Chef's Table: France (2016) s01e04 Episode Script

Two frogs à la carte.
The eel
Are you doing a good job with the eel?
It's for Marc.
We won't cut it in half.
We'll leave it whole.
I was born in 1958.
And the Salmon and Sorrel was created
by my father and uncle in 1962.
Salmon and Sorrel is the dish that made
the reputation of my father's restaurant.
It changed French cuisine.
My entire childhood,
I saw Salmon and Sorrel again and again.
Every family get together
we would have Salmon and Sorrel.
Then I started working with my father.
Clients would greet me by asking,
"How is Pierre?"
I felt the shadow of the past.
For 15 years I was frustrated.
There is the weight of history
in this restaurant
that has had three Michelin stars
for 47 years.
I was cooking Salmon and Sorrel every day.
This is a dish
that was innovative in its time.
But my vision is turned
towards the future.
I needed to free myself from the past.
And then, when my dad gave me
the opportunity to be
in charge of the kitchen,
I decided
no more Salmon and Sorrel
in the restaurant.
We have an order, à la carte.
One giardiniera,
one eel with saltimbocca, two frogs.
Will follow with two spicy lamb, please.
Oui.
We will have at least one more plate.
Oui.
- Are the Robelins here yet?
- No, Chef.
- Let's give them a beautiful service.
- Yes, Chef.
Maison Troisgros
was established in 1930.
This restaurant,
along with Maison Bocuse,
has the longest record in France
for three Michelin stars.
Between 1960 and 1970,
Maison Troisgros launched
what was known as nouvelle cuisine
with their Salmon and Sorrel,
which earned it the title
Best Restaurant in the World.
Many generations of the Troisgros family
have lived above the restaurant.
But today,
when you enter Maison Troisgros,
you are entering a universe
that belongs to Michel Troisgros.
He is working in the kitchen
Michel is someone of immense curiosity
which pushes him to discover
other cultures and flavors,
all of which he puts into his cuisine.
You can't anticipate
how moved you'll be by Michel's cuisine.
Everything is so small and fragile,
but when you eat it,
there is this intoxicating power.
But it's not just about his cuisine.
It's also a story
about what we are able to do
when faced with our doubts, our fears,
in order to move past
what our parents did.
This is incredible!
Dad! Dad!
He's gotta come see this!
No, wait.
I started without you.
Let's make a broccoli white truffle dish.
When I start a dish,
the idea comes from a desire
to work with a product.
A dish of broccoli
with anchovies and mushrooms,
that would be really good.
I think we can only innovate
with knowledge.
We'll go see Gunter,
but I don't know what he has.
- Gunter.
- Gunter.
Gunter.
It's simple to design a cuisine
which is interesting and personal.
- The one I tried was delicious.
- Very good.
But when there is no knowledge,
everything else is meaningless.
Oh, wow!
The aroma!
They're not ripe yet.
A few years ago,
I was at a restaurant in Kanazawa, Japan,
and I enjoyed eel which was skewered
and then grilled on only one side.
I discovered a pleasure
in the crunchiness of the eel.
I wanted to recreate that.
Let's go.
The raw ingredient drives the research.
First, taste the eel for what it is.
Try it with and without its skin.
With and without the fat.
With and without the bones.
In pieces or filleted.
Skewered on its length or its width.
I never know how many people
will work on it.
maybe even my pastry chef.
And all of this analysis
will lead me to draw conclusions
and make a choice
without the guarantee of results.
But all the mistakes and errors,
they push me to keep going and going.
I do not give up.
I'm not satisfied
until we come up with a new dish.
And that gives me energy every day.
When a customer arrives
at Maison Troisgros,
we invite them into our kitchen.
For us, it's part of a ritual.
And we know how much
it pleases the customer.
But also, we're telling a story.
to tell the history of French cuisine
and Maison Troisgros.
My grandfather was a restaurateur.
He was bold, ambitious, a visionary.
In 1930, he borrowed money
and bought this restaurant.
It was a hotel and a restaurant.
Since there was a train station close by,
customers could arrive by train
and walk across the street
to the restaurant.
During that time, inns started
becoming very popular restaurants
to the point that these restaurants
were the first ones
to become internationally known.
Jean-Baptiste was the first
to begin the legacy.
