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The French Laundry - Yountville
The Fat Duck, High
Street, Bray, Berkshire, UK Yokohama - Milan
Yokohama, Via Gonzaga 4, Milan, Italy
El Bulli - Montjoi
El Bulli, en Cala Montjoi, Roses, Girona, 17480, Spain
L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon - Paris
L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon, Rue de Montalembert, Paris
Nobu - London
Nobu London, 19 Old Park Lane, W1Y 4LB, London, UK
Phileas Fogg - Bruxelles
Spice Market - New York
Spice Market, 403 West 13th Street, NY, USA
Galileo - Sydney
Shun - Milan
Shun, Viale Tunisia 6, Milan, Italy
Tetsuya's - Sydney
Dal Pescatore - Canneto sull'Oglio
Sapa - New York
Sapa, 43-24th St., near Broadway, NY, USA
The Cliff - Barbados
Tad - Rome
Tad, Via del Babuino 155a, Rome, Italy
Aria - Boracay
Aria, D'Mall beach front, Boracy, The Philippines
Jean Georges - Shanghai
Gramercy Tavern - New York
Gramercy Tavern, 42 E 20th St, New York, NY 10003-1300, USA
Felix - Hong Kong
Le Jardin des Sens - Montpellier
Le Jardin des Sens, 11 Avenue Saint-Lazare, 34000, Montpellier, France
Fire Restaurant - Dublin
Fire Restaurant, The mansion House, Dawson Street 2, Dublin, Ireland
Le 3 melarance - Milan
Le 3 melarance, Via Orti 10, Milan, Italy
Public - New York
New York, 210 Elizabeth Street, NY, USA
(source of the article is the website http://www.worldpress.org who reported the rank of the best fifty restaurants in the world and several magazines) |
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| Play the Life! creation - 2005 mail: info@playthelife.com | ||||||
Built in 1890 as a French
Steam Laundry, this rustic two-story stone house is surrounded by a
country garden planted with vintage roses, perennials and seasonal
herbs. The French Laundry Restaurant has an intimate dining room with
17 tables. The dining time is 3-4 hours with three prix-fixed menus to
choose from. Reservations are taken two months in advance to the
calendar date (i.e. Reservations for April 1st are taken February 1st).
The dining Style is a fine dining cuisine while
the cuisine itself is American and French.
The Fat Duck has had its
feathers trimmed and now looks rejuvenated. The overall impression is
of a more chic décor and there can only be general rejoicing that the
journey via the great outdoors for needs of nature has been rendered
but a fond, damp memory – the rain, of course. Within, the pilgrimage
through the rich land of gastronomic development continues. There are
not too many people who could turn cooking into the High Art that it
has become under Heston Blumenthal. In 2004 Fat Duck was awarded three
Michelin Stars, followed in 2005 by the Harpers and Moet Best
Restaurant of the Year outside London Award. This latest phase has
resulted into a procession of small courses with choices available at
the third, fourth and sixth courses only. The majority of those who
experience them speak of the results of this approach with awe.
Meanwhile on the wine list front the credits continue to roll, with
never an indifferent bottle in sight. House wines from £17 are not
cheap, but at least you can trust them. No pipes or cigars in the
dining room.
Oriental
creative cuisine is what is tasted at Yokohama. The dishes belong to
the Japanese gastronomic tradition, but they are proposed with unknown
variations. The special sushi offers two quality of fish, the soba
noodles are tasted with green tea sauce, while the tuna is accompanied
with a warm soy beans salad. The relaxed atmosphere is created by
minimalist furniture and music lounge. It is also possible to reserve
room with tatami for small parties or a big space with tables for
business breakfasts.
A visit to El Bulli
requires a willingness to suspend the reality that eating is a basic
fundamental of life, something we do in order to survive. There is
little about a meal here that bears any relationship to notions of
eating for living. It’s an experience that will give you sensual and
intellectual pleasure, as far removed from eating to live as reading
Kafka is to following a set of instructions on how to program a video
recorder. The connection is there but it’s not immediately obvious. In
a world where too many people struggle to get the calories they need
just to survive, it is a luxury to eat just for the pleasure of a
series of tantalising games, where the satisfaction of hunger doesn’t
seem to have any part in the motivation for preparing and offering the
meal. Once you
accept all that, and it doesn’t take long because from the moment you
arrive it’s so beguiling, then you’re in for a memorable experience,
one which the restaurant staff appear to enjoy as much as the diners.
If you choose the degustation menu, and on a first visit almost
everyone does, you’ll experience some 25 different tastes, each one
memorable and some exquisite.
