The renowned chef thinks that while most fine dining restaurants are unsustainable, there will always be a place in people’s heart for fine dining
It’s easy to pick out Paul Pairet as he walks into the lobby of Rosewood Hong Kong at the end of March; wearing a faded vest and jeans, his peppered face peering from his trucker hat, he makes for an interesting contrast to the spiffy art-week aficionados frolicking about the hotel, and even more so to the prestigious awards and dining movements with which he’s synonymous.
Pairet was here to promote Nonos and Comestibles par Paul Pairet at the Hotel de Crillon, A Rosewood Hotel in Paris, launched earlier this year and in April respectively. Unlike his Shanghai claim to fame—the three Michelin-starred Ultraviolet—his two latest establishments are a departure from his usual spectacle-ridden modus operandi of “creativity, surprise, precision, wit and reduction”.
Joining the hotel’s existing restaurants—including the Michelin-starred L’Écrin and all-day dining outlet Jardin d’Hiver—the upbeat Nonos is a French grill home to gourmet dishes and French classics. At the Hotel de Crillon, these cuisines are given a ’70s-era makeover: think escargots, onion soups, saucy steaks, egg mimosas, seafood platters, pâtés from around France and racks of beef cut tableside on a carving trolley. The retro edge was a fortuitous surprise, adds Pairet, who only discovered later in the development process the similarities between his menu and those from yesteryears. His initial goal, he says, was simply to serve guests a taste of nostalgia that’s only second-best to how their mothers used to make them.
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“Everyone’s memory of their favourite food will always be their mothers’ cooking—so if we can make the second-best in everything, that’ll make me very happy,” he says. “Our goal at Hôtel De Crillon is delivering good comfort food, things that already exist everywhere but are also hard to find. Take the roast on the trolley: it’s simple home cooking that French restaurants don’t think is interesting enough to put on their menus. But it’s here: we’ve recreated a version that marries the simplicity of the dish and the luxury of the hotel.”
The accompanying deli, Comestibles (which means “edibles” in French) is a chic addition that complements Nonos’ offerings. The outlet serves sandwiches, snacks and quick bites for takeaway or munching on premise.
“I love this inside a hotel. The food is readily here; it’s flexible; it’s something you can eat all day long,” he says. “Most of the guests have been to so many fine dining restaurants, but there are days when they want to rest and have something nice and simple.”
Pairet calls his partnership with the storied establishment “a perfect storm”. Officially, the invitation came from Hotel de Crillon’s managing director Vincent Billiard—a long-time fan of the chef’s Shanghai restaurants. The opportunity arrived at a time when Pairet was looking for a new adventure in Paris, where he has been spending prolonged periods as a judge for the French cooking reality show Top Chef. At a deeper level, however, the Parisian hotel means so much more to Pairet.
He remembers his first meal there—prepared by then head chef Christian Constant—when Pairet visited as a young chef in his 20s.
“I remember there was a white bean soup and a dessert trolley with a mille-feuille this big,” he gestures a gap as wide as a dictionary with his middle finger and thumb. “There aren’t a lot of palaces in Paris, but there’s nothing like Hotel de Crillon. It’s very special and I have a lot of memories there,” Pairet says.
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