The World in My Kitchen (15 page)

Worldwide, the best known chef at that time was Paul Bocuse of France. Paul Bocuse had trained in Fernand Point’s restaurant La Pyramide and owned a three star restaurant in the outskirts of Lyon at Collonges-au-Mont-d’Or. Bocuse had just come out with a book in France called
La Cuisine du Marché,
which had revolutionized French cooking, then considered the best in the world. The book illustrated the way the new French chefs ran their restaurants and revolutionized their cuisine. They went to the market every morning and served only what was in season. The classic recipes of yesteryears were made lighter and more innovating. The book also discussed new trends among the French chefs: They all employed Japanese cooks in their kitchen and used Chinese techniques and utensils. In the United States, Pantheon bought the rights of Paul Bocuse’s book and was looking for a translator.

I had met Paul Bocuse many years before on one of the food trips I had taken with my stepfather to La Pyramide. When Pantheon suggested me as a translator, Paul, who remembered meeting me and knowing my stepfather, agreed that I should translate the book. Bocuse’s book contained 1,200 recipes; exhaustive step-by-step instructions to various methods of cooking; and stories about him and his family. This was a monumental job! I had never tackled anything like this before. I was still teaching full-time, taking care of my four children, and running a very hectic household. It all seemed too daunting, but I decided to take the Bocuse project on anyway. The contract offered me two options: I could get a substantial fee, or I could get a small fee with a share in the royalties. I consulted my agent and talked to my friends in the food world. Everyone agreed that this book was going to be a great success and that its sales would most probably top those of Julia Child, who was the reigning queen of the food world. I also learned that the first printing would be over 100,000 copies and that they predicted sales of over a million. I accepted the job and chose to share in the royalties. Working at night, I began to translate the book.

The first twenty pages seemed easy. Paul’s style and explanations were clear and gave the reader tips that only a chef would know. But when I started to translate the recipes, I had the feeling that they were not Paul Bocuse’s. Some assistant must have followed him as he cooked, then later adapted the recipes for household use. The problem was that whoever had written the recipes did not know how to cook. I was and am a cook that can easily detect, just by reading a recipe, if the recipe will or will not work. Many of Paul’s recipes did not seem to work! Although I was denied a budget for testing, I decided to try some of the recipes in my own kitchen. The results were deplorable. I contacted Pantheon and suggested they send me to Lyon to talk over the recipes with Paul. The answer was a no; but I could telephone him and discuss them with him. I tried several times. Paul was either too busy or away and would refer me to his assistant who, I was sure, was the one who had written the book. Her responses were always the same: “Non, Madame Rossant, les recettes sont parfaites!” (No, Mrs. Rossant, the recipes are perfect!) I stopped calling after I translated the coq au vin recipe, which called for two quarts of red wine for a four-pound chicken. I had tested the recipe and found I had a coq au vin soup! Her answer to me was the same as usual. The recipe was correct. So I started to change the recipes but always writing explanations for the changes in the margins.

The book came out in the spring. Paul Bocuse, his wife, and his chefs de cuisine were put up at the Pierre Hotel. I was to meet Paul and accompany him to interviews and translate for him. Paul did not speak a word of English.

On the day of publication, Paul was to prepare a dinner at Lutece for the press. We were to meet for the first time in twenty-five years at 7:30
A.M
. in front of Balducci’s food store on Sixth Avenue to shop for the dinner. Paul had brought many things from France, but we needed meat, vegetables, and fruit. I recognized him immediately. Paul was a tall, imposing man with a prominent French nose and an easy smile. He embraced me heartily, nearly breaking all the bones in my back. A few journalists began to assemble, and Paul, acting like a great star, spoke with them as I, standing shyly behind him, translated their questions and his answers. Unfortunately, Balducci’s had forgotten our appointment, and the store was not yet open; we were too early.

“Colette, I need breakfast; where shall we go?” I looked around. Nothing was open except McDonald’s. I tried to explain that McDonald’s, which had not as yet invaded France, was a fast-food chain, and there wasn’t much he would like.

“Let’s go there; it is fine,” and so to McDonald’s we went, followed by the press.

As we sat down, I explained to Paul what was on the menu. “You can have a muffin with egg and cheese, or ham.”

“Muffin? What is a muffin?”

I explained, and Paul chose the muffin with eggs and ham and french fries. Paul ate the eggs with gusto, thought the coffee was too weak, but announced loudly that “These are the best french fries I have ever eaten. I want to meet the chef.”

“But Paul, this is a fast-food restaurant, there is no chef.”

“Nonsense Colette, every kitchen has a chef!”

With these words Paul got up and walked over to the counter where a young black man was standing, waiting to receive orders. To his astonishment and amidst flashes of the photographers, Paul insisted on shaking his hand and saying over and over again “Bravo, jeune homme. Les meilleures Frites que j’ai jamais mangées. Traduisez, Colette.”

There were large headlines that evening in the papers, “Paul Bocuse eats the world’s best french fries in New York at McDonald’s.”

The dinner at Lutece went well, and for the next two days, we ran around the city. Bocuse appeared on all the talk shows; always trailing behind, I was translating what he was saying. He loved American veal…believed our beef was the best in the world…he liked California wines, said their vegetables were great…but he missed French salad, bread, and butter.

On Wednesday, Pantheon received a call from Julia Child. She was opening Faneuil Hall in Boston with the mayor. She wanted Paul Bocuse to join her, and then they both would go to her home and together cook dinner for the press. Pantheon was in heaven. Julia Child, the grand dame of American food, was endorsing Paul Bocuse! Paul accepted, and I was told to call Julia Child and make the arrangements with her. We would both go to Boston, and I would continue to translate for him although Julia understood French very well. On Thursday, Paul received a call from the Rolex Watch Company. Would he pose for them on Friday for a rather substantial sum of money? Paul accepted and announced that he would forgo the trip to Boston. I pleaded with him, Pantheon pleaded, but Paul would not change his mind. I tried to explain who Julia Child was, how important she was to the American public, what she could do for the success or failure of his book. Nothing would budge him from his decision. He would not go and that was final!

I was told to call Julia Child and announce the bad news. Julia was furious with him and unfortunately with me, as the bearer of the bad news. The next day when interviewed on television about Faneuil Hall, Julia was asked what she thought of Paul Bocuse’s cookbook. She dismissed it with shrug. “Nothing new,” she said, “nothing worth talking about.”

The book, which had sold 30,000 copies the first three days, had now slowed down to selling a trickle of copies. Our only hope was that with good publicity, the public would forget Julia Child’s comments and again buy Paul Bocuse’s book. This was not to happen because six months later an article appeared in
New York
magazine claiming that Paul Bocuse had never written the book. What he had done was buy the manuscript from the widow of a young, brilliant chef and adapted the young chef’s recipes into his restaurant. Pantheon sued Flamarion, the French publisher. Bocuse accused us of not translating the foreword, which recounted the story of the manuscript. It turned out that the book that Flamarion sold to Pantheon was the second edition, and in that edition, there had been no foreword. Paul had not known what edition I had received. However, the book virtually stopped selling since the story made the rounds. My dreams of riches died with the book.

The following summer, Paul Bocuse, feeling sorry for me about what happened with the book, invited Jimmy and me to Lyon. He wrote, “I will send you off to visit all my friends: Troigros, Michel Guerard, and Outier. So come and see me.” And so we did.

Bocuse’s restaurant was just outside of Lyon. Paul received us in full chef regalia. We were given the royal treatment. He ordered all the recipes that had made him famous and that I had translated but never tasted. We had his signature soup—the one that he had made for the French president Giscard D’Estaing and that had earned him the title of Meilleur Ouvrier de France. The soup was called
soupe aux truffes Elysée,
a very strong flavored chicken consommé, with thick slices of black truffles swimming in it; the soup was sealed with a golden, buttery dome of flaky pastry. I broke the pastry dome, and suddenly I was engulfed in the truffles’ strong, earthy aroma. This dish was followed by mullet served with a pistou sauce, then partridge with cabbage, and for dessert, the most beautiful croquette-en-bouche, tiny pâte à choux filled with cream and glazed with spun sugar. For the next two days, Paul took us around Lyon and talked about his pet project: an Oscar of food. (Three years later, true to his word, The Bocuse d’Or was born, and I was asked to be a judge for the first event.)