Getting to El Bulli isn’t
easy. Most people approach it from the direction of Barcelona, which is
about 160 kilometres to the south. However, we were staying in
Collioure, in France, a pretty fishing village surrounded by steep
hills planted with grapes, most of which are destined for making
Banyuls. From Collioure, it is about an hour’s drive on the main road
or a two and a half hour drive on the winding, but breathtaking,
coastal road. If you want to stay nearer, Hostal de La Gavina is highly
recommended. You should also allow time to visit the Museu Dalí in
nearby Figueres. Of all painters, Dalí is the one who springs to mind
when you eat Ferran Adriá’s food and it’s probably no coincidence that
he was born nearby.
We know that it is almost
impossible to get into El Bulli these days due to its current
popularity. If you like the sound of the food experience and can't
secure a booking then there is another option, namely to stay at
Adrià’s first elBullihotel hotel, Hacienda Benazuza, and eat at two
star La Alquería, which features dishes originally created at El Bulli.
Joel Robuchon
has chosen to create his new restaurant at the Pont Royal because he is
an artist committed to authenticity. The simple truth of foods prepared
before your eyes, the purity of juices which enhance, not smother. A
superior wine cellar and an impressive choice of wines served by the
glass, at a comfortable price. Gastronomy has returned to its roots...
Quality, exceptional ingredients, prepared without culinary trickery by
a Virtuoso.
Nobu is the latest
in a succession of stylish oriental restaurants to open in some of
London's major international hotels. For instance, there's the
breathtakingly expensive Oriental at the Dorchester in Park Lane and
the Inn of Happiness at the St James's Court Hotel in Victoria. Nobu
London occupies a whole floor of The Metropolitan, located amongst that
cluster of smart modern hotels at the bottom of Park Lane, and the
restaurant has its own entrance at 19 Old Park Lane. The massive
hit of last year was Vong - short for Jean-Georges Vongerichten - who
followed up his successful New York operation here in London at the
Berkeley Hotel in Knightsbridge. Nobu is short for Nobuyuki Matsuhisa
who also has restaurants in LA and New York and who has used the same
design team as Vong, United Designers, to create another stylish
uncluttered dining space here in London. Nobu has been open now for two
months and when we visited early on a Monday evening the place was
already getting busy. By the time we left just after nine o'clock all
the tables were full, and both the drinks bar and the sushi bar were
packed with happy looking people. We sat at a table overlooking the
park, the sun streamed in through electronically adjusted translucent
blinds. I'm not an expert on Japanese cooking - I've been to those
noisy Teppan-yaki places in New York where they chop and flick food
about with amazing dexterity. Such displays have little to do with real
cooking and I was relieved to find that the emphasis at Nobu was on
restraint rather than vulgar exuberance. Having said that, it is a fun
place to be, with plenty of celebs to spot if you like such diversions.
The atmosphere comes naturally from enthusiasm and enjoyment. There is
a wide choice of many, mostly smallish, dishes. Each one that we
sampled was an intense and harmonious expression of flavours, colours
and textures, elegantly presented on a different ceramic bowl or plate,
none of which would have looked the least out of place in one of the
Oriental galleries in the Victoria and Albert Museum. There were oval
ones, dark green oblong ones, curved translucent blue ones like an open
canoe: a procession of shapes and hues. The waitress are as charming as
a waitress could be, but more than that, they know every detail of each
dish and how it was prepared. You could place yourselves entirely in
their hands and they chose a brilliant combination of dishes, each one
a joyous little surprise. Eating at Nobu London was an immensely
pleasurable experience and I highly recommend a visit. Booking is
essential; tables are turned but the staff are quite discreet and
sensitive abut how they do it. 
The
name of a great traveller, Phileas Fogg (6 rue Van Bemmel), for a
maison d’hotes in which you can breath, thanks to the furniture (rooms
from 85 Euro) coming from all over the world, environment of
interesting trips as those that, habitually Karin, the owner, made. The
building, a traditional house bruxelloise of 1883, perfumes of history,
with native staircases in wood traveled many times a day by Cheops and
Nefer, the dogs of the house. Rue Van Bemmel is a calm road, on the
edge of the Turkish district and close to the Madou metro station. With
the favorable season it can be possible to have the breakfast in the
garden.
