chef Sohocki @ restaurant Gwendolyn

I was watching an old episode of Bizarre Foods :laugh: set in San Antonio... and they featured this guy, Michael Sohocki.

Now, normally on this show they don't really feature too many nice restaurants, that I have seen, but the section was very notable to me, as a matter of fact I rewound and watched the whole episode when I heard Andrew Zimmern say that Sohocki doesn't allow modern tools or techniques in his kitchen, practices locavorism, and is so to speak a pedigreed chef who has spent time living in Japan.

I looked him up online, and he seems like a pretty legit guy on paper.

I've never eaten at his restaurant or worked under him, and as a matter of fact this thread really isn't about him at all.

My question to my fellow cooks and chefs is... what do you think about the policy of not allowing modern tools or techniques in a professional kitchen?

I guess this really strikes at the heart of the new school vs old school debate, different perceptions of what constitutes the foundation of (lets say) Western cooking.

And I don't mean conceptually, as a gimmick to go along with some turn of the century themed dining room.

locavorism

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Oh brother.

I don't come out either way on that kind of stuff. I don't have a solid enough education in "agronomics" to comment on the efficacy of those kind of ideas. I believe, again, that it is part of the concept at Gwendolyn, some throwback to the 1850's. I don't care for the concept, but the thread really isn't about that.

I'm sure his dedication to handmade authenticity and standards of sustainability, while respecting the nuances of the finest fresh locally sourced seasonal organic farm to table heritage heirloom ingredients (and prepared with appreciation for the discipline of the culinary craft), makes the turds I poop out after eating his chow like, waaaay more satisfying.

:razz:

*facepalm* Ok let me rephrase the question. I understand titling the thread as such might have been confusing.

Given that there is some pretty sound apprehension about subjects like (brace yourselves) agricultural sustainability, water security, renewable energy concerns, increasingly stringent environmental regulations, food waste and the rising cost of resources en masse, do you think the style of cooking as espoused and codified by people like Careme and Escoffier (who are still heavily referenced in culinary school textbooks) is truly sustainable? Do you think it is intellectually honest to teach young cooks dogmatic adherence to the archaic operations and codified recipes contained in texts like Guide Culinaire?

Do you think cooking in a professional kitchen will resemble what you were taught, whether by apprenticeship or by attending a culinary school, in 2050?

Simple answer is yes and no

At its fundamental level cooking really hasn't changed much. Yes the gadgets to cook with have gotten better. But ultimately you cut product and apply heat or cooling or a combo of both to finish.

Yes how and where the produce is sought may change. And view the power to run the equipment is sourced may change but i don't think it will change cooking, at least at restaurant level much.

Yeah and I bet he walks to work everyday instead of using his modern equipment to get there.

I personally use both the old and the new as they both have a place in my kitchen. Just another tool in the kit so to speak.

malexthekid said:

At its fundamental level cooking really hasn't changed much. Yes the gadgets to cook with have gotten better. But ultimately you cut product and apply heat or cooling or a combo of both to finish.

Yes how and where the produce is sought may change. And view the power to run the equipment is sourced may change but i don't think it will change cooking, at least at restaurant level much.

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At its fundamental level yes things have not changed, but there are relatively new things being introduced into kitchens from industrial food processing ie. a better understanding and widespread availability of hydrocolloids, vacuum packing, precision (PID) cooking methods, better understanding and widespread availability of pure starches.

All that being said I'd argue that most cooking which is not QSR cannot simply be reduced to cutting product and applying heat or cooling.

spoiledbroth said:

At its fundamental level yes things have not changed, but there are relatively new things being introduced into kitchens from industrial food processing ie. a better understanding and widespread availability of hydrocolloids, vacuum packing, precision (PID) cooking methods, better understanding and widespread availability of pure starches.

All that being said I'd argue that most cooking which is not QSR cannot simply be reduced to cutting product and applying heat or cooling.

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Let us agree to disagree then. Not taking anything away from chefs... I'm an engineer and fundamentally i just add and subtract.

So there are greater techniques involved but they really are all based around preparing produce (cutting), heating and/or cooling in some combination.

So that is where my point comes from. I am not one of those people that would ever imagine dining on a pill or some futuristic rubbish like that. So i don't see any drastic changes in cooking. Just look at how much other industries have changed since escoffier was pubblished yet in the cooking realm his techniques are still widely used

What about controlled fermentation?

Is that to me?

What i said is of course an over simplification but one that is reasonably true with of course exceptions to the rule.

As for it being a "new" thing, semi controlled fermentation has been happening for as long as people have discovered making alcohol. Yes modern technology has helped make the process more scientific and sometimes consistent but it hasn't revolutionised it.

And like i said before. Not taking anything away from chefs. I have mad respect for them. Just to answer the question i don't see significant changes. More just adaption of techniques to suit be technology where suited.

