Herbal examination
Steve Drake chose a stage at Marc Veyrat's Auberge de L'Eridan when he won the 2001 Roux Scholarship. He knew the French masterchef was keen on herbs, but as soon as he arrived he realised Veyrat was a man obsessed. Joanna Wood reports.
Steve Drake thought he knew a lot about herbs until he arrived at Marc Veyrat's three-Michelin-starred Auberge de L'Eridan at Lake Annecy in the French Alps.
However, the current holder of the Roux Scholar title, who spent the month of August with Veyrat as part of his prize, found that it wasn't long before he was introduced to the French chef's well-documented passion for local plants. In fact, Drake's initiation took place as soon as he stepped through the doors of the 14-bedroomed restaurant-with-rooms. Not only are there dried herbs suspended in fine meshes between the restaurant's ceiling beams - artfully strewn in graphic designs - and herbal flowers decorating table tops, but the fresh flavours of the Savoy region's grasses and plants burst through every dish that Veyrat puts on his menus.
Herb lover
Veyrat's much-hyped love affair with his Savoyard herbs is not just for media show - it colours his whole approach to food. On his menus are dishes containing the lichen, calamint, sweet cicely, wild sorrel and wild woodruff with which he has been familiar from childhood (see menu panel opposite).
Drake's first taste of Veyrat-style food was on the night he arrived. It was his first view, too, of the fedora-wearing Frenchman's detailed and theatrical attention to presentation. "I got here really late - hot and sweaty - and they sat me down and fed me for three hours," says Drake. "Everything I ate had great flavours, but one thing that really impressed me was being served a tranche of turbot on a piece of rock with lemon balm sauce. When you cut into the fish, the juices just run down over the rock and the aroma it gives off is amazing. The whole thing works fantastically."
Visiting Drake during his stage at the end of August, scholarship founder Michel Roux experienced an 11-course lunch at Auberge de L'Eridan. Guiding his sponsor through the gourmet menu, Drake reflects on his impressions of working with Veyrat. He has not, he says, learnt any new culinary techniques in the kitchens, but will go back to his own kitchen at Drake's on the Pond in Surrey, where he is head chef, inspired by Veyrat's passion, vision and complete belief in his restaurant as one entity.
Theatrical style
"It has been an eye-opener to see the set-up here," Drake says. "The decor, some of the crockery, the staff levels (there's about 20 staff in the kitchen and I think another 25 or so out front), the equipment - it's incredible. Everybody knows their stuff, from the people on the bread and cheese trolleys to the sommeliers. It taught me a lot about how I could improve front of house at Drakes. I'd like to get a cheese trolley, for example, and be a little bit more theatrical in the restaurant."
Interrupted by the arrival of another dish, Drake breaks off, mid-flow, as Roux registers his approval on tasting the offering. "Yes," Roux says, "that's probably my favourite." It's a simple dish of maize soufflé, made without butter or fat, served with a cèpe tuile and accompanied by a small glass of tomato juice and génépi (a local liqueur). "I'd like to try doing something similar back home."
In culinary terms, Drake is struck by the way Veyrat places together unlikely flavours: a ratatouille with grapefruit, served with breast of Bresse pigeon; eggs containing passion fruit gelée, served with coffee, topped off with a cream of prunes and shot with apricot purée; and, of course, herbs (picked freshly from the mountains every morning at 6am) with everything.
In French gastronomy, Veyrat is undoubtedly a one-off. Indeed, his highly individual cuisine - rooted in the Savoy region of his birth, based on emulsions and reductions - was at one time regarded as too unsophisticated and too bizarre to gain acceptance from his country's culinary establishment.
The bestowal of three Michelin stars on his two restaurants (his second, La Ferme de Mon Père, in the exclusive ski resort of Megève, earned its third star in February) has certainly signalled a national acceptance of his food, but he is still widely regarded as an eccentric chef. Nor does he seek to dispel that aura. "Yesterday I was mad and I couldn't cook. Today I'm still mad, but I can cook because I have three stars, eh?" jokes Veyrat, emerging from his kitchen to join Roux and Drake in the restaurant.
He continues, with passion: "It's incredible how conservative France is. Some Paris chefs are not open to developments outside France. They are totally narrow. We are losing leadership in cuisine to countries like Spain. When, like me, you have not been trained by a masterchef, you are much more free. You have no baggage. My food comes from my past and I have developed it through imagination and instinct."