This
is the new meeting point of Meatpackmg District where, close to shops
like Alexander McQueen and Stella McCarney, new places for fashion and
design keep opening. The new restaurant Spice Market born from a
Jean-Georges Vongerichten;s idea who was able to mix the Asian cuisine
with the sophisticated need of the newyorker experience. Totally in
Asian style, the restaurant offers to its customers also seven private
small rooms where, like in an hedonistic temple, it can be possible to
taste innovative dishes.
In
the historical heart of Sydney, close to the astronomic observatory,
the restaurant Galileo of the Observatory Hotel (89-113, Kent Street)
boasts a chef of exception: the Japanese Harunobu Inukai. It is he who
invented the dishes balanced between Japanese and French cuisine, in a
unique "fusion" of tastes and of styles as the Spatchcock a la Haru,
grilled volatile served with asparaguses in a crust of salt. The
attached Globe Bar deserves a stop with aperitif, with paintings
performed by artists that accompany James Cook in his exploratory trip
for discover Australia. Menu from 45 Euro.
The
name of the new Shun restaurant in Japanese means season. Here in fact
the ingredients are selected according to freshness and seasonality for
customers. The food, as the oriental tradition teaches, must sweetly
satisfy the vital cycles of the nature in order to be able to transform
itself in energy. As a consequence we find seasonal variations of
sushi, in this local of minimal design, colored in black and metal with
also a water cascade and sparkling lacquers. But the Japanese rigor
spouse in an amazing way with the western creativity, thanks to the
culinary creations of the Brazilian chef Mario. Not to miss: ‘sfiziosi’
gunkan, fresh salmon pulp and eggs, creative pastries with rice rolls
creativi, with weeds, cooked salmon, fresh light cheese, chives and
fish eggs.
Tetsuya Wakuda has
refurbished a heritage-listed site in the city to create what he has
described as his a dream restaurant and what many others have called
Sydney's most unique dining experience. Located at 529 Kent Street,
Sydney, Tetsuya's Restaurant offers private dining rooms for group
bookings and two larger main dining rooms overlooking a Japanese
garden. Tetsuya's cuisine is unique, based on the Japanese philosophy
of natural seasonal flavours, enhanced by classic French technique and
the freshest possible ingredients. It is here on Kent Street, in
Tetsuya's personal upstairs 'Experimentation' kitchen, that Tetsuya
develops his meals in a constant effort to create a new and interesting
culinary experience.
Via Tetsuya's renowned
degustation set menu, diners are offered a frequently changing array of
ten courses. A typical meal could start with a plate of hors d'oevres -
a gazpacho with spiced tomato sorbet , west Australian marron with
asparagus and truffle mayonnaise, tartare of tuna with fresh wasabi,
marinated fillet of trevally with preserved lemon set on sushi rice and
tataki of venison with rosemary and honey. Tetsuya's signature dish
follows, confit of ocean trout served with unpasteurised ocean trout
roe, followed by double cooked de-boned spatchcock with braised daikon
and bread sauce, followed by a grilled fillet of grain fed beef with
sansho & shiitake mushrooms.
Courses are planned to
build upon one another, careful consideration is given to each offering
to ensure that it perfectly compliments the last. This process
culminates in Tetsuya's amazing desserts, including an orange, honey
and black pepper sorbet served prior to a blue cheese bavarois. A meal
could end with early season berries with orange and Grand Marnier jelly
and champagne ice cream, a floating island with vanilla and praline
anglaise and a flourless chocolate cake with a bitter chocolate sorbet
and orange ice cream.
A complete encounter,
Tetsuya's offers one of Sydney's most remarkable wine lists. Tetsuya's
distinctive style can be matched with wines that complement the menu,
available by the glass. 
Every moment of our free
time, holidays included has been spent learning about, trying to
understand and studying the cuisine, customs and traditions of other
countries. This process of studying and appreciating cuisine and
cultures which are different from ours has been fundamental in our
quest to discover our very own style of cooking. In this way many of
the most important French houses such as Bocuse, Troisgros, Haeberlin,
Vergé, Point, Guerard, Pic, and Italian ones such as Cantarelli and
Colombani have shown the way forward. A restaurant is the perfect
balance between yourself, your kitchen, and your guests, all combining
to create a magical whole. The restaurant aims to satisfy a myriad of
emotions and pleasures while at the same time being rigorous, full of
character, peaceful, charming and courteous. One other important factor
which is never forgotten is health. While keeping the principles which
tradition has taught firmly in mind, it also aims to move with the
times. As alimentary and nutritional needs change, so it is the
responsibility of those who cook and receive guests to keep apace with
this constant evolution. This is the idea which the restaurant is built
on.
