Yes Dominique is good. She’s a cool lady as well.
Steve,
I also wish not to get into a long thread about this. First I will tell you, when discussing a retail business don’t discount popular. It’s actually very important. I understand his technique is influential with some other chefs. Still when the history is written Batali will have a much more prominent role than Wylie will as it stands now.
The only reason this could turn into a protracted thread is because you are suggesting that in the future the way influential is defined will be different than the way it is defined today. It is fine if you want to believe that but, you will have a very hard time showing an example where that happened. All of the famous chefs I can think if are famous due to the techniques and theories that they developed. Popularity is not part if the equation.
How about putting something on a plate that people want to eat time and time again. Or does that not have enough technique for you? And if you don’t think that Batali is far more famous than Dufresne will ever be, then you need to check out the definition of famous.
Using that logic, Kendall Jackson Chardonnay is a better wine than Coche Dury Meursault Perrieres because more people want to drink it.
No I’m not suggesting that at all. I think the problem here is we are talking about two different things. You are speaking of a chef’s influence within his industry. I am defining “top” in a much broader sense. The chefs I listed all control multiple restaurants in multiple cities. I realize that this in and of itself does not make someone “top” but their influence spreading their style among their staff and the media presence that they all enjoy insures a large impression on the present and future culinary scene.
As usual you missed the point.
I get the point. You guys do not get it. In order for something to be important, you need to be able to form a secondary intellectual argument around the topic. The way those arguments are typically organized is by creating a hierarchy based on influence. When it comes to a craft like cooking, those arguments are formed around technique, application of technique, and how humans interact with food. Mario Batali might make some tasty food, but his cooking is devoid of contributions in those three categories. That makes it difficult to make an informed argument about his importance as a chef. What Batali did was do a brilliant job of marketing a style of cooking that already existed. In that way he influenced what many people eat every day. But his fame will not outlive him because it’s just marketing. It’s not a actual contribution to his craft.
You can create whatever you want. If no one wants to eat it, how influential are you? Not very is the answer.
I don’t agree with that. You’re influential if you influence a lot of chefs. He can be the father of the movement.
That being said, I’m not sure it’s an argument for “top chef”. Maybe “most influential chefs”
Agreed and I would think that most people would use the require that someone consistently produce delicious food to be a top chef. Generally, and this is no insult at all, you seem to intellectualize food more than a lot of people who have a similar love of food and eating. By your own assessment of his poneering and his food, my judgement would be that he IS not a great chef. Personally there is an element of appreciation for technique and innovation, but not much if as a whole it is not manifested in food that is delicious. I would say that being the pioneer of something indeed contributes to legacy, but again is not in and of itself enough to make one great. A person can conceivably come up with multiple techniques yet no possess other requisite skills to make a great meal. I know of one local Top Cef chef who seems to have excellent technique, use good ingredients, and conceptualize good dishes. But I had a couple of poor meals from the simple over-salting of numerous dishes. His great attributes don’t really control if he can’t turn out delicious food.
Inasmuch as some techniques are food-science based, they could be conceptualized by a culinary professor who is not even a chef. Or using Rene as an example, what if went tp WD-50 and then essentially replicated a number of the techniques that Wylie pioneered. Perhaps slightly improving them and/or using them on superior ingredient combinations. That might manifest itself in a meal that just tastes better than Wylie’s. Are we to substantially grade up Wylie and down Rene? Perhaps yes in the culinary encyclopedia 20 years from now, but (again personally) I would not rate Wylie the better chef for my current purposes.
Steve, have you been to June? I saw it on your list and am in that area a couple of times a year with a lack of grub.
This is the crux of the argument. You are making a subjective argument. The problem with subjective arguments is that there is no proof that the person making the argument knows what they are talking about. Take the following example. The introduction to Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring is hauntingly beautiful. But when Igor debuted the piece in 1913, the audience found it so avant garde and dissonant that it almost caused a near riot. So was the audience right, or had Stravinsky changed the definition of beautiful and the audience not realize it?