I thought in 20 years we will all be eating soylent green....

:cook:

But seriously I do think popular foods will change in the future. Cutting, applying heat, fermenting etc. will likely stay the same. I just hope that fine dining in restaurants (or at home) won't be wiped out by the masses who prefer Lunchables and microwaved factory food.

The basic mechanisms of cooking are the same today as they have always been. The techniques and products by which we apply those mechanisms have changed, and will likely continue to change. New techniques are not inherently superior to older, nor is tradition worthier than modernity. Cooks apply techniques, new or old, to achieve desired outcomes, and it is to their benefit that they can choose from an ever-widening tool kit.

In the time of escoffier a commis came in at the ass crack of dawn and lit a coal fire in the oven. Today I held a cigarette lighter up to a pilot light. Down the street at one of the big hotels a cook rolled a speed rack loaded with plated raw food into a high tech combi oven the size of a closet, inserted a USB key with that had that plate up's program in it, and pulled out fifty plates of ready to eat food. I would say that the food industry has kept up with the changes in others.

I like cooking over open fire. I also like having a decent thermometer.

To the OP: putting limitations in your restaurant is important. It is what gives your restaurant identity.

The guy from Philly with the Israeli restaurant (not Alon, but the guy still in Philly, the restaurant starts with a Z I think.) mounts all of his sauces with tahini, because in Israel you don't find meat and dairy on the same plate. This makes his food fit in completely with the restaurants identity and totally unique in the city he is in.

When I was at Cochon we asked ourselves is this Southern food when we considered a new item. The restaurant was open for five years before we ran a pasta that wasn't Mac and cheese. And when we did it had cowpeas and braised greens.

We had to think creatively to express the ideas we had inspired by all sorts of food in the context of a regional cuisine and that gave the restaurant identity.

I'm going totally speculative here, never heard of this guy in San Antonio, but he says, man these sous vide short ribs are awesome, how do we do this in the context of our restaurant and market? And comes up with a new and somewhat unique approach to a dish.

Also, being the commis at the ass crack of dawn was M. Pepin's first job, and he's still with us. In one man's career we have gone from coal fire to centrifuges, ice as refrigerant to LN ice cream.

Dardeau said:

Also, being the commis at the ass crack of dawn was M. Pepin's first job, and he's still with us. In one man's career we have gone from coal fire to centrifuges, ice as refrigerant to LN ice cream.

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I would generally say that i agree with you but I don't necessarily call those changes innovation. Just modifications of techniques. All comes down to perspective on change i guess.

I think the biggest change has been automation. Those combi ovens are a thing to behold, I've heard of really big ones where you have dinner for five hundred done all at once with about four cooks and an army of dishwashers. I don't even know if that is cooking at all.

Another big one is the knowledge of microbiology and cultured bacteria, on baking in particular.

You are correct on one thing, at the end of the day you are still making hot things hot, and cold things cold. But you could say the same about say commercial air travel over the same time period. You are still putting people on a plane and flying them to another place. You just do it faster, more automated, safer, and in larger numbers that in 1920 or whenever it was little Jacques was washing lettuces and lighting fires.

Would be interested to try something out of one of those giant combi ovens and see what it is like vs a "properly" cooked steak

Better than you would think. They have those things worked out to a T. You can only put certain combinations of stuff on a plate together, but the stuff doesn't taste bad.

It doesn't taste great either, and I can only imagine how demoralizing it must be to work one.

Dardeau said:

. You can only put certain combinations of stuff on a plate together, but the stuff doesn't taste bad.

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So said Mrs. Swanson...

I suppose I have failed to be tremendously clear in my question, and the question itself is a little vague.

I understand heat is essentially an immutable property in cooking, if you can't heat things up you are heavily limited... but that's not really what I'm asking.

Theoretical: Potable water becomes scarce due to some type of major disaster. Consider cooking in a professional kitchen where all water use is metered (I have seen dishwashing machines which actually do measure the amount of water used like an odometer). Boiling? Stock making? Steaming? Perhaps this is too extreme.

More likely theoretical: Hybrid electric or other alternative fuel vehical technology is not adopted en masse and an equally efficient replacement for fossil fuels are not found. If a shortage of oil occurs or oil production begins dropping, given the cost of transporting produce across the country, the dreaded "locavorism" is now simply the only option for only but the most Elbulli-esque not-for-profit fine dining establishments. Assuming you are not lucky enough to work in one of these establishments, consider working somewhere far from the equator: what kind of food are you cooking? What if you are located thousands and thousands of miles from the nearest farmer growing grains, or the nearest mill, so flour of any sort is a luxuy item. Perhaps these questions simply affect menu options more than anything.

Question: Given the last example of a lack of grain, what if you had plenty of arrowroot starch? Is a veloute a veloute without a roux?

