The Most Honored Chef on Three Continents and the Island of Mauritius was beaming. His visage suggested the cat who ate the canary also had lapped up some cream to wash it down.
Frenchman Alain Ducasse, 46, who owns or operates restaurants in Monte Carlo, Paris, London, Tokyo, Mauritius and New York City, was enjoying a hard-won victory.
On this night, in mid-January, Ducasse had come to Chicago to participate in a banquet to benefit the Windows of Hope Family Relief Fund. He was in a magnanimous mood.
A month earlier, after 18 months of tension, contention and downright hostility, New York’s critical community waved a white flag in the form of a four-star review in The New York Times. Alain Ducasse at the Essex House, a tiny (65 seats) restaurant tucked away in the rear of a midtown Manhattan chain hotel, was recognized as the biggest big-deal restaurant in the Big Apple.
William Grimes, the Times reviewer, wrote that chef Ducasse’s kitchen was producing “the kind of food that brings diners to their knees” and added that “inconsistencies have all but vanished.”
This from a man who wrote that in its early days the restaurant “had the unmistakable look of a giant gilded turkey” with a menu that was “florid and cryptic.” He also complained about the absence of the chef.
Longtime New York magazine critic Gael Greene acknowledged after several visits that the ingredients at Ducasse were very special and the dishes were “all turned up a notch.” But, she added, “The food must be seriously good. And it isn’t.”
Price and pride were two other key items in the indictment against Ducasse by a sizable cross-section of the press and Manhattan restaurant groupies.
You get what you pay for
People winced when the Daily News (not a likely venue in which to connect with potential Ducasse diners) proclaimed that dinner for two would cost $500.
Grimes reported that his first meal cost $1,500 for four people — before tip. Ducasse responded by citing the high cost of courtside tickets for a Knicks basketball playoff game, but it didn’t matter. With a $160 four-course fixed-price menu, a la carte items such as fillet of striped bass for $74 and $30 glasses of wine, he would bear the burden of being New York’s most expensive restaurant.
But even before the city’s big spenders could check the cash in their wallets, the Ducasse team delivered another blow. Before opening, they announced 2,700 reservation requests had been received and the restaurant would give priority to customers of the chef’s European restaurants. “There will be no special treatment for the press,” Ducasse added pointedly.
In response, the press, with a few exceptions, gave the chef some special treatment of their own. They criticized details of the decor, service, wine selection and, of course, the food.
“It was inevitable,” says Len Pickell, a wine merchant who heads the James Beard Foundation and has dined at the restaurant a dozen times. “When it became evident Ducasse was not God, a game of who could outbash whom in putting down the restaurant started. Eventually, though, some prestigious people became embarrassed and rallied to him.
“And he stuck with it.” Ducasse stayed in New York and “forced an evolution in what came out of the kitchen.”
“He also brought in a really good press agent,” Pickell said, “who did damage control and organized the flow of who got into the restaurant and who among the press got to him.”
But Pickell said some criticism was warranted.
“At the beginning, the staff was stiff, condescending and uncoordinated. Over time, they have learned to work as a team and became much more congenial. In the early days, some of the food was wonderful, but a lot of it wasn’t.
A harmonious meal
“But my most recent meal was phenomenal, five or six courses that were harmonious and had a perfect sense of balance. The chef, Didier Elena, has been there from the first and faithfully executes Ducasse’s concepts whether the boss is there or not.
“Recently Daniel Boulud (chef-owner of Daniel) told me, `If my restaurant is worthy of four stars, Ducasse should have five.'”
During the past year, the chef also worked on his image. Grimes wrote of Ducasse’s “immeasurable self-esteem.” Others find redeeming qualities. “Warm, calm and gentle,” Pickell says. “A wonderful, generous guy with a great sense of humor,” adds his friend Charlie Trotter.
In New York, though, the chef’s reserve was read as an “I don’t care” attitude. Friends protest that intense shyness coupled with a limited command of English kept him quiet. Usually seen in a business suit, if he was seen at all at the Essex House, he was quoted as saying, “I don’t cook at a stove. I cook and create recipes in my mind.”
Susan Magrino, the publicist who is credited with humanizing the chef’s image and steering the press to focus on subjects other than price, came on the scene in the fall of 2000. She represents several highly visible celebrities including Martha Stewart and her connections with movers and shakers range well beyond food journalists.
No arrogance
“I wanted to understