Rockstar chef Albert Roux: 'Food, unfortunately, has become fashionable'

During my time at the Langham Food and Wine Festival in Hong Kong, I had left behind all of Manila giddy with anticipation, swooning over Maroon 5’s hottie Adam Levine.

I myself was in the same boat, only I was as anxious as a teenage girl to meet my own food rock star, Albert Roux. He perhaps doesn’t have the beefy muscles nor the same vocal chops as the pop star, but he can definitely simmer a piece of beef to tender abandon and roast the best veal chops in town.

He may not have his own TV show or flashy marketing ploys like most fancy restos do now, but Albert Roux is a serious pioneer in the fine dining industry. The French-born Roux moved to the UK in his youth to apprentice in the kitchen and continued to be one of the most celebrated chefs of our time, being the very first chef ever in the UK to earn a Michelin star, then the first to earn three stars for his restaurant Le Gavroche. That was back in the day before the Internet, food bloggers, celebrity chefs and the like. At that time word of your excellence had to travel many mouths and kilometers to garner world respect. Apart from his stars he also has a Legion d’Honneur and is part of the Order of the British Empire. Le Gavroche was Queen Elizabeth’s favorite restaurant.

I was waiting impatiently for a month to try his food. You see, contrary to other famous chefs, Albert Roux almost never ventures out of his own kitchen. To do a special dinner away from home is really a rare occasion. He was familiar to the Langham group, however, as he runs a restaurant for them at The Landau in London. “I’m not in a strange country here we have a partnership and I like to insist on the word ‘partnership,’” Roux says. “It has worked extremely well, it’s an extremely quality-driven product, it has to return money with capital, which I have no problem with, but not at the cost of quality. And that’s what I like with the group. Also, it’s a long-term group not driven by short-term gain. Always I will be here.”

Crab with caviar and delicate lemony cream sauce and chive oil

The gala dinner paired with Louis Jadot Burgundy wines was a serious treat. I’m not much of a terrine fan but his pressed pigeon, pigeon breast and foie gras terrine had to be one of the most spectacular things I’ve ever eaten. The tender flesh, the tangy and sweet cabbage, velvety, barely cooked foie gras, layers of pure shaved black truffle highlighted by this unctuous, luxurious cream sauce that had a lemony tang and flecks of heady Perigord truffles. I wiped my plate clean, using my finger to wipe up every little bit left on my plate.

A man of restraint yet surprising frankness, Roux is someone who is traditional in every sense but open-minded, a pragmatic entrepreneur yet a wistful romantic, English by serious adoption and French in his ways. Here’s an inside look into a fascinating icon in the food industry.

THE PHILIPPINE STAR: Your father was a charcutier (pork butcher) in the Loire, so I’m sure you were surrounded by wonderful food with your brother. Share some of your earliest food memories and your defining aha moment.

ALBERT ROUX: Peeling onions on Thursdays, which was the day that the pig was killed for the black pudding or boudin noir, and that’s what we would have for dinner.

Drop-dead gorgeous: Roux’s terrine has layers of black truffle, velvety, barely cooked foie gras, sweet poached cabbage, rich pigeon meat, and that beautiful sauce.sauce and chive oil

At 14 when you left priesthood training, did you end up in the kitchen by chance?

It was my second choice.

Back in the day, people had to work their way up the culinary ladder, starting young and doing all the hard work for years before even being called a chef. How do you feel about these young guns who call themselves chefs straight out of culinary school?

I don’t criticize. Life is an evolution, I believe, in the old days. In my time I was 10 years old when I started learning. One doesn’t learn the basics in cooking. Some cannot cook or fry an egg properly. Before building your house you have to dig and build your foundations. There is a lack of foundation and a lack of learning pastry. Before cooking you should learn the art of pastry. It’s a mystery. It’s chemistry. It shows you precision, teaches you to please the eyes. When I see something beautiful it revives the appetite.

Milk-fed veal in a porcini jus

You’ve trained quite a few famous names like Gordon Ramsay and Marco Pierre White. How do you feel about celebrity chefs, TV, and all the hoohah outside the kitchen? Can a chef really run five or six restaurants to his name?

Many of the Michelin UK chefs have been to our doors or have been taught by chefs who’ve done their apprenticeship with us. Many are fantastic chefs. “Celebrity chef” just means you’re not shy with the camera. Others don’t know much about cooking, they’re just flamboyant, and come across nicely on the box. If it wasn’t for the box you wouldn’t know them. If they worked in a restaurant they wouldn’t be able to work, for sure. But they earn very well.

Some are good chefs but there is a problem, though, to that. If I go to the opera and bought tickets to see Pavarotti and he won’t be there, only his number two, even if he sings well enough it’s not quite the same. These people are never in their restaurants or very rarely, but it hasn’t stopped them from being successful. Gordon Ramsay, for example, has this Irish lady, Claire, who is so fantastic you won’t even know he isn’t there.

