The Incredible Legacy of Juli Soler

Every great restaurant has both a front and a back of the house. Juli Soler personified the front of the house in one of the most influential restaurants in history. In 1983, he was managing an unassuming seaside bar and grill that was part of a miniature golf course when he hired a young chef with an unimpressive résumé. It was a very inauspicious start, but, together, the two of them changed the world of cooking. The chef was Ferran Adrià, and the miniature-golf bar and grill was elBulli.

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To say that elBulli was special is an understatement. Carved out of a bay on the Costa Brava, it was a magical spot, and Juli was largely responsible for that magic. Committed diners waited years to secure a reservation before traveling incredible distances for a single, albeit very large, meal. Juli was there to welcome them at the climax of their journey. He was everything a host should be—gracious, funny, and warm. He changed the fine-dining experience, stripping away many of the formalities so that guests could relax and engage emotionally and intellectually with the dishes in front of them.

The cuisine of elBulli, crafted by Ferran, his brother Albert Adrià, and an extremely talented team, was legendary of course, but there would have been no elBulli without Juli. He was the kind of person you wanted to work with, someone who inspired the people around him to grow. As elBulli began to evolve, he encouraged the team to learn, travel, and experiment. When Ferran took sole control of the kitchen and threw out old recipes, Juli fostered Ferran’s burgeoning creativity. They took risks, challenged conventions, and would eventually close the restaurant down for six months each year so the chefs could dedicate themselves to research and culinary innovation. The dishes that came out of elBulli captivated diners and inspired chefs throughout the world, including the Modernist Cuisine team and the work that we do.

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Together, Juli and Ferran transformed an inconspicuous restaurant into a hotbed of culinary creativity. Some of the most talented chefs in the world passed through the kitchen and went on to become industry leaders—their success is a testament to the tremendous environment Juli created. elBulli is one of the great restaurants. It will be talked about for many years to come and Juli’s legacy will live on in those conversations.

Juli will be deeply missed. Our thoughts go out to his loved ones and the elBulli family.

Cooking for Ferran Adrià: Reflecting on Inspiration and Innovation

There are always stories behind food, whether it’s a quintessentially Modernist dish, spheres and all, or a beloved recipe handed down over generations. Mistakes are made, learned from, and then ideas are refined through trial and error. You can taste the labor, the love, and the inspiration in sublime flavors and intriguing textures. In the same manner, thoughtful food creates memories. Flavors comfort and transport us with dishes that surprise and delight us.

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There are many memories wrapped up in the experience of cooking for Ferran Adrià. Here are a few of the stories behind a handful of the fifty dishes we prepared that afternoon.

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Head Chef Francisco Migoya: Rye Levain Noodles

I own many of the elBulli books, and I’ve certainly tried many of the recipes. But the influence of elBulli goes beyond simply producing their recipes; their work changes your way of looking at food and what it can be. Cooking is about seeing the potential that lies beyond the obvious by looking at food from a different perspective.

The idea for the rye levain noodles came to me shortly before I joined the team. With our upcoming book on breads in mind, I was thinking about pasta, which traditionally doesn’t have yeast. I couldn’t find any recipes that added yeast to a pasta dough, which got me thinking: why are there no yeast-leavened pasta doughs? As commercial yeast has little flavor, it occurred to me, conceptually, that a levain would be more flavorful. And in the realm of levains, a rye levain would be even more flavorful.

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To make the pasta, I replaced some of the water and flour in a rye pasta recipe with a fully ripened rye levain. Getting the sour taste right was one of the most challenging things about the course. The lactic acid produced by lactobacillus in a levain preferment has a very characteristic taste and is what makes sourdoughs taste sour. If it doesn’t have the right degree of ripeness, the sour flavor will not come through, and the concept is lost. Timing the levain preferment just right is the key.

We served the rye pasta with sauerkraut beurre blanc and toasted nigella seeds. This dish preceded the pastrami dish (one of my favorites) because it ties into the Jewish-deli classic of pastrami and rye, with the rye in this instance being rye levain noodles.

Cooking for Ferran Adrià was an honor. It was nerve-racking at the same time, especially since I had joined the team as head chef just prior to his visit. It was my first dinner at the lab, so I saw it as a tremendous challenge with a responsibility to succeed. In the end, the team performed at a very high level—we had one of the smoothest services ever.

