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Can the World's Best Chef Save Spanish Tourism?

Filed under: Dining

Chef Ferrán Adrià, the innovative visionary behind the strange and wondrous cuisine of El Bulli, a restaurant widely reputed to offer one of the most amazing dining experiences in the world, has a new job. The chef has been charged with helping draw tourists to Spain. Tourism is a big part of Spain's economy but like other destinations it has seen visitor numbers decline. So the tourism industry is calling out the big guns. Adria will team up with the Esade Business School in Barcelona and La Caixa, the savings bank, to head the Tourism Management and Gastronomy School. Adrià will give classes one week each year teaching innovation and creativity to hospitality business owners. The London TImes reports that Adrià has met José Luis Rodríguez, the Spanish Prime Minister, to ask for €14 million to back the project which should begin next year.

World's Best Chef To Open A Pizza Place

Filed under: Dining

ferran adria
What does the chef at the world's best restaurant do for an encore? How about opening a pizza joint? The LA Times reports that El Bulli chef, Ferran Adria has been in Italy studying pizza making. it's quite a change in direction for a man famous for his devotion to molecular gastronomy. But Adira has promised that his planned pizza restaurant in Barcelona, Spain will be a straightforward affair, no foams, no liquid nitrogen or strange balls of flavor, just your basic pizza pie.

Some Italian chefs are skeptical about the pizza skills of Ferran Adria and his pastry chef brother Alberto feeling that pizzamaking is more of a calling than something you can just quickly pick up. But for the Adrias the new planned venture offers a chance to cook for far more people than the small amount who eat at El Bulli each year. Let's just hope we don't see Adria frozen pizzas in the market in a few years right next to the Wolfgang Puck boxes.

El Bulli Is The Top Restaurant Yet Again

Filed under: Dining

ferran adria
Once again the molecular gastronomy stylings of chef Ferran Adria have pushed Spanish restaurant El Bulli to the top of another world's best restaurants list. El Bulli won the top slot in the San Pellegrino World's 50 Best Restaurants 2009. The list is the result of a poll of more than 800 chefs, critics managers and others done for Restaurant Magazine.

According to the AFP, Adria is quoted as saying it was an important night for Spain (in addition to El Bulli, two other Spanish restaurants, Mugaritz and El Celler de Can Roca were in the top five). He dedicated his award to Heston Blumenthal, whose restaurant, The Fat Duck was in the second position. Adria praised Blumenthal for his honesty. Blumenthal closed his restaurant briefly over a potential food poisoning scare earlier this year. Restaurants in the top ten from the U.S. were Thomas Keller's Per Se and Grant Achtaz's Alinea in the US.

Off the list this year was Gordon Ramsay's flagship London restaurant. Bloomberg reports that it was in 13th place last year but didn't even crack the top 100 for 2009. He did squeak onto the list in slot 91 with his restaurant Maze.

El Bulli is Still the World's Best Restaurant

Filed under: Dining


What does it take to be the best restaurant in the world? Ask El Bulli, who holds the honor for the second year in a row according to Restaurant magazine's ranking of the top 50. Last year El Bulli squeezed out Fat Duck for the top spot, and this year all top six spots remain the same. The United States made a respectable showing also, with two restaurants in the top 10: The French Laundry and Per Se, and among others Alinea in Chicago made the list for the first time this year at #36.

Faces by Ferran Adria

Filed under: Dining

Faces is the collection of kitchen tools and tableware designed for the most famous molecular gastronomist, the man who heads up the best restaurant in the world, Ferran Adria. The basic cutlery (pictured) is elegant, with tattooed handles and sinuous curves. The shell-like Egg bowl collection is used both for serving and for work in the kitchen, depending on size, while the rest of the serving pieces, primarily made of stainless steel, glass and even leather, are unlike anything you'll find anywhere else. For the truly dedicated home chef, you can even pick up some of the unique spoons, skewers and tongs that all serve as eating implements at el Bulli itself. Prices run from $48 to $392 for various pieces of the collection.

El Bulli Named The World's Best Restaurant

Filed under: Dining

What are the 20 best restaurants in the world? According to Restaurant magazine, El Bulli, Ferran Adria's iconic restaurant in northern Spain is now top on the list, upsetting last year's winner the U.K.'s Fat Duck (shown here), which is now number two, where El Bulli was last year. Both restaurants specialize in experimental cuisine. French Laundry was tops in the U.S. at number three four and Thomas Keller's New York restaurant Per Se ranked eighth.

1. El Bulli (Spain)
2. The Fat Duck (U.K.)
3. Pierre Gagnaire (France)
4. French Laundry (U.S.)
5. Tetsuya's (Australia)
6. Bras (France)
7. Restaurant le Louis XV (Monaco)
8. Per Se (U.S.)
9. Restaurant Arzak (Spain)
10. Mugaritz (Spain)
11. Can Fabes (Spain)
12. Nobu (U.K.)
13. Gambero Rosso (Italy)
14. Gordon Ramsay Royal Hospital Road (U.K.)
15. Restaurant Alain Ducasse (France)
16. Jean Georges (U.S., New York)
17. Le Cinq (France)
18. Daniel (U.S., New York)
19. Oud Sluis (Netherlands)
20. Chez Panisse (U.S.)


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