His sons, Pierre and Jean Troisgros,
took over for Jean-Baptiste.
Pierre and Jean,
with their different personalities
made Maison Troisgros one of the most
renowned restaurants on the planet.
In the mid-1950s, the symbol
of the heaviness of French cuisine
was cooking everything
until it became brown.
Vegetables were overcooked.
No bright colors at all.
That was the standard.
Heavy dishes were the way.
In 1960,
my brother and I were on vacation
in the Basque Country
during salmon season.
The Basque people eat salmon undercooked.
We realized that when salmon
is undercooked,
it keeps all the freshness and smoothness.
We decided to cook the fish
for just a few seconds in a pan.
We used a light sauce,
which was new and different.
We were adventurers
trying to discover a new style.
But it was quite impossible to serve
an undercooked fish in France.
Clients would send it back and say,
"Learn your job! Cook this fish!"
One day, Mr. Courtine,
a famous journalist at Le Monde,
came into the restaurant with my father.
We told them that we had a new dish
Salmon and Sorrel.
And in Le Monde,
Mr. Courtine titled his story
about the dish, "Finally, a Smart Salmon!"
And "smart salmon" attracted many people.
Everyone wanted to know why it was smart.
That was the beginning of my career.
This dish became symbolic
of French cuisine.
Society was evolving.
There was a need to break with
some French culinary traditions.
And Pierre and Jean Troisgros
were among the first to understand this.
Salmon and Sorrel ended up getting
this restaurant three stars.
In the '60s and '70s,
the Troisgros brothers were celebrities.
It's a job I wouldn't change.
I didn't choose this job.
My father imposed it on me.
There would be no question.
I was 14 and my dad said,
"You and your brother will be cooks."
Jean was the serious one.
He spent his time in the kitchen.
Pierre was a jovial guy.
He liked to be out
talking to the customers.
And the two worked together harmoniously.
People came from all over the country
and the world
to feast and celebrate.
I grew up with my entire family
living above the kitchen.
There was my mother,
my father, my uncle and my aunt.
Also my grandfather, Jean-Baptiste,
and my grandmother
and five of us children
all lived above the kitchen.
Just the family took up
half the rooms in the hotel.
When we were kids,
the wine cellar offered us
a labyrinth of possibilities.
We would play hide and seek.
The others could always be found,
but not me.
My brother, sister and cousins
would move onto another game,
but I would still be there.
I remember the smells and the sounds
of the kitchen.
I could hear the intensity, the stress,
the emotion that would burst forth.
I was sure I wanted
to devote my life to cooking.
Mmm It seduced me.
We're building a new restaurant
which is not the same
as the one in Roanne.
Yes, but at the same time,
we follow the natural shape
of the property, along its length.
Come here, look!
There I'm entering the kitchen, right?
Over there is the champagne cellar.
There's the wine cellar.
And we'll put up a porch roof
above this door.
Marie-Pierre and I met
when we were in the same class
at culinary school.
I was 16 and she was 17.
I was too young for her.
She was brilliant in class and I wasn't.
- Daniel, will we see nature?
- In nature?
Besides cooking classes,
I was not a genius
in accounting, math classes.
I didn't take school seriously.
Marie-Pierre and I liked each other
right away.
I think my motorbike helped me
in seducing her.
I think that was it.
In school, Marie-Pierre worked
on the weekends to pay her school fees.
She had no choice
because her parents did not help her
like mine were helping me.
I liked her force of character.
That helped me grow up.
I stopped being lazy
and started taking school seriously.
I worked very hard every day
to improve my schoolwork.
Without Marie-Pierre, I don't think
I would have made it this far.
She opened my eyes
to the world beyond Roanne.
After graduating culinary school,
Marie-Pierre and I traveled
the world together.
First we traveled across France,
where I met great chefs.
And then we left France
and traveled across Europe and Japan.
I had just returned from a trip to Italy
where I was inspired by Fontana,
the painter.
He had this style of contrast
with textures and colors.
And so, I wanted to create a dish
that contrasts truffle with milk.
It is very hard to make a dish
with just two ingredients.
A great dish is recognized
by its simplicity.
the milk and its softness,
and its opposite, the truffle,
which has an earthy and powerful taste.
But taste complements
what the eye sees.