Sapa
was a name of a vietnamese village, blockahouse French in 1922. Sapa
today is a restaurants that mix the two gastronomic traditions, the
French and the Vietnamese ones, served in a unique dish where both find
space, after having been blended by the chef, Patrice Yeo. She proposes
from the typical French foie gras to the spring rolls with rhubarb jam.
Designed by the multi prized Ayroko Ko, it has a minimal and balanced
style, elegant but fashionable. Preferred spot by vip, it has been
chosen as a location for the shot of a scene of the movie with Bruce
Willis “Perfect Strangers”.
Elegant dining in a
superlative setting, The Cliff is renowned as one of the Caribbean's
most prestigious restaurants. Perched on a cliff overlooking the west
coast Caribbean Sea, this restaurant presents unmatched gourmet dining
and impeccable service in a sensuously romantic setting.
Internationally-renowned Chef Paul Owens and his team of dedicated
chefs innovatively create each dish using only the finest ingredients.
Combine this with The Cliff's first class service and you are
guaranteed a truly memorable experience.
Metropolitan
oasis for sophisticated shopping, antistress therapy against the daily
frenzy, encounter point for light fusion lunch. There are many ways to
define Tad, a new concept store on four levels opened by Marina Coffa
after the success of the twin store in Rome. In the basement there is
the restaurant of Italian tradition with touches of Japanese
gastronomy. At the same floor one can relax with quick beauty treatment
for hair, facial and hands. Then, on the ground floor there are the
furniture and the perfumes of Laura Monatto and Miller Harris requested
among the connoisseurs of essences. The Fashion Atelier is dedicated to
the avant-garde fashion designers, from Issey Miyake to Hussein
Chalayan. The top floor is a crystal box to be used as a space for
exhibition arts, parties and cultural meetings.
The
distinctive aroma of olive oil, seafoods and Feta cheese wafts in the
air with the tropical breeze beckoning visitors to sit down and relax
for a hearty meal. The cooking can very well be mistaken for that of
Mediterranean Italy. Aria's kitchen is the domain of Gino Amodio where
he diligently whips out classic signature dishes from coastal Italy
that have hooked many first-timers, turning them into regular patrons.
Gino gives three good reasons why a visit to Aria should be a part of
every Boracay vacation. "The location, the ambiance, and of course the
cuisine." Aria sits along the beachfront in D' Mall, right at the heart
of the island's commercial district. Easily accessible to shoppers and
beach strollers, the cozy, airy interiors designed by Gil Coscoluella
irresistibly tempts Boracay-goers to lounge and laze around for an
extended breakfast, lunch, or dinner. Among the culinary delights that
have kept people coming back to Aria for more are Gamberoni Alla Greca,
saut‚ed prawns with feta cheese, tomato, and basil; Costolette D'
Angello Alla Rosa Marina, grilled lamb with rosemary flavor; and
Polletto Al Forno, baked chicken with garlic and rosemary and, of
course its salads. In order to entice patrons all year around, Gino
constantly experiments in creating up to four or more new dishes every
week. An indispensable aid for Gino in creating genuine pizza is the
authentic handmade wood-fired oven that was built in the Aria kitchen
by Italian chef Giuseppe Genco. It is one of only two such ovens used
in the country today. Handmade wood-fired ovens, which are widely used
in Italy until today, cook the pizza from the top as opposed to
conventional ovens wherein the cooking heat comes from the bottom. When
putting pastas and main dishes together, Gino sticks mostly to herbs,
vegetables, capers, anchovies, seafood and olive oil. These raw
materials are the basic building blocks of the cuisine abundantly
available in the coastal Mediterranean regions of Italy as well as
Boracay. Aria is the brainchild of radio executive Juan Elizalde in
partnership with Paolo Occhionero, an 18-year veteran in the restaurant
business. Given the mixed local and foreign makeup of the Boracay
population, these entrepreneurs recognized an opportunity to attract
customers through authentic Italian dishes. "The ultimate goal of Aria
is to deliver the highest quality Italian-Mediterranean cuisine on the
island of Boracay while keeping our prices reasonable and competitive
with all establishments on the beachfront," Elizalde concludes.
