ALAIN PASSARD
LEFT Table decor at Arpège.
« ‘passport’ of the ingredients, the know-how of the producer and the traceability of the products. “This style of cooking does, of course, come with its own difficulties and can be testing at times, but there is nothing without hard work and passion. Each day is the first day! “Luckily for me, nowadays diners tend to reduce the amount of meat on their plates to add more vegetables, which may be a reason why the restaurant is still so successful! Everything evolves, and you must evolve with it. At the time I chose to focus on vegetables it was a natural evolution in gastronomy for me, a purely personal choice, but as with so many things it turns out that veg-centric has become trendy. Guests used to come to Arpège to taste a good piece of meat; now they come to taste good vegetables. “I think the vegetable ‘trend’ will continue, which is a good thing, but for me the real trend would be respecting nature and seasonality. This would be the only way to achieve true harmony and protect the future of food.”
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“With vegetables, you have so many different colours and textures you can almost make a painting on the plate. Interestingly, I find that even my hand works differently with vegetables: it is always in motion, like a conductor of music.”