- GASTRO.The 20 tastiest ideas to devour in Mugaritz
"I am disturbed by things of the soul, why do we want, what is behind the pleasure, why are we as we are ... I am hungry to meet, maybe that's why I'm so interested in Atapuerca ». Andoni Aduriz (San Sebastián, 1971) holds a glass of sake as it descends step by step to the depths of the human essence from the hand of our ancestors.
"Paleontologists tell you that they made flint pieces not only by necessity, but as an exercise in virtuosity, " he continues, while the wood-burning stove that tempers the Mugaritz booth (mixture of muga and haritza , oak and border, in Basque, cracks in Basque ) and rain on the hills that surround Rentería rains.
From the dark chasm, the Basque chef returns with a torch that illuminates everything: «It is the human essence, overflowing efficiency. Surely, these cultural constructions are the closest to sucking drops of immortality, ”he argues.
The metaphor is not accidental. He evokes it because that is precisely what his Michelin-starred restaurant is dedicated to: serving cultural constructions that transcend the physiological need to eat to turn his tastings into a dialogue full of surprises and surprises. A conversation in twenty rounds in which no bites are thought, but ideas are chewed and utopias are devoured.
TABLETS
«With creativity you can pose creative and intelligent looks on things, you can eat stories, stories, science and culture. You can eat everything at once with the same gesture, ”lights Aduriz. And that is what this report is about, distilled over five hours of exclusive talk with one of the most unique chefs on the planet : one of warming, three of table and tablecloth and two of dessert in a restaurant that only the best sweet in the world serves: the desktop. "It is the most extraordinary thing in this life."
The curious thing about Mugaritz's long conversations is that they are not the end of anything, but the beginning of everything , because from them the philosophy, provocation and genius of Aduriz's culinary proposal is nurtured. Table tops with Juan Luis Arsuaga and Eduald Carbonell, co-directors of the Museum of Human Evolution, who encouraged him to serve a dish that included a sharp piece of flint with which to cut a veal entricula.
Or the one in which the neuroscientist Antonio Damasio chiselled one of the currencies of the house ( "your creativity makes diners creative" ) and the chef turned on so many light bulbs that should have caused a rise in tension and power outages throughout Guipúzcoa "It made me think that many people come here only one day in their life, but if we sow the seed, they can understand that their mouth is an eye with which to observe and eat the world, " recalls the chef.
Aduriz himself is a kind of contemporary Socrates, a defender of liquid leaderships, a gastronomic reference who only knows that he knows nothing («my R&D team has total freedom and I am only the last filter, but I am very much say nosé , so ... » ) and a skilled conversationalist who, like the Greek philosopher, finds in the questions the path to knowledge. For example, when they serve on a napkin the ice cream Sigh dish, a transparent, but mottled, egg that creaks in the mouth with a clatter. Or what is the same, a balloon of ice water with no nutritional value, but seasoned with pepper, a joke that the chef celebrates with laughter.
- Someone might feel ripped off with this as a dish ...
- From your reasons, yes. Or not, because, what if I tell you that this pepper is the most expensive in the world? Where do we put the value of things? this is serious? Is it a genius? It's a joke? Does the food have to be eaten? Is it a bite? a sensation? a sigh? a kiss? what has happened?
These logical games, common in Mugaritz, are just one of the many surprises that an unsuspecting visitor can find that reaches Rentería guided by the aroma of fame and Michelin stars. Others have to do with the kitchen of absences, named for the amount of elements that have been stripping the restaurant in a long striptease of 22 years .
«When you leave the table naked, when you remove the bread and cutlery, when you no longer only force to eat with your hands, but they are uncomfortable things to eat with your hands, when you do not serve a conventional menu with an identifiable order, when you remove desserts, when you say what time you have to come and you charge a lot of money ... How do people lend themselves to this? How is there not a revolution and break the windows with the chairs? », Aduriz wonders again.