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Research and Development Sous Chef Sam Fahey-Burke: Onion Soft Serve Ice Cream

It’s really impossible to measure the influence of elBulli on my work as a chef. The work that was done there pretty much established the Modernist movement, and I’ve spent my entire career cooking that type of food. If it hadn’t been for the work of Adrià and his team, I would still be a cook, but every day would have been completely different.

I’m always a little nervous right before a long tasting, and with 50 courses (and chef Adrià in attendance) I was probably a little more on edge than usual. But once we got into the service routine, the nervousness faded and I started to enjoy it. We normally serve our dishes in a traditional progression, but we switched it up for chef Adrià. We added courses we had never served before, including Onion Soft Serve, which kept us on our toes.

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The Onion Tart recipe in Volume 5 of Modernist Cuisine is one of my favorites. It’s a great example of fundamentally Modernist cooking—it’s the evolution of a technique, as opposed to a technique that exists for the sake of adding obscure gelling agents or emulsifiers to a dish.

A champion of the tart, I’m always trying to convince Nathan Myhrvold to serve different versions of it at our tastings, which is where the idea for Onion Soft Serve originated. Fortunately, Chef Migoya and I are both experienced ice-cream makers, so we succeeded on our first try. To get the texture right, we processed the ice cream in a Pacojet for about 10 minutes before serving time and then put the mixture in the freezer (in piping bags) on a frozen Baking Steel. To keep the dish cold for service, we gave the cones, handmade by head chef Migoya, a quick dip in liquid nitrogen before adding the ice cream.

The idea of onion-flavored ice cream might seem alarming to some, but it’s sweetened just like traditional ice cream. The onion purée creates more depth, adding an incredibly savory element to the base. And the crunchy cone adds a nice textural contrast to the ice cream. We’ve done this course at two lab dinners now, and each time the diners seemed to be taken by unexpected enjoyment.

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Research and Development Chef Johnny Zhu: Binchotan

When the first translation of the elBulli books came to the U.S., I was a young cook in New York. I remember at the time that it cost about $350, which was the most expensive cookbook I had ever heard of. I was still determined, however, to save up and get it. I remember finally getting my copy and rushing home on the subway, like I was smuggling some kind of treasure. When I opened the book, I was simply blown away. Everything I knew about food had been completely reimagined in those pages. It taught me that food is never static but always evolving.

The inspiration for the Chicken Liver Binchotan is trickery, a play on the theme of trompe l’oeil (culinary deception), a theme perfected at elBulli and a common element of Modernist cooking. The dish is served with points of toasted brioche on a binchotan grill; inside, the actual binchotan coals are charred just to the point of smoking. Coal-shaped chicken livers are then placed in front of the diners, who are still drawn to the hibachi grill in front of them. For just a moment, the diners think, “What is this, a spare piece of charcoal?” The illusion subsides quickly, but the aroma, aesthetic, and interplay of smoke and liver mimics the look of binchotan exactly, and, when diners dig into it, it spreads like butter.

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The Chicken Liver Binchotan recipe started with a sous vide version of chicken liver mousse. If you look at most recipes for chicken liver mousse, they are pretty vague. You’re supposed to cook chicken livers to what you think is medium rare and then purée them with aromatics and butter. But the livers can be easily undercooked or overcooked, so the texture can range from gloppy to gritty. When cooking the chicken livers sous vide, however, they are medium rare every time, and the texture is incredibly smooth. Such consistency is a testament to cooking sous vide.

Chef Migoya introduced us to silicone mold making and suggested that we try a few shapes. We tried shapes that we had lying around, one of which happened to be a Japanese binchotan charcoal. When we cast the chicken liver mousse into the molds, the effect was striking. The mousse captured every nook and cranny of the wood, resulting in a realistic imitation. To complete the effect, we dusted the mousse with edible dietary ash.

The evolution of this dish was so natural that all we had to do was pair the tasty mousse with toast points, but presenting the dish was tricky. Excited about the trompe l’oeil, we enthusiastically (and artistically) piled the binchotan grill with toast points; getting the binchotan grill onto the table and in front of chef Adrià without dumping the toast-topped grill in his lap was nerve-racking. Even he looked a bit nervous as we made our way over.

Cooking for Ferran Adrià was an incredible honor, being both exhilarating and terrifying at the same time. Preparing a meal for one of my idols is an experience I will never forget.