The problem with this discussion is that the original post wasn’t really made to determine a real answer, it was intended to create a debate whereby it would ratify people’s existing opinions. That’s okay with me as in large part that is what discussion forums are about. But why do people feel the need to reject what are clearly important facts that people raise? If I was on the Gary York side of the argument, and someone told me the Rene Redzepi story, it would make me think about reconsidering my position and seeing if there was something I was missing.
It is the same with Nick and whether Batali is an important chef. Why cant Nick say, I like Batali’s food but I understand why he might not be an important chef. Instead, he feels compelled to try and shoehorn him into the definition. It’s as if he feels (no offense Nick) that he is lesser somehow if there is not a perfect correlation between his own taste and what is important. I don’t get that. I like to eat lots of things that are not important, and I do not have a problem admitting they are not important. And there are other things I do not personally like, but which I will gladly admit to their importance (Led Zeppelin and Bruce Springsteen for example.) Those concepts are really not at odds, and when you conflate them, it limits the benefit that you can get from these types of discussions.
I was at June when it first opened and it was very good. But that was 3-4 years ago so I can’t vouch for its quality today. But Josh Adams is a good guy and a talented chef. John if you are going to go, let me know and I will send him and email for you so he takes special care of you.
Anyway, if you want to create a list of “top chefs” using popularity and success as a measure, you need to look at people’s balance sheets. Nobu, Michael Mina and Roy (whatever his last name is from Roy’s) would probably be at the top of the list. Nobu’s business is worth something like $350 million. Daniel Boulud was trying to sell his business for $150 million I believe. Aside from his Eataly holdings, I doubt Batali’s restaurant business is worth anywhere near that. But Mina and Roy have less of a chance to be remembered than Batali. Nobu on the other hand pioneered Japanese/Peruvian cooking and will always be remembered for that. That would be true if his business was only worth 1/10 as much and he was not a household name.
Bob Dylan is hard to listen to…I find his voice to be awful, yet there is no denying that he is incredibly influential in the music world.
I consider a lot of things. But the most important one is that you are wrong. You used the word “famous”, see above post 43, and by any normal definition of the word Batali is far more famous than Dufresne can ever hope to be. And if you want to talk about influence, how about the guy that basically retired French food in NYC. Look around NYC and you will see the bones of French food. Unless you are going to argue that NYC doesn’t have enough influence. I am not sure that even some false sense of elitism could support that.
I will enjoy answering this later when I’m at a keyboard.
Charlie yes that is my point.
But you are refusing to acknowledge that there are two types of fame. There is fame that flows from being popular - like Kendall Jackson chardonnay, and there is fame that flows from doing something substantive like Coche Dury Corton Charlie. Long term reputations are measured by the latter, never the former. The only people who measure it by the former are people with uninformed opinions. What you are really saying is, I insist that my uninformed opinion has as much value as the opinions of people who are informed. That is patently untrue. It only has value to you, and possibly other people who are uninformed.
The only way to have an opinion that has value is if you accept that there is such a thing as an informed opinion so you can learn something. But since you are refusing to do that because you feel like it challenges your manhood or some other silly concern, you are stuck in a circular loop. And you are frustrated with me because I keep pointing that out to you.
Before Nick responds how about we approach the topic from this angle.
What if I told you that Mario Batali is popular with people who have uninformed opinions, and is not rated highly among people with informed opinions. And what if I told you it was exactly the opposite for Wylie Dufresne. Does it sound like Kendall Jackson yet? Highly popular among people with uninformed opinions and totally dissed by wine afiicianados.
You can drop the whole KJ thing. Only someone as uninformed as you would draw such a comparison. And you can also drop your version of informed opinion. And you can try to redefine famous. That might work. But I kind of doubt it. You might want to find another word, that is not FAMOUS. There are many to choose.
I am not the one arguing that popularity should be the measure, you are. It’s just that you like the popularity argument when it helps your conclusion, but do not like it (KJ) when it hurts you. That is why I keep asking you to explain your criteria other than a subjective opinion. Or why you refuse to accept criteria other than the one you want to use?
You realize that this entire argument is about Gary York’s refusal to acknowledge that the criteria other people use to evaluate WD-50 is valid. I guess it must make him feel like he has a small wee wee.