When I served it for the first time,
at the table,
I lacerated the truffle immediately.
It opens up immediately
and the black color is visible.
It was surprising.
At the moment
that I sliced through with the knife,
the contrast of the white milk
and the black truffle
made me think of Fontana's work.
The world fascinates me.
Over the years, I came to realize
that traveling with Marie-Pierre
had become necessary.
It enriches me
and inspires me to re-invent my cuisine.
In the winter of 1983,
Marie-Pierre and I were back in Roanne.
We were getting ready to open a restaurant
in Sydney, Australia.
I already had my Australian visa
and we had a place to live.
And then my uncle Jean died
on a tennis court.
My father was stunned
by the unexpected events.
Jean was only 57.
It was the end of the story
of the Troisgros brothers.
The clients and the media were doubtful
about the future of the restaurant.
Even with my father still there.
They said, "With one of the brothers gone,
Maison Troisgros will never be the same."
Claude, my brother,
owned a restaurant in Rio.
Georges, my cousin,
was working in New York.
And I was here.
I never imagined
that we would live in Roanne.
We wanted to get away from here.
We had told ourselves
that nothing is better than freedom.
But somebody needed to help my father.
Michel was right there
when my brother, Jean Troisgros,
passed away.
Michel, out of a real family spirit,
saw that I was alone
and he decided he could help.
After Jean died,
the years went by.
There was the birth of Marion,
our eldest daughter,
And I was working under my father.
During these years,
I had disagreements with my father,
not only in the kitchen,
but also about my position
in the restaurant, about its future.
The things he was for, I was against,
and the things I was for, he was against.
We didn't have the same goals or tastes.
He wanted me to be like him.
And I'm not like him.
It's from yesterday.
And these are the two from today.
Well, we'll figure out
something to do with it.
Okay, so let's try that.
Agreed.
Let's go.
This restaurant was all about
a time that had passed by.
Marie-Pierre and I, we had moments
of doubt where we wanted to leave.
It was 1995.
My father was close to 70.
We'd been there 13 years.
I was almost 40.
It was time that we took charge
of the restaurant.
We told ourselves,
"We are grown-ups
and we're keeping the legacy."
That was when we said out loud
that we either take over
or we are leaving.
Passing the torch is not easy
because there is always someone
who wants to come in
and there's someone else
who doesn't want to go.
My father thought
it was too early to leave.
He had to close the book
of his professional journey.
For an artist to withdraw from the scene
is a difficult thing.
What's the use of caramelizing it?
Because I think it's still too thick.
Michel Troisgros
had just taken over the restaurant,
and he was in front of a blank page.
"What am I going to do?
Should I revolutionize the restaurant?
Should I be true to myself?"
The pear, the quince, the ginger
and the sesame go well together.
There was pressure from Michelin
and from the customers.
By making any small changes,
he would be
in danger of losing three stars.
Yes, it's very good.
From the moment
my father retired,
I wanted to do something different.
I was very hesitant, very afraid.
I was constantly reminded
of the weight of the past.
It wasn't just about fried frog legs,
like back in the day.
It wasn't about escargot
with garlic butter.
I needed to scare myself a little bit.
In order to find
my personality as a chef
I had to leave my past behind
and break free from the shackles
of my family's legacy.
So I removed
Salmon and Sorrel from the menu.
I got reprimanded by the customers,
saying, "You can't touch this."
"It's sacred!"
"Michel doesn't understand anything."
"He's spitting on history."
I heard it all.
Customers were not ready for the change.
I had to dive into the deep end
and see what I had in me.
- Are you adding a little more?
- What?
- Are you adding a bit more salt?
- No.
Is that enough?
Uh
A little chunk like this.
But you know, by stirring,
I can get you some.
When I was 14 or 15,
I wanted to work in any other field
besides cuisine.
Not because I did not like cooking,
but because I was getting tired
of the same old lecture.
Everyone was always saying
how I would be a chef like my father.
I wanted to work in the music industry,
despite the fact that I had
no prior knowledge of it.
And I ended up getting hired
as a sound engineer.
It didn't take me long
to realize that I didn't like it.
The environment was not my thing.
I started questioning my future.
I was also working part-time
at the restaurant
just to make myself some pocket money
to go to the movies, buy myself a bicycle.