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Research and Development Chef Anjana Shanker: Caviar Service

Cooking for the world’s greatest chef was a dream come true. It was an opportunity I had been hoping to have for a very long time. Ferran Adrià’s visit turned out to be incredibly humbling—when you meet him you realize that he is remarkable and simple at the same time.

Chef Adrià and the elBulli team played an important role in my culinary career, inspiring me to value creativity and to better understand the connection between food and science. Their work influenced how I approach deconstructing a dish—how I will transform all of its elements or modify its texture and taste so that it appears fully Modernist, while retaining the dish’s original essence.

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Our caviar service was inspired by a course at elBulli. The dish appeared to be a traditional pile of caviar—decadent, salty, and delicious. Even the first bite confirms its appearance: this is good caviar. The caviar, however, was actually mustard seeds.

It took me a great deal of work to perfect this recipe before chef Adrià’s visit. Caviar has a distinct flavor and texture, so developing the faux version was a scientific process. I researched, experimented, documented, and analyzed many variations of it, but the trickiest part was replicating the mouthfeel—getting the mustard to gently pop like caviar with each bite. We also had to figure out how to reproduce the buttery, oceanic, and delicate tastes that are reminiscent of traditional caviar.

We soaked yellow mustard seeds, pressure-cooked them with a neutral oil, and then centrifuged with the mixture with anchovies. Olive oil and squid ink were added to disguise the seeds. We then served the seeds on a blini to mimic traditional service.

Because Ferran Adrià’s work and research has been such an inspiration to me, it was a tremendous feeling when I read The New York Times’s coverage of his response to the dish. He declared it “Fantastico,” which is an incredible honor.

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Research and Development Chef Aaron Verzosa: Cryoblanched Lobster

Cooking for chef Adrià was like painting to impress Picasso—why would you do that? You’re making food for a man who has seen it all, broken all the rules, and written the language that we at Modernist Cuisine have chosen as our industry dialect. In fact, it was slightly terrifying. Hours before the dinner, to my amazement, chef Adrià walked through the kitchen by himself, taking in the atmosphere. What was I doing when we first met? Making spheres, of course—a technique synonymous with his name.

Despite the anxiety and fear that accompanies such a moment, and after months of preparation, the dinner finally started. The first course went out, then the second, and finally the 50th. When you’re in the moment, it’s easy to be swept up in the details of each dish and the intensity of service. You hardly have a moment to realize that within 50 courses, the man, Adrià, had asked for seconds of many of our dishes.

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One of my courses was a spoonful of delicate, cryoblanched lobster. We dipped the lobster in liquid nitrogen for 10 seconds (not long enough to freeze the meat), and then submerged it in cold water. The temperature differential between the liquid nitrogen and water is enough to completely release the meat from the shell. Classically, to remove a lobster from its shell, you blanch it in boiling water, but the problem therein is that the lobster and its shell are then partially cooked. By cryoblanching we are able to cook an entire piece of claw or tail to an exact temperature; the pieces are cooked all the way through without overcooking the outer portion of meat. The Coconut Lobster Sauce, made from lobster shells, is also more intense because the flavor is never lost to the boiling water, an artifact of classic blanching.

The concept behind this technique evolved from a method I learned in Paris. We would put the lobsters in the freezer from 45 minutes to one hour, then place it into the fridge for about an hour or two—the result was similar to cryoblanching. In Paris, we didn’t have liquid nitrogen, so, when I came back to Modernist Cuisine, it was the first thing I tried. Getting the timing right was difficult. If you keep the meat submerged in liquid nitrogen too long, it freezes. If you defrost the meat too quickly, the texture is compromised—the result is mushy lobster. Aside from producing incredible results, liquid nitrogen drastically reduces prep time—hours can be shaved down to minutes.

Being able to serve Ferran Adrià a dish that was born out of my own culinary explorations was amazing. Through the momentous challenge of preparing and executing our most ambitious meal to date, to see chef Adrià eat our food with curiosity, intrigue, and a childlike delight was undoubtedly the single greatest moment in my career.

ElBulli and the concept of elBulli Taller have probably influenced me in more ways than I realize. It was certainly the first establishment that got me interested in Modernist cooking. I suppose then that it was the reason I was so enamored of the possibility of joining the Modernist Cuisine team. But more so than any one technique, the philosophy and mindset of elBulli—to be ever dedicated to curiosity, innovation, and purity of flavor—is what has truly influenced me as a chef.

