IS HAUTE CUISINE DEAD? NOT BY A LONG SHOT!
By John Mariani

The death knell for haute cuisine has been sounded about as often as for the demise of Broadway, and a new book by Michael Steinberger carries the plaintive title Au Revoir to All That: Food, Wine, and the End of France, detailing how the decline in both standards and admiration for the glories of French cuisine have been long in coming, as Michelin star restaurants go empty and master chefs go global rather than stay in their kitchens cooking.
To which I answer that such assertions are looking at the issue from the wrong end: Haute cuisine as represented in ultra-expensive dining salons with crystal chandeliers and gold bathroom fixtures are indeed suffering from both a weak global economy and a certain stuffiness out of kilter with the way most people enjoy eating these days.  But the true excellence of haute cuisine’s legacy is still very much intact; in fact, it is more widespread than ever, and, thank heavens, cheaper.

The reasons are simple: the last generation of chefs who learned all the lessons of masters like Joël Robuchon, Alain Ducasse, Eric Ripert, and Daniel Boulud have applied them with a more modern style and individual panache that has resulted in restaurants around the world now serving the same quality of haute cuisine in more casual surroundings that used to be served only in the three-star temples of French gastronomy.
Indeed, while the worldwide appeal of Italian, Mediterranean, Spanish, and Japanese cuisine is now in full flourish in cities from New York to Berlin, classic French cuisine and techniques are and always will be the ballast for it all.  Modern American masters like Alfred Portale of Gotham Bar & Grill in New York, Thomas Keller of The French Laundry in Yountville, CA, Rick Tramonto of Tru in Chicago, and Lee Hefter of Spago in Beverly Hills all trained under the French system, yet their restaurants—all tremendously successful—are anything but staid or traditional in menus and décor, and all are expressive of their own American backgrounds.
At every level of modern restaurant haute cuisine’s concepts have filtered down, from the commitment to freshness in every ingredient to the stocking of winelists that are designed to complement chefs’ cooking.  You might dine at a superb Italian restaurant like Valentino in Santa Monica and find that the best seafood is shipped in from the Mediterranean and the finest wines from small Italian estates fill the list.  At London’s Nobu, the sushi takes on all sorts of global influences along with a winelist that matches the food impeccably.  And in New York, Chef Michael Psilakis has revolutionized Greek cooking by using French and Asian techniques, along with a screed of the finest wines coming out of the Mediterranean. In the past, French cuisine monopolized the term “haute,” even when the cuisine was not, though the prices were.
The truly wonderful thing about this evolution of haute cuisine is how master chefs have brought down the haute along with the prices.  The great Joël Robuchon has opened a series of L’Atelier restaurants (New York’s is shown at right) where you sit at counters and choose from an array of small plate dishes that might include the finest Iberian ham or the beef burgers riddled with morsels of foie gras. It ain;t cheap but, à la carte, you may spend what you wish.
Famous Washington-based chef José Andrés has been in the vanguard of modern Spanish food in America, nowhere better enjoyed than at his restaurants Jaleo and minibar, and now in Los Angeles at the superb Bazaar, where he takes common foods like olives, chicken wings, and even cotton candy and serves them as small plates of wondrous invention based on the soundest and most precise cooking techniques.
This is a far cry from the day when dining out, as opposed to eating out, was a world of privilege and expense, and more about social clout than true fine dining.  French haute cuisine was synonymous with extravagance and the haute meant haughty.  Social position counted more than wealth, and knowing the rules  more than gustatory taste. The pompous owner of New York’s Lafayette (long defunct), Jean Fayet, once ordered a guest to remove her sunglasses because they caused a reflection on the ceiling; refused a table to the beauty editor of McCall’s Magazine because her Pucci dress was too short; banished the Italian designer Valentino for wearing a turtleneck; Fayet even refused to accept credit cards because he “didn’t want to be another name on a list.”   Robert Meyzen, owner of La Caravelle (also gone), told the New York Times, “I don’t care if you call three weeks ahead.  When I can have someone like Mrs. Lytle Hull and Mrs. Burden [two New York socialites], why should I take Mrs. Somebody from Kalamazoo? Even if I have ten tables empty, if I don’t feel like taking someone, that’s my privilege. We don’t sell tables here. You couldn’t get a table here for $200.  If you belong here, you get a table.”
If, then, the definition of haute cuisine is stuffy, pretentious, overly elaborate food full of truffles and caviar served on gold-rimmed plates at astronomical prices, then there are more than enough such places still thriving in Paris, New York, Las Vegas, and Tokyo.  But the heart of haute cuisine has always really been the excellence of product, the care in cooking it, and the richly flavorful result that distinguishes it from food that is merely tasty.  Indeed, traditional French cuisine is alive and kicking, both on the haute and bas levels: NYC’s La Grenouille just received three stars from the Times; In Las Vegas you can luxuriate at French salons like Guy Savoy and Fleur de Lys; in Chicago, Everest is still going strong; in NYC and Washington DC, there are Alain Ducasse restaurants; but you can also feast at bistros and brasseries doing top-notch French food–much of it once regarded as haute cuisine–all over the U.S., London, Copenhagen, and Berlin, (and, of course, France). In Atlanta, Pano Karatassos has just opened Bistro Niko; in Cleveland, Zak Bruell has a big hit with L’Albatros Brasserie; and NYC is filling up with bistros like Fleur de Sel and Minetta Tavern. Under the circumstances, I’m happy that haute cuisine conquered a long time ago and now just needs not to rest on its laurels.