I felt something comforting
in the kitchen.
My father asked,
"Do you think you would like to take on
more responsibilities with us?"
And I wanted to.
I decided that all I wanted was
to be in the kitchen.
Considering the fact that I was born
in a culinary environment
it was inevitable.
Can you give us
some space to work, please?
What are you thinking about?
I was thinking we could do something
like when we did white truffle broccoli.
And replace the white truffle.
Taking over a restaurant
is not easy.
There was less coverage
in the media and it wasn't very busy.
But Michel had the urge to rise up,
beyond the past.
They're nice, very firm.
Anchovies?
- Like this?
- Yes.
During the years 1997, 1998,
I put myself to work.
I was having fun creating
developing, taking risks.
For example, Japan had infiltrated me.
With my dish of warm oysters,
I wanted to combine sushi rice
with a broth with vinegar
to give it an interesting acidity.
This was very different
from French cuisine.
This was different
from the cooking of my father.
It was one of the first dishes
that helped me move forward.
The dishes that I was designing
had a taste of somewhere else.
It was as if someone from here went away
and then came back even better.
Customers traveled a lot
and were looking
for new and different cuisines.
With time
customers were not coming in
for the old dishes anymore.
The younger customers
were more open to new things.
They were pushing me to go further.
Troisgros was growing
and attracting connoisseurs
from all over the world.
I did it without Salmon and Sorrel.
At that moment, I realized
that the tradition of Troisgros
is to change.
The moment I understood
that this movement towards the future
allows survival,
I didn't hesitate for a second.
It was all about creation and change.
That was my salvation.
In the years 2012, 2013,
He was very curious to see
the Salmon and Sorrel.
He had heard about it,
but had never seen it.
Questions were coming in,
and I sensed
a young new take on this dish,
a dish that, in my eyes,
had been overused.
And I felt the desire
to communicate to my son
the dish that represents
the history of our family.
The moment I put the salmon in a hot pan,
the countdown starts.
I throw my raw sorrel
in the salty cream sauce,
which has a hint of lemon.
- Get ready.
- Yes, Chef.
The salmon is cooked
for 15 seconds on each side.
At the same time,
I finish my cream sauce,
which is a shallot reduction, wine
and smoked fish stock.
- Lemon here.
- Yes, Chef.
This is an immediate dish,
like sushi in Japan.
Sushi seems simple,
and yet nothing is more difficult
to achieve.
Salmon and Sorrel is the same.
I take my warm plate
and put the sauce on it.
Then it's time to add the salmon.
Every second the salmon is
on the plate is important.
The time between the kitchen
and the client's table
should be 12 seconds.
The time between
when the customer gets his plate
and the first bite
should be six to seven seconds.
If this goes wrong,
it is the quality that suffers.
This establishment is distinguished
by the way it constantly renews itself.
Salmon and Sorrel is the emblem
of this renewal.
It serves as a link
between our past and the future.
I don't have the shadow of the past
hanging over me anymore.
It was time for me to make peace with it.
Good.
Uh
- Am I going back on the main road?
- Yes.
Hold on, I don't know if I closed
Okay, let's go.
The Troisgros cuisine has evolved.
But we still have to take
another huge step forward.
I'm always looking towards the future.
I'm always focused on what I can do
to continuously reinvent Maison Troisgros.
By chance,
we discovered an abandoned farm.
Well, almost abandoned.
There were cows there.
And we acquired it.
It will still be Troisgros, but a new one.
We will be leaving Roanne.
Together, we are completely relocating
to a new place.
We will have to redo everything,
reimagine everything
and rebuild everything.
that will undertake all of this.
"Dead leaves must be picked with a shovel.
Memories and regrets, too."
Let's stop here.
Shall we start eating the ham?
Let's eat! Let's eat! Let's eat!
When I think
about this move that we're making,
I can sense
the passing of the torch coming.
to take over the restaurant.
who is also a cook.
to see where he ends up.
My brother is going to spend
his life here.
But I'm too young to say yet.
I want to discover the world.
Just like my father did.
It's too soon to write
that the duo of the Troisgros brothers
will be reborn.
But at the same time, I think about it.
I don't speak it out loud.
The hardest thing
will be to outdo my parents.
It's not over.
This story is not over.