Great British Menu

Certainly, if I am going into a restaurant to eat an expensive meal, I expect to be served something that I couldn't have done myself.

I wish! Usually these days I think I can do better. But then I'm not eating at high end restaurants! One ambition I have is to go to Heston Blumenthal's Fat Duck. I once booked a place there for my birthday (you need to book months ahead) and managed to fall over and break my pelvis the week before... sad. I have a long list of other Michelin starred restaurants where I'd like to eat.
 
Nouvelle cuisine has pretty well disappeared I think. It was a trend in the 70's as I recall. But I think these days the best aspects of that style have informed some of the best Chefs
 
No that is not my perspective either. I recall one of the top chefs making the point that a significant part of being a genuinely great chef is taking really great ingredients and simply not destroying them. Certainly, if I am going into a restaurant to eat an expensive meal, I expect to be served something that I couldn't have done myself.
To not destroy great ingredients could be done by a relatively simple (qualified) chef. I expect most restaurants to be above what I can cook at home i.e. when it doesn't involve just a simple cut of meat, conventionally prepared.

Whilst I applaud nouvelle cuisine for its lighter, more delicate and fresher approach...this can be achieved with being slightly more generous with the miniscule portion. It smacks of being exploitative/hyped up. The 'less is more' i.e. that you appreciate it better for being a couple of forkfuls! Ha! I dislike feeling ripped off but I guess you do not feel you are being...(?)
 
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Nouvelle cuisine has pretty well disappeared I think. It was a trend in the 70's as I recall. But I think these days the best aspects of that style have informed some of the best Chefs
Yes it's said to be now integrated into mainstream cookery.
 
To not destroy great ingredients could be done by a relatively simple (qualified) chef. I expect most restaurants to be above what I can cook at home i.e. when it doesn't involve just a simple cut of meat, conventionally prepared.

Whilst I applaud nouvelle cuisine for its lighter, more delicate and fresher approach...this can be achieved with being slightly more generous with the miniscule portion. It smacks of being exploitative/hyped up. The 'less is more' i.e. that you appreciate it better for being a couple of forkfuls! Ha! I dislike feeling ripped off but I guess you do not feel you are being...(?)

Well, I could argue that if a restaurant seeks to impress its clientelle with the size of its portions it is usually a fairly reliable indicator that it uses low quality ingredients and treats them with all the respect they deserve.
 
Well, I could argue that if a restaurant seeks to impress its clientelle with the size of its portions it is usually a fairly reliable indicator that it uses low quality ingredients and treats them with all the respect they deserve.
Well, this is taking my point to the other extreme isn't it? I was just advocating a slightly more generous portion for the money... Each to their own.
 
So...does this mean the wedding's off?
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No that is not my perspective either. I recall one of the top chefs making the point that a significant part of being a genuinely great chef is taking really great ingredients and simply not destroying them. Certainly, if I am going into a restaurant to eat an expensive meal, I expect to be served something that I couldn't have done myself.
This is a very interesting subject, with many varied aspects. To many people eating out is viewed as an overall experience, with food quality being only part of that. This explains the survival of restaurants who turn out mediocre (sometimes truly appalling) food - points can be scored by an interesting menu, attentive staff, oak beams and roaring fire, or simply the social experience. To those of us who have a genuine passion for food this can be rather frustrating. Our local village pub restaurant used to be quite good, but since a change of owner and chef now struggles with food quality. Yet it remains popular because it's a beautifully restored Elizabethan building, has fantastic waiting on staff and is a 'place to be seen'. We have often walked back from a pretty poor, but over priced meal, thinking that we could have done far better food at home at a fraction of the cost. Part of this is that most things that we would have chosen off the menu are things that we probably have cooked at home. Then again, if you are prepared to pay for Michelin star food then I think you can rightfully expect something very special, not only because of the skills of the chef, but also because the dish is way beyond anything you are likely to attempt at home. The competent home cook has two big advantages - not having the same budgetary constraints and not having the same time pressures as a commercial chef.
 
not having the same budgetary constraints

That, I think is the key point that is being missed by some. The truth of most, if not all, shall we say 'standard' quality restaurants is that the food is a loss leader. They make their profit entirely in the drink.What is the famous statistic? - 50%, I think it is, of new restaurants close within a year. And it is very noticeable that the ones that survive for significant lengths of time do tend to be the type that pack 'em in in large numbers and sell it cheap. There have been some very good restaurants near to me that have survived for longer than that, but very few seem to stay open longer than five years. That doesn't necessarily mean that they go out of business as such, just that the owners / chefs eventually run out of the drive necessary to keep it going. The truth, even for the very top chefs, is that you don't go into that business to get rich. You have to have a passion for it and you have to be prepared to make huge sacrifices for it. If you are lucky enough to experience some of the things they produce - and the equal economic reality is that many of us just can't afford it - the one thing that is definitely not the case is that you are being ripped off. Even at those high prices.
 
We have one restaurant here, that is supposed to be fantastic. Oh it was back in the late 70's.
I have eaten there a couple of times in recent years. It was nothing to write home about and they accidentally got a jalapeño in my steak. I could have understood that if the restaurant had been busy, but it was not crowded at all. I think each of the 4 waitresses had one table.
The only thing going for it is the name.
But then again people here still flock to a restaurant that had a salmonella outbreak.
Makes no sense to me.
 
Where I live, there is no restaurant that makes anything that I can't make, except for pressure fried chicken. That being said, I can usually make what I want better that can the local restaurants. It's not that I'm that great, it's that they are that mediocre.

Seeeeeeeeya; Chief Longwind
"There is no success that justifies failure within the home."
 
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