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Director of Applied Research Scott Heimendinger: Laser-Etched Tortilla

The Virgin Mary has made hundreds of appearances on toast, grilled-cheese sandwiches, and quesadillas. Far fewer people, however, have witnessed the visage of legendary Spanish chef Ferran Adrià on the surface of their tortilla.

As part of the epic, 50-course tasting, we decided to have some fun with the presentation of our Milagro al Pastor. Before the course arrived, servers littered the tabletop with English- and Spanish-language newspaper articles touting miraculous appearances of the Virgin Mary in various griddled foods. As our guests curiously pored through the flyers, the dish arrived: alternating layers of pork and beef, laminated and cut into perfect cubes, which sat atop an avocado purée embroidered with dots of fiery red achiote sauce. The dish was a richly flavored and technically exquisite interpretation of tacos al pastor, but it was also the setup for the punchline that followed. Head chef Francisco Migoya rounded the table inauspiciously, offering corn tortillas to accompany the course. When chef Adrià pulled a warm tortilla from the top of the stack, he was more than a little surprised to see that his own face adorned the surface.

How did we create this eBay-worthy tortilla? In the days leading up to the dinner, we worked to perfect the technique of transferring black-and-white images onto the surface of tortillas using a laser engraver in our machine shop. Although designed for cutting and etching plastic, wood, and thin metals, the engraver happens to be remarkably useful for toasting the faces of unwitting guests onto flat foods. You might remember the time we etched Jimmy Kimmel’s face onto an omelet for Nathan’s appearance on Jimmy Kimmel Live. This time we had much more control of the joke, including the rather elaborate setup leading to the final unveiling.

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Why, you might ask, go to all this trouble? The dish would have been just as delicious in the absence of Adrià’s face. The joke demonstrates one of the hallmarks of Modernist cooking—the desire to extend the dining experience beyond our five senses—in this case, to include humor. Many Modernist chefs, including honoree Ferran Adrià, punctuate their tasting menus with moments of levity: welcome reminders, amidst a marathon meal, that the point is to enjoy yourself.

Making humor part of the menu is a gamble in the same way you might wrestle with using a joke to begin a speech. Will the joke fall flat? Is this as funny as we think it is? We anxiously held our breath before the reveal. When chef Adrià recognized his likeness on that corn tortilla, he heartily laughed out loud, smiling ear-to-ear with genuine exuberance. He even tucked an extra tortilla into his notepad to show his brother, Albert, who is opening a Mexican restaurant later this year.

It was one of many incredible moments that night. We’re thrilled that our joke paid off and honored to have shared it with a chef whom we so admire. Only time will tell if laser-etched faces will be the next big trend in Modernist cooking, but, for now, we’ll keep inspecting our tortillas for signs from above.

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Read more about how chef Adrià and experiences at elBuilli inspired Nathan and the idea behind Modernist Cuisine.

Welcoming Ferran Adrià

Ferran Adrià is one of the most creative and influential chefs alive, but that isn’t the entire story. He’s also a philosopher and an avant-garde provocateur. From 1983 until it closed in 2011, elBulli was a fountain of tremendous creativity and stimulation, and it was often a source of controversy because of its techniques, approaches to food, and fine-dining philosophy. Ferran, along with the entire vanguard of chefs who pioneered Modernist cooking, played an influential role in the inspiration to write Modernist Cuisine, which covers science and technique but is also a testament to the power of food to be intellectual, emotional, and unpredictable

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I had heard a great deal about elBulli—both the enormous praise and the debate over what Ferran was doing—well before ever eating there. Although I had already visited its sister restaurant in Barcelona, I was completely shocked when I finally experienced elBulli. Within three dishes, I was blown away. Why hadn’t I eaten here sooner? The food was interesting, intellectual, and deeply profound. This statement sounds somewhat silly, but, in reality, what I was eating spoke to me in the most amazing way. My first spherified olive was a revelation.

Throughout the evening, it became apparent that what I found truly stunning was the enormous range of techniques, methods, and ingredients. In one course diners might be presented with something highly technical, quintessentially Modernist. The next would be insanely simple yet equally as imaginative. Immature pine nuts, harvested by breaking open green pinecones, were transformed into something entirely original. It’s a simple, overlooked ingredient, but at elBulli it became tender risotto.

Incredible moments of playful surprise were always expected, and yet unexpected, throughout the meal. I was served what I thought was a perfect, small baguette. It appeared to be entirely ordinary, but the first bite revealed the “bread” to be completely hollow. I then might discover that a heavy-looking item was actually a foam (essentially a wisp of air bound together by minuscule ingredients) in disguise.