CHALLENGE THE COMENSAL
Complaints and regrets have been going on for years, but more and more people come to this gastronomic temple with their minds as open as their mouths, wanting to be surprised («challenge», says Aduriz) and participate in the great dance that they put on stage their tastings, in which the boundaries between what the diner knows and what he can discover, what things are and what they seem, what it is to eat and what it is to drink, the explicit and implicit message are permanently blurred.
"Everything is a kind staging so that complexity does not run over you," he explains, "and that if you don't want to find it, you can do your walk in a conventional way and enjoy; but if you want to scratch, move the fabrics and appear a lot of wonderful things » .
This year, a clear example of that choose your own adventure is represented by the snack (in Mugaritz you don't eat dishes, but snacks) TASTE. American lobster , in which a fresh lobster with roe and lobster concentrate is served, washed down with carabinero sauce. «It is one of the dishes they are enjoying the most: you eat the icon, the reference, the tradition ... you eat it all even if you are not interested in the concepts or ideas. It's very good, ”explains the chef. «But what interests me most is that you are eating a camouflaged raw lobster made with a sauce that tastes like grilled seafood. The best texture in the world with the best flavor » .
'BOILED' WITHOUT HEAT
And now look at the romanescu that illustrates this page. Its vanishing point (the keywords that set the horizon with which the bites in Mugaritz are conceived and that head its name) is FRACTAL . It looks like a boiled vegetable, but it hasn't been exposed for a second to the heat. This paradox is achieved with a double chemical-based technique: lime and the pectinase enzyme are applied to achieve creaminess inside while keeping the outer appearance intact.
It is an example of how, in addition to philosophy, anthropology and psychology, science plays a fundamental role in this restaurant. First, because Aduriz often includes all kinds of academic essays among his readings. But also the result of the pioneering collaboration they have had for years with the Azti technology center, specializing in food R&D. "We have been the first to work with high pressures, we have become entangled with ultrasound, with electromagnetic freezing (CAS), we have here a huge lyophilization machine that is worth a pasture ...", Aduriz lists.
The result of this experimental desire was SYNTHESIS. Fossilized stew , a soup deconstructed in broth of concentrated chicken and lyophilized chicken. "This is what astronauts should eat in space," the Basque chef suggests joking while savoring it.
- Isn't it something dry?
- Wonderfully dry. What is the problem? A polvorón is too and nobody eats it at Christmas and says it is dry.
It is the privilege of enjoying a haute cuisine menu with its creator sitting in the next chair. How to share with James Joyce while the pages of the Ulysses follow one another or contemplate with Kandinsky the abstraction of his compositions.
Back in the warm atmosphere of the booth, the conversation turns to music, literature and plastic arts while a barista serves one of the most expensive coffees in the world in a glass of wine. "One of the most decisive influences for me is that of Balenciaga," Aduriz explains. «Drooling in the Balenciaga Museum, because there is a lot of truth in it and it fascinates me how an uncle so attached to the earth was so global» . And yet, aesthetics, such as taste, protocols and product, have a relative weight in their universe. «I like this dish to be ugly ...», the cook alleges about EARTH. Fresh pea "I like not having complexes to prioritize the appeal of an idea and seek poetry over beauty," he explains.
THE BERRY
They are concepts, traditions and wants that are part of the culture and identity of Mugaritz, which becomes a religion for employees and stagiaires .
Visiting the kitchens, its R&D director, Ramón Perisé, asks one of the chefs to show on his right arm the palmaria demonstration of that commitment: a tattoo with the meticulous bending protocol of the yellow wipes, one of The sacred rituals of the house. Up to 14 Mugaritz employees currently wear the same tattoo.
«The cloth is a symbol and the symbols tell you more than words. To fold it is to appear that I am disciplined and ordered to end up being it, ”says Perisé, leader of a team of designers, engineers, librarians ...
During the year they deal with quality control, but from January to March they explore new horizons. And they are delivered to games as crazy as tasting sugar or coffee under the effects of sweetness and acidity blockers. «We are very idiots», confesses Perisé, summarizing the philosophy of the restaurant. But don't be fooled, behind Mugaritz's avant-garde idiocy there is a lot of science, a lot of intention and a lot of philosophy.
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