If you consider the methods by which we cook involving heat (boil, steam, saute, broil/bake, fry) they are all tremendously inefficient unless you are a microwave wizard. Now if you take that inefficiency and apply it on a commercial scale (professional kitchen, industrial food processing operations are actually usually pretty efficient) you can see there is a bit of a problem in terms of energy use. If the cost of natural gas or electricity jumps in the future, cooking would presumably change radically and in particular commercial cooking.

Food security is also an increasing issue, and actually if you are paying close attention you will already see alot of chefs like Rene Redzepi talking about this sort of thing. Unfortunately, unlike many specious environmental claims, population growth is simply a fact borne out by relatively simple mathematics and fundamental precepts of biology, and this will affect the supply of food. Whats more, climate change is a real thing and hefty hefty carbon taxation is coming, probably in ways which will make the current environmental levy you see now and again on your reciepts look like a walk in the park. This would lead to a host of relatively staple ingredients being virtually unavailable in many parts of the world under our current model of "agronomics".

There may come a time indeed when we cook with and consume compounds decocted from various crops or livestock in order to reduce the amount of energy expended to move x amount of calories from source to destination as cheaply as possible (carbon taxes, overall energy expendeture). This type of cuisine is envisioned by Herve This in his book Note by Note Cuisine. It is very interesting, though I do not know how palatable the food is, I imagine the first time someone cooked a dish in human history it was pretty god awful.

Aaaaanyway.

Maybe but i doubt it. I can maybe see it where it moves to "locavorism" where you eat what is in season in your area, but that would be adapting what you cook to what is available

"Maybe but I doubt it" ... doubt what? Potable water is always a concern. Renewable energy is always a concern. Fossil fuels, reliance thereupon and availability thereof are always a concern.

The fact is that most of our great grand children will likely live or grow old in a very different world than we will.

So basically you're having a long winded panic attack about the looming food and water shortage?

That's cool man, but most of us come here to, you know, talk about knives and ****.

And our great grandparents lived in a very different world to us.

Technology exists to make potable water availability not a big issue. Reverse osmosis treatment and desalination to name a couple.

If it was to actually become an issue then restaurant cooking is going to be the least of our issues.

maybe I got a different idea than most when seeing the question. wisks rather than immersion blenders.... I've been in a place where a prick sous used those smash choppers for everything. ya know the grid on bottom, place vege ontop and smash with top handle thingy. everything came out mashed and bruised. Had to cut carrot matchsticks and pulled out knife, sous got irritated and said to always use mandolin.... guess it's just a skill thing.

There is a misconception that if you buy your food locally from a small farmer you are doing something good for the environment and in terms of energy expended this is just not true. The energy costs of transporting food , even across the US is a tiny percentage of the total amount of energy consumed to grow/raise our food. Larger farming operations are also much more efficient. Now if you feel better knowing the farmer and his/her practices that's something else. I do think local tastes better - usually, and I like the idea of supporting small farms.
Freakanomics did a podcast that touched on this but I could not find it based upon the titles, however I did find this: http://freakonomics.com/2008/06/09/do-we-really-need-a-few-billion-locavores/

Bill13 said:

There is a misconception that if you buy your food locally from a small farmer you are doing something good for the environment and in terms of energy expended this is just not true. The energy costs of transporting food , even across the US is a tiny percentage of the total amount of energy consumed to grow/raise our food. Larger farming operations are also much more efficient. Now if you feel better knowing the farmer and his/her practices that's something else. I do think local tastes better - usually, and I like the idea of supporting small farms.
Freakanomics did a podcast that touched on this but I could not find it based upon the titles, however I did find this: http://freakonomics.com/2008/06/09/do-we-really-need-a-few-billion-locavores/

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There's a misconception here that I'm talking about environmentalism or making "choices"- not really. I'm asking what people think the future of cooking might look like.

We already knew there would be intelligent people like malexthekid who honestly believe the earth will continue in some state of stasis indefinitely supporting human life in the manner to which we have become accustomed. This is patently incorrect.

SousVideLoca said:

So basically you're having a long winded panic attack about the looming food and water shortage?

That's cool man, but most of us come here to, you know, talk about knives and ****.

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You're incapable of contributing to any sort of intellectual conversation I guess, shouldn't be a surprise considering your handle and the content of every post I've seen you make on this board... "That's cool man," indeed.

I'm not having a "panic attack" about anything, I'm just wondering if, 114 years after guide culinare is written given the changing state of life on earth whether we are really served at all by still using these codifications.

Again, Escoffier has been quoted as having said the roux would be replaced by pure starches once readily available. This never happened. We've not had a great history of being early adopters generally in foodservice, and whats more given our general resistance to change where food and preparation thereof is concerned, there seems in my mind a greater likelihood that subtraction of any of the constants of cooking which I've discussed here would indeed precipitate the end of the restaurant industry as a whole like malexthekid said.

I feel like I've having this conversation with myself though, so **** it.