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After experiencing elBulli, one can’t help but wonder who Ferran is cooking for because his food works on so many levels at once. Dishes are not intended to simply showcase a new texture, flavor, or technique—they reference the history and future of gastronomy in a single bite. In many ways, the experience is akin to discovering the work of a truly prolific writer for the first time. A gifted writer can do something amazing with words, producing work that is polysemous, that is simultaneously evocative and provocative, reminding readers that words can be powerful. Ferran’s food works the same way. A single dish at elBulli could be amazingly novel and unique, yet, on the same plate, allude to the familiar and classical: the neoteric pine nut risotto simultaneously celebrated this tradition. Understanding the history of gastronomy provided an even greater appreciation of what I was eating. These weren’t just meals—they were servings of a deeply cherished philosophy.

Though elBulli is gone, now reincarnated into a series of exciting projects, we are certain Ferran Adrià will continue to drive the culinary world. Our team was thrilled to see his newest book, elBulli 2005–2011, an incredible masterpiece that not only captures the final seasons of elBulli but also the creative spirit of Ferran’s restaurant. Of course, we were also rather amused when we placed Modernist Cuisine and elBulli 2005–2011 next to each other. With numerous volumes, both are heavy, to say the least, and must be contained within acrylic cases. The books, however, couldn’t be more different.

Modernist Cuisine is an exploration of techniques employed across the world of cuisine—the contributions of 72 different chefs are found throughout our volumes. In contrast, Ferran’s book is amazing because it’s the singular vision of one chef, supported by a fantastic team. The intellectual evolution of his cuisine, a concept particularly important to Ferran, is covered in fascinating detail. Last fall we were thrilled when we got word that Ferran would be able to visit The Cooking Lab during his book tour. It would become an incredible opportunity to demonstrate how he has influenced what we do and the evolution of our food.

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Normally, lab dinners showcase the techniques we describe in Modernist Cuisine with a menu that typically spans 30 courses. Dishes range from very traditional to very modern in order to demonstrate the content of the books. But for Ferran, our goals were different. Firstly, we wanted to serve him as many courses as he had served me. Secondly, we wanted to construct a menu centered on creativity and innovation as well as celebrate elBulli by organizing the courses into thematic sequences so that the experience would be similar to what diners encountered at elBulli.

The idea of cooking for Ferran Adrià is truly exciting but also rather daunting. It is quite rational to worry that we might make fools of ourselves. We started planning the menu as a team in January, casually bouncing ideas off each other for new, exploratory concepts. Over the course of several months, we reimagined our repertoire, fine-tuning and perfecting some of our hallmark dishes. A dozen new courses were debuted, and we ultimately eliminated several others. In fact, we met just three days before the dinner to go over the final menu. A handful of dishes didn’t make the cut, but eventually our sequences emerged—nine in total. Each sequence consisted of five to seven dishes bound together by a theme, whether it was a country, like France or Italy, or a phase of the meal, like cheese or dessert.

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Meals at elBulli started with a welcome cocktail, which is something we had never done before. A cocktail at elBulli was not your standard gin and tonic or Manhattan; it was always a cocktail as Ferran imagined. As an homage to elBulli, we started our meal the same way, with a shot of olive oil and basil-infused alcohol. The nine sequences took our guests on an international journey of traditional dishes, all presented in unconventional ways. The night ended with a round of desserts, culminating in absinthe poured over sculptures of 3D-printed sugar.

The dinner was a tour of what Modernist cooking is and can be. We toasted Ferran with intriguing texture, sublime flavors, and, hopefully, a bit of the unexpected. In all, we hope the dinner was a fitting tribute to a chef who continues to inspire us to explore, imagine, and create.

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50 Courses in 60 Seconds: A Toast to Ferran Adrià

On March 7th the Modernist Cuisine team had the distinct pleasure of welcoming Ferran Adrià to The Cooking Lab. Over the course of five hours, our culinary team constructed and served nine sequencess, 50 courses in all, to honor Adrià and his newest book elBulli 2005-2011. Each sequence was thoughtfully designed to ignite the imagination and speak to the incredible diversity of Modernist cuisine. Unexpected flavors and textures transported guests across the globe and back again, often playing on comforting, familiar dishes.

Here are all 50 courses, in just 60 seconds, from the first cocktail to the final pour of absinthe and every bite in between.