正文
经济学人下载:法国大厨米歇尔·鲁克斯(3)
Growing up as the son of a charcutier, he had learned whether it was Monday or Tuesday from the smell of boudin or andouillettes on the stairs; and his earliest memory was of beating up egg yolks which, as if by magic, thickened in the hot stock into sauce for his mother's blanquette of veal. To run just one restaurant with Albert would have been good enough. And it was hard work: so hard that he was hardly ever at home, and his first wife divorced him. Though he knew almost no English, he still had to take his turn at front-of-house while Albert was manning the stove.
米歇尔·鲁克斯是食品商的儿子,他很早就能在楼梯上通过闻猪肉香肠或粗粒香肠的味道来判断当天是周一还是周二。他最早的记忆就是打蛋黄,就像魔法一样,鸡蛋在热高汤里变稠,熬成他母亲做的小牛肉的酱汁。和艾伯特一起经营一家餐厅就足够了。并且非常辛苦,以至于他很少回家,而且他的第一任妻子和他离婚了。尽管米歇尔几乎不会讲英文,他仍然得轮流待在前台,彼时艾伯特就会掌管后厨。
They cooked and played host in alternate weeks, knowing well that if they tried to share service there might be blood. Both of them came up with ideas, but his strength lay in details. Precision and patience were a pastrycook's skills. It mattered to him, for instance, that commis waiters should not talk to the customers and that diners should wear ties (he almost refused entry to the Rolling Stones when they turned up without them). Every ingredient had its right place, too, and as each arrived he would taste it, unseasoned, to judge exactly where it might sit within a dish.
他们知道,俩人得轮流负责前台和后厨,在一块服务的话可能会有流血事件发生。他们两人都会有点子,但他的优势在于细节。精确和耐心是面点师的技能。例如,对米歇尔来说,重要的是,服务员不能和顾客说话,而且用餐者应该打领带(滚石乐队不戴领带入场时,他几乎拒绝让他们入场)。而且每个原料都得各得其所,在加调料之前,他会品尝每一种原料,以此判断它对之后做出菜肴的影响。
When he and Albert produced cookery books, spreading the revolution to ordinary British kitchens, he, being a perfectionist, wrote the words, just as on their cookery shows he was the suave and particular main presenter. And in 1986 it made sense to split their interests, so that while his brother went bustling after new business he departed for Bray, to run the whitewashed former pub on the Thames they had opened a decade before.
鲁克斯和阿尔伯特出版烹饪书,将革命传播到普通的英国厨房。烹饪书的文字是完美主义者鲁克斯完成的,就像他们上烹饪节目时,他会是那个温文尔雅的主讲人。所以他们分开是情理之中的事情,1986年,在他的兄弟忙于新生意的时候,他离开去了布雷,在泰晤士河边经营他们十年前开的那家粉刷过的旧酒吧。