Don't Let The Secret Recipe Die With

With Cult Foods, There Is An Underlying Assumption That The Best Cooking Ideas Came Generations Ago. Yet Culinary Innovation Is Nothing To Be Ashamed Of. When A Chef Tells Me He Is Cooking With His Grandmother's Recipe, I Always Wonder Why. Did Talent Skip The Past Two Generations?

Near Marseilles In The South Of France, Bouillabaisse Is A Cult Food. In Toulouse And Carcassonne, The Bean-based Stew Cassoulet Is A Cult Food. Spain Has Paella And A Number Of Others. Italy Has So Many, Its Cuisine Is Practically Defined By Them.

The Idea Behind A Dish - The Delight And The Surprise - Makes A Difference. Great Literature Surprises And Delights, And Provokes Us. It Isn't Just 'here's The Facts - Boy Meets Girl, Boy Loses Girl, Boy Gets Girl.' It's How You Tell It.

There's No Way I'm Going To Stand Up For Bad Ingredients. We Love Seasonal Ingredients. It's A False Dichotomy To Say That Modern Cooking Is At Odds With That, But Some People Want To Have A Great Ingredient And No Technique.

Cooking Is An Art, But All Art Requires Knowing Something About The Techniques And Materials. Using Modernist Techniques, You Get More Control, And That Allows You To Be More Artistic, Not Less!