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The Natural Gastronomy of Alain Ducasse
“Nourishing oneself in a healthier and more natural way is today a widely held expectation and necessity that it is time to translate in the realm of haute cuisine.
Exceptional products expressing themselves in their simplicity, a technique that has the elegance to efface itself to render itself in service to a larger ensemble.”
This is the cuisine that I sincerely love. A cuisine of naturality, one that is liberated, emancipated. This highly personal interpretation plays here henceforth, in my restaurant at the Plaza Athénée.” – Alain Ducasse
This time, Alain Ducasse transports us into a newly declared realm where fish and grains are elevated to sublimity. The Plaza Athénée proposes a differentiated restaurant offering that you won’t find anywhere else in France. It’s important for a hotel to set itself apart from the rest. In doing so, it can create a strong connection with its clients.
The gastronomic experience will be sure to leave a lasting mark on your impressions. Once you arrive, the French art of welcoming takes its place. You are welcomed with a highly personalized attention. The host offers you a chilled tomato cooler infused with hibiscus, followed by a tuile of grains and several fine slices of rice-bread, along with lightly salted butter from Frédéric Leroux of
Cauville-sur-Mer, in the Seine-Maritime. The excellence and originality of the products speak through their presence.
To accompany a glass of wine or champagne, the host delivers you variations on the theme of vegetables, followed by seafood hors d’œuvres such as clams, grilled sardines from Saint-Malo, and sea urchins au naturel.
This generosity extends throughout the course of the meal, with, preceding the arrival of the cheese, rice cooked and presented in a ‘chamba’: oven-cooked black rice, with clams, squid, and octopus. It comes somewhat as a surprise, since you would typically expect a pre-dessert at this stage of the meal.
And trailing behind your dessert comes the ultimate gesture of generosity: fresh fruits of the season and a small bar of black praline chocolate from Le Manufacture de Chocolat Alain Ducasse.
The Plaza Athénée Chief
Update
After the departure of multi-starred chef Alain Ducasse from the Plaza Athénée, Jean Imbert will succeed him at the head of the kitchens of the palace since July 2021. Revealed by the cooking show Top Chef broadcast on M6 in 2012, he is in charge of the hotel’s six restaurants, namely the Table Gastronomique, the Cour Jardin, the Galerie, the Relais Plaza, the Montaigne terrace and the Bar. More recently, at the end of 2020 and during 2021, he has begun several collaborations with the luxury house of Dior.
Laurent Delporte, an editor and conference speaker, is a strategic expert in the sector of hotels. A visionary, he brings his unique look on hotels in service to the decision-makers in the industry, whether to enhance the development of new projects or strategic visions.
Laurent has visited and audited over 350 hotels across the world and also participates in mystery visits to provide quality control for the world’s finest hotels.