Jean
George, who is one of the world's most celebrated chefs, opened the
only Jean Georges outside of New York in Shanghai in 2004 bringing
superb French cuisine in a spectacular setting to Shanghai. His
philosophy is simplicity with an emphasis on superior ingredients,
light cuisine using mainly locally products. The interior which was
designed by
world-renowned architect Michael Graves has plush seating, warm colors
and romantic lighting to evoke the splendor of the French influence in
Shanghai. Jean-Georges Vongerichten is a "legend" (Bon Appetit ¨C
2003), one of the "10 Hottest Chefs Alive" (Food & Wine), 4-time award
winner of The James Beard Foundation and 4th Restaurant in the World
(Restaurant Magazine ¨C UK), among other accolades. According to the
International Herald Tribune, his cuisine is "able to lift spirits and
lighten bodies with an ethereal magic touch". Eric Johnson, the chef de
cuisine at Jean-Georges Shanghai, has worked with Vongerichten since
1997, heading up Vongerichten's acclaimed Paris restaurant, Market,
prior to his arrival in Shanghai. He promises: "We intend to present
some of the classics from the New York Jean Georges menu in Shanghai."
To ensure guests select the most suitable wines to accompany their
meal, Jean Georges Shanghai introduces award-winning sommelier Yvonne
Chiong, one of Asia's youngest and only
female sommeliers. The wine cellar at Jean Georges Shanghai holds over
5000 bottles, including some choice selections from Bordeaux, Burgundy
and Alsace ¨C each of them specially selected for their compatibility
with various dishes. 
Danny Meyer surmised that
a Union Square Café with dark wood and draperies couldn't miss. But
busy as it instantly became, something was missing. What it was, it
turns out, was the time it takes for a space to develop its own
personality. Having shed its clonish cues, Tavern has become Meyer's
warmest, most appealing restaurant. An irresistible cunning propels
chef/owner Tom Colicchio's menu, pairing foods folks crave with
elements they usually shy away from. The menu reads like a holiday meal
at the house of a friend who loves to cook almost as much as he loves
to challenge himself and impress others. Not only does each gamble pay
off, but so tickled are diners by their nascent daring that on their
next visit, damned if they don't demand sweetbreads with Jerusalem
artichokes and sea urchin-crabmeat ragout!
Created by world-famous
avant-garde designer Philippe Starck, Felix sits on the 28th floor of
The Peninsula Tower and is Hong Kong's most glamorous dining
experience. Expect inventive Pacific Rim cuisine, exhilarating
interiors and lighting - plus the most incredible sweeping views of the
harbor and Hong Kong's skyline; great for people-watching too. The
small, space-age Felix Bar also draws a glamorous crowd any time from
happy hour to after hours. The dress code is smart
casual.
The cuisine of Languedoc,
like any other Mediterranean cuisine, combines ingredients from land
and sea. Above all, it is high in taste, aromatic, spicy and full of
personality. It is more Spain-orientated than Italy, which is a
reference for the cuisine from Nice and Provence. It is also more based
on sea products, due to the large amount of seafood on the coasts, the
wide sand beaches, the fish specialties and of course the famous salt
of the zone. The knowledge in cooking was built on the greediness, and
specially on memories of the youth. It starts with tastes from home and
gets enriched by different travels abroad. You can make the art of
cooking a continuous research, dare breaking the mould of classical
cooking and look in your environment, your nature, your country, the
whole world or in your own dreams the way to a style in constant
evolution. There's no better place to try the pure sense of the cuisine
of Languedoc.
The
hottest address for one supper is right in the center of Dublin, in
Dawson street. Fire is the central element of Fire Restaurant, opened
in dance room of Mansion House, a palace that from nearly 300 years is
the residence of the mayor of Dublin. The kitchen is in open view and
from the big firewood oven come out not only meats and fish dishes but
also breads and focacce of Mediterranean inspiration ones. Saturday
morning the appointment is with the jazz brunch, before facing the
‘tour de force’ of shopping.
The
name derives from one fable of Carlo Gozzi. In via Orti, ‘high
gastronomic street’ of Milan, a new wine restaurant bar of a sober and
elegant atmosphere. The ‘3 melarance is a restaurant, bar, lounge, and
also a photography and an art gallery. Design and concept are in
minimal style, embellished by oriental themes. Among the most demanded
recipes, there is the zucchini cream with mint and pumpkin flower, the
season vegetables with pianogrillo oil on the rice of Venere.
In
the heart of Nolita, the neighborhood loved by newyorker
fashion-addicted, there is a new lounge-restaurant of an internal
design that reminds the public spaces of Sydney. Public is restaurant,
bar, lounge, and also bookstore and wine room. Designs and concept are
in minimal style, enriched by old british complements. A civic library
and an industrial loft, Public is distinguished also for the optimal
extreme fusion cuisine. Among the most requested recipes, there is the
kangaroo meat served with spices, mint yogurt and coconut mousse.