How was it working so closely with your brother, Michel Roux?

Strenuous, to say the least. Quite interesting to notice what love does. Love seems to cement everything that appears to be wrong. And there is much love between my brother and myself. I was vitally important for him but there was that cession. His ambition — I’m an entrepreneur, he is not — to his regret having to stay with me all the time in one restaurant, two brothers, no women, no wives, all for business, so in a way there was a big deception to him. It was quite interesting to see that six years after his cession he managed on his own to get three-star Michelin in Waterside Inn.  He achieved something on his own.

How important is the role of sauces in fine cuisine? Some say it’s the pillar of French cuisine.

Sauces can masquerade, so to speak, quite a lot of things. Not unlike a woman, when she’s not entirely pretty she would put a lot of things on her face, so she is hiding.  That’s the role of sauces, but the ultimate thing is the main piece — chicken or beef. You cannot lie if it is a bad piece, it’s a bad piece. It will remain like this. It will be more palatable, yes, because of the sauce, but it will never be a top piece of meat.

Many people associate fine dining with flashy, expensive items, a very posh, upscale, showy environment. Do they really grasp what good food is about?

There is a lot of truth in what you say, we have embraced in the UK very much the American system, you open a restaurant, big article in the newspaper, full for six months and empty six months after. The crowd goes away to another one, the next one. The restaurant is successful today like us: three months fully booked for lunch, two weeks fully booked for dinner. That’s great but there are one-star, two-star Michelin restaurants that have gone bust. So yes, food, unfortunately, has become fashionable. Fashion — it should never be fashion. There is also the mixing because of the access of new product we have not had before, the access of traveling, the mixing of tastes, which I dislike immensely.

Fusion?

Ah! This is abominable!  I’m a great lover of Chinese food, but I like pure Chinese food. I don’t want Chinese food mixed with French food, I want pure Chinese food.  Fusion is confusion. Fusion creates confusion.

Sounds like Confucius!

Now there is also very much the over-decorating of plates. Over, over, over... it should not be! With eight or nine, sometimes I count 10 different items on the plate. That should not be. I’ll never do more than three items to complement the main piece. Should not. Because so many hands have touched that food. It will arrive cold to the table! It should not be hot-hot. Food should never be hot-hot, it should be warm. And most of the time it doesn’t enhance the main product. The idea of garnishing is to lift up the main product, not to kill it.

One piece and two, three things, and that’s it.

Favorite Asian dish?

I like everything in the Chinese food, anything Chinese I will try. The Chinese dinner last night was absolutely fantastic. My main one was the eel. Ah! Absolutely superb.

Southeast Asian food?

I don’t like Thai cuisine. I don’t like — I hate — cilantro! I cannot bear cilantro! It makes me sick. I have an aversion… it’s the only food I cannot stand. I don’t like Indian food; to me it’s too spicy. I like Japanese food, Italian and I certainly like Spanish food, the northern part of Spain: Catalan, Basque.

Favorite cheese?

Well, if I had to choose one, it would be Comté, you put it in your mouth and it’s like chocolate, it melts gently, long… longevity, it stays. It is also extremely good to eat and drink with white wine or light red. To me it is the king of cheese, but that is my taste. I like also goat cheese but Comté would be my number one.

Favorite wine and food pairing? Perfect moment?

Comté and white wine. A glass of Meursault or Sancerre.

Favorite ingredients you can’t live without?

Butter and cream.

Most overused ingredient nowadays? One you don’t like?

Beetroot and cilantro. Beetroot in England, they’ve gone beetroot bazooka, they’ve gone mad. Mad! You got beetroot for canapé, beetroot for starter, beetroot for main course, ice cream made of beetroot, beetroot everywhere!

In the winter Jerusalem artichokes, which were really as a child we used to feed to the pig... and they use that extensively.

Any dirty little secrets or fast-food indulgences? 

McDonald’s. McDonald’s is a very constant product and extremely clean product, so I do not think of going to McDonald’s, but if I’m in a railway station and my train is delayed, I want to eat something, I’ll go to McDo and I’ll enjoy it.

What do you order?

A Big Mac full of cheese, bacon… the chips are fantastic, they’re not greasy, crispy… I love it. It’s a good product. The beef is superb.

When it’s cold and rainy and you’re feeling a bit down, what do you like to eat and cook and why?

I never feel down. It’s mind over matter.

Comfort food?

A soup. A thick soup. Especially in the winter coupled with classical music, not too loud, with my dog by my feet, that’s very important. And after finishing my soup I’ll indulge in whiskey, malt. Not too peaty, some Scottish whiskeys are too peaty. Something mellow. And apartales. Cigar. Ah, then heaven is open!