A few days later, going south, we stopped at Roanne at the Brother Troisgros’s restaurant. Jean Troisgros was the younger brother. A handsome man who loved food, tennis, and architecture, Jean was in the process of remodeling his kitchen. When he discovered that Jimmy was an architect, he kidnapped him and while drinking 100-year-old Armagnac, discussed the remodeling of his restaurant. While they were occupied, I was told to go to the kitchen to observe how a famous kitchen was run. The kitchen staff put me in a corner near a giant stainless steel vat filled with boiling water. I looked around and was astonished by the noise and the speed with which everyone cooked. Then I turned my attention to the vat. I wondered, as I looked around, what the vat was for. Soon I understood it was for making the consommé used in cooking. Every bone, every leftover raw vegetable went in the vat. The young chefs would throw chicken bones from their cooking station, like a basketball player throwing a ball. They never missed! What made this vat different from the others I had seen before was that this one had its own stove and was gargantuan. At the bottom of the vat was a faucet. From time to time, a young apprentice would come and first remove the scum that was building on top, adding salt and freshly ground pepper, then retrieve some broth for the chef de cuisine. At night the broth was strained, degreased, and used for preparing Troisgros famous
Filet de Boeuf au bouillon de Pot-au-Feu
(a piece of beef poached in this strong delectable consommé), which we were served at dinner that night. The meat was so tender one could cut it with a fork.

Once Jimmy had visited the architect in charge of the remolding of the restaurant and given some suggestions, we left for Saulieu to visit Bernard Loiseau’s La Côte d’Or restaurant with a care package of homemade sausages, fresh bread, and a bottle of Troisgros’s best wine.

Bernard Loiseau was also young, but less of star than Bocuse and more of a family man than Jean Troisgros. In Loiseau’s restaurant we talked about his children and ours. I felt very much at home with him. We dined on breast of chicken poached with truffles surrounded with slices of foie gras, so rich and tender that I can still taste it. The rest of the meal is a blur. The next day we drove to Michel Guerard in the Bordeaux region at Les Près D’Eugenie hotel and restaurant. Michel Guerard, like Paul Bocuse, was a star. He was very proud of his hotel and restaurant and felt strongly that like Bocuse a few years before, he had come up with a new and revolutionary way of cooking. Cuisine Minceur was his contribution to the new woman, and giving me a meaningful look, he said he hoped I would try it. He promised me that his menu Minceur (a gourmet diet menu) would allow me to shed the few pounds I had acquired in my quest for good food. I had a poached sole in a very light broth and delicate miniature vegetables that simply disappeared in one bite. Dessert was a fruit soufflé with just egg whites. If I could cook that way, I would certainly go on his diet.

Jimmy opted for the regular restaurant dinner and splurged on rabbit and Guerard’s famous cannelloni with herbs. I was jealous of Jimmy, who raved of his meal all the way to our next stop.

Before going on to Outier’s restaurant in the South of France, I needed to rest from all this rich food. We drove to Hendaye, a small town on the Atlantic coast, where thirty years ago, Jimmy had proposed to me in front of an old-fashioned hardware store. To our disappointment, it was now a very modern one. A few days later, rested, we went on to Outier.

L’Oasis, Outier’s restaurant, was a beautiful place near the ocean in the small town of La Napoule near Cannes. This was to be the end of our trip. Outier was more like Jean Troisgros. He was tall, very handsome, and believed himself to be the best cook in France. He was very proud of his three-star Michelin rating. Outier was one of the first chefs that I had met who was truly international. He had opened restaurants in Thailand and India. That night, I told Outier what we had done and eaten for the last ten days. He then understood that to conquer us and show me what a great chef he was, he had to serve us something lovely, but simply cooked because by now, I could no longer eat and wished only for plain yogurt! He served us a frothy consommé, light as air, with tiny morsels of fresh raw scallops. This was followed by the best bouillabaisse I had ever tasted. Just before the next dish arrived, to clear our pallet, a small pear and brandy sorbet was placed in front of us. The cool sorbet was so refreshing that suddenly I felt rejuvenated and with enjoyment, ate the roast squab that followed. Later, while I was savoring a fresh
fromage blanc
drizzled with local honey and roasted walnuts, Outier talked about coming to New York and opening a new restaurant. He had trained a young chef who would run the restaurant while Outier was at L’Oasis. Outier, three years later, true to his word, opened Lafayette, a restaurant in the Drake Hotel in New York. He brought with him the young chef whom he had trained. Jean-Georges Vongerichten, like his mentor, would become the darling of New York and one of the United States best-known chefs. He would also open restaurants around the world.