You both make good points. Moving people around or meeting the chef won’t make up for inadequate food and service otherwise. And this extra stuff can prolong a dinner and interrupt your engagement with the other people you are dining with. So it depends on what you are looking for.
When my wife and I book a tasting course, 3 hour+ type of meal, we generally do it as a couple and view it as both a meal and the “show” or entertainment of the evening. So we are happy to spend many hours and to have the conversation and focus be on the meal. If we are planning to catch up with friends/family, we tend to book places where we will get good food, but won’t have all these extras. That way we can focus on the conversation with our friends/family.
And on a side note, we loved Perigee and lamented its passing.
I have had this happen at Korean BBQ restaurants. Lycra, Spandex, wicking, and Lululemon type fabrics absorb these scents and others more than natural fibres, in my experience. LOL
I suspect higher tech, higher capacity fans in the a properly designed open kitchen could take care of this situation.
Many restaurants don’t have the right fans, and an open kitchen concept is going to require properly designed fans.
I notice it right away with a couple places, where the smell of deep frying hangs in the air in the dining room.
I also take the scent of oil in the dining room as an indication that the ventilation might not be that great.
Sitting near the kitchen, where the fans are on, is sometimes one of the better ventilated places to be, if one is a customer who seeks out better ventilation.
Hong Kong’s Michelin 3* Caprice, inside the Fourseasons, has a fully opened kitchen right smack in the middle of the dining room. Configuration has been like that for years. No one seemed to mind or complain?!
Wonder what reason people have regarding Perigee’s open approach?
Steve, we don’t have to agree and I do enjoy a good discussion.
IMHO, fine dining has been moving in a more experiential direction for some time. This is especially true for restaurants in the upper echelon with 2 or 3 Michelin stars. Look at the restaurants that are garnering attention like Alchemist, Noma, Geranium, Frantzen, Wing, … I don’t necessarily like all of them but I do feel that is the direction of how some restaurants are progressing. Even in the case of Canada, why is Taniere the only one in Quebec receiving Two Stars? Is it because the food is so much better than the others or is it because in addition to good food, they deliver a more wholistic dining experience?
As we are discussing fine dining, I do agree that food quality is first and foremost the most important but why does it has to be a trade-off between food quality vs service/experience? These are all meals that cost a small fortune and surely some restaurants can deliver delicious food, good service and a wholistic dining experience? In the case of RPM or The Pine, I believe both deliver good food already. What impresses me recently is their effort to improve on the diners’ experience.
Not sure if you have travelled in the Nordics recently but it is common for chefs to deliver and explain dishes at the table. In my experience, most of the Nordic Michelin starred restaurants there are doing this. This is also standard for counter seating restaurants in Japan. Explanations are almost always by chefs and not servers. Maybe this is rare in Toronto but as someone else points out, Ten does this as well.
Multi-room dining is tricky and I can understand why it might not be for everyone. It is also very difficult to pull off since if it is just moving for a simple bite and back, I would rather stay put. For super long meals that last over 3 hours, I do appreciate the moving around to break up the meal. It works much better if there are other elements such as a kitchen tour, wine cellar tour or a comfortable lounge for coffee. Frantzen does this the best. They start the meal in their lounge that feel like relaxing in a friend’s living room. Amuse bouche and champagne are served. Ingredients are explained and then guests are taken on a kitchen tour before settling in at their counter. At the end of the meal after dessert, guests are then moved back to the lounge where they can enjoy coffee, petit four and a bottomless supply of madeleines. Lingered there for over an hour and never felt rushed to leave.
Takja uses those expensive smokeless grills with exhaust built into the grill itself. Shinpo from Japan is famous for manufacturing them. Think quite expensive but good that they are willing to splurge for these
