed.co/). In an Irish context, the Dublin Gastronomy Aikens noted that he had developed a massive ego while Symposium is a biennial event which first ran in 2012 (http:// working as head chef in Pied à Terre, which was not healthy, arrow.dit.ie/dgs/). and that it was the time spent directly after this working on an organic farm and abattoir which really grounded him. He suddenly realised the link and argues that chefs should Table 1: Speakers’ information and emerging themes Country Need to Producers Country of Food & Family Shortage Name where now Sustainability Education Creativity know farms & origin health dining of chefs working history chefs 85% 82% 79% 74% 72% 56% 49% 31% Nathan Outlaw England England * * * * * * Sasu Laukkonen Finland Finland * * * * James Petrie Scotland England * * * * * Albert Adrià Spain Spain * * * * Amanda Cohen Canada USA * * * * * * Mark Best Australia Australia * * * * * Matt Orlando USA Denmark * * * * Davide Scabin Italy Italy * * * * * Mikael Jonsson Sweden England * * * * Roderick Sloan Scotland Denmark * * * * * * Niko Romito Italy Italy * * * * * * Andy McFadden Ireland England * * * * * * Alyn Williams England England * * * * * * * Jess Murphy New Zealand Ireland * * * Phil Howard England England * * * * Phil Wood New Zealand Australia * * * * * * Ross Lewis Ireland Ireland * * * * * * Ben Reade Scotland Scotland * * * * Daniel Patterson USA USA * * * * * * * Gunner Karl Gislason Iceland Iceland * * * * * * * Ricardo Camanini Italy Italy * * * Kobe Desramaults Belgium Belgium * * * * * André Chiang Taiwan Singapore * * * * David Kinch USA USA * * * * Clare Smyth N. Ireland England * * * * * * * Kevin Patricio USA Spain * * * Wojciech Modest Amaro Poland Poland * * * * * * Paul Flynn Ireland Ireland * * * * * * Elena Arzak Spain Spain * * * * * * * Tom Aikens England England * * * * * Connie Desousa & John Canada Canada * * * * * * * Jackson Kevin Thornton Ireland Ireland * * * * Tim Raue Germany Germany * * Brandon Baltzley USA USA * * * * * * Roberto Solis Mexico Mexico * * * * * * * Wade Murphy Ireland Ireland * * * * * Quique Dacosta Spain Spain * * * * * Jair Tellez Mexico Mexico * * * * * * * * Mark Moriarty Ireland Ireland * * * * * * * * Research in Hospitality Management 2016, 6(1): 107–111 109 draw their inspiration from producers and suppliers. Niko the sea by adhering to quotas, watching the by-catch, and Romito, a self-taught three-Michelin-starred chef from protecting the spawning grounds. Italy, suggested that the complete removal of the ego of the chef is the future of food. He notes that simplicity Sustainable food supply-chains is the key to truly sustainable food, not by being banal or One of the more controversial and impassionate speakers lacking complexity, but by lacking complication. His video was Mark Best, an Australian chef. He painted a dispar- of a simple dish of capellini (thin spaghetti) with bacon, aging picture of the lack of diversity in the food supply white wine, juice of chargrilled leek, and a pinch of chilli chain in Australia which is dominated by two major players flakes had the whole audience drooling. Food is the ideal (Woolworths and Wesfarmers), which between them way to transfer the message between the producer and account for 70% of the market.