Veyrat's self-belief in his own style is a lesson well-learnt by Drake. "Monsieur Veyrat does what he thinks is good, what he thinks is right," Drake says. "He doesn't worry about what anybody else is doing. I'll go back to England with the confidence to cook what I'm comfortable with cooking."
"Yes," concludes Roux. "You must cook how you feel, not be pressurised, not try and copy anyone else. If you're good at what you do, people will understand."
The Roux Scholarship
The Roux Scholarship was set up in 1983 (with the first final taking place the following year) by Albert and Michel Roux, with the aim of encouraging and showcasing the talent of young British chefs. Both brothers remain closely associated with the competition, which now also involves a second generation of the Roux family - Michel's son Alain (joint chef-patron of the Waterside Inn, in Bray, Berkshire) and Albert's son Michel Jnr (chef-patron of London's Le Gavroche).
For the 2002 Roux Scholarship, sponsored by the Savoy Educational Trust, the upper age limit for entrants has been raised by two years, so that British-trained chefs between the ages of 22 and 30 (on 1 February 2002) are now eligible for the competition. The major prize remains a stage of as long as three months at a three-Michelin-starred establishment in Europe. An initial paper judging round will be followed by regional cook-offs, from which six chefs will progress to the final. The 2002 final will be held for the first time at London's Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park hotel, on Monday 25 March.
The closing date for paper entries is 15 January 2002. Entry forms are available from Golley Slater PR (tel: 020 8831 7660/7661 or e-mail: roux@golleyslater.co.uk).
Veyrat's variations
Diners at Auberge de L'Eridan last summer (average spend about £250 per head) had a choice of an … la carte menu and two set menus (the six-course Sonata or nine-course Symphonie menus). On his visit to see Steve Drake in August, Michel Roux was served dishes taken from all the menus. His meal included the following…
Pre-lunch assiette: lichen mousse, Bayonne ham smoked with juniper, toasted bacon bread, potato beignet, escargots with lichen broth, and pork and chard sausages
Escalope of foie gras with syrup of liquorice and sweet cicely, fennel with cucumber and sweet cicely mousse, fennel bouillon
Trio of quails' eggs - with kolrabi mousse; smoked bacon and nutmeg mousse; and a smoked egg flavoured with wild sorrel and liquorice
Four-vegetable ravioli variations served with bouillon of pea and parsley: carrot stuffed with foam of wild parsnip, hazelnut oil; polenta stuffed with Parmesan cream; artichoke with truffle, filled with wild spinach, foam of ferns; potato purèe with Seyssel truffle
Turbot with lemon balm sauce (served on rock)
John Dory cooked in mountain herbs, noodles cooked in calamint, fish mousse flavoured with fir tree sap (served on tree bark)
Lake Annecy fish with coffee sauce
Iced maize soufflè on a shallot confit with cèpe tuile, glass of tomato juice and gènèpi
Duck coated with liquorice and nut reduction, served with a vanilla sauce, duck and sweet woodruff consomme
Cheeses from the Savoy
Sorbets - wild celery, santolina, girolles, tomato; chocolate mousse
Assiette of brûlèes - caramel, almond, pistachio, sesame
Marc Veyrat
Marc Veyrat was born in Annecy in 1951. The son of peasant farmers, he spent his formative years on the family farm in Manigod in the Savoy region of the French Alps. A self-taught chef, he unwittingly absorbed the traditions of his region's cooking throughout his childhood, but came late to the restaurant stove, via jobs as a shepherd, cowherd, washer-up and ski instructor.
In 1978, he opened a bistro in Manigod on land given to him by his father. It quickly became successful, attracting the likes of François Mitterrand, and prompted a move, in 1985, to Annecy, where Veyrat rapidly picked up two Michelin stars (his first in 1986 and a second in 1987).
In 1992, he bought the villa in Veyrier du Lac that now houses Auberge de L'Eridan and set about adding 11 guest rooms to the restaurant. The project sent him spiralling into debt. He regained solvency only after going to his local Savoy banks and telling them he would close the Auberge if they didn't help him out. Such was the region's pride in its Savoyard son that they handed over the finance with alacrity.
Veyrat gained a third Michelin star in 1995 at Veyrier, and four years later opened his second restaurant, La Ferme de Mon Père, in Megève. The two restaurants alternate their opening months, with Auberge opening during the summer and La Ferme during the winter season. Veyrat's staff move with him from one site to the other. Within two seasons of its opening, La Ferme had also achieved three Michelin stars. At present, Veyrat is the only French chef to cook at and own two three-Michelin-starred restaurants.
In the last season alone, he has spent £1m on refurbishing Auberge de L'Eridan.
