L’entrée BY FRITZ GUBLER
W
hen I published Great, Grand & Famous Hotels, it was to share my enthusiasm for the world’s great hotels. Now, with Great, Grand & Famous Chefs and Their Signature Dishes, I am returning to my first love, the subject of my earliest training – the world of the chef. While the first book was four years in the making, this book could be said to have taken 40 years, for that’s how long it’s been since I did my chef’s apprenticeship. Since that time, food has been my passion, my religion. Throughout my years in the hospitality industry, travelling the globe professionally, I have had the opportunity to eat the food of many different countries, both local and haute cuisine, which fed my passion, so to speak. As my career advanced, I was able to widen my culinary horizons even further, making pilgrimages to the more famous restaurants, following the chefs of the moment. I have been fortunate to enjoy the food of several of the chefs in this book, and I still have
a long wish list of restaurants not yet visited, signature dishes not yet tasted. Some of the featured chefs have provided meals that have been highlights to me in the past. I will forever remember Anton Mosimann’s mushroom risotto, and the foie gras terrine at Gordon Ramsay’s restaurant at Claridge’s. The famous soufflé Suissesse at Le Gavroche had a texture that is a testimony to an absolute master. At Maison Boulud in Beijing, the chilled salad of Alaskan king crab paired with grapefruit gelée created a perfect balance of flavours. Special mention goes to this book’s one Australian chef, Tetsuya Wakuda, whose newest creation–scallops with foie gras–is a very happy marriage of aromas and textures. Eating baba au rhum at Ducasse’s Jules Verne in the Eiffel Tower, with its panoramic view of Paris, is probably the closest one can get to heaven without dying first. Meeting Heston Blumenthal at the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival makes me determined to visit the Fat Duck in Bray, continuing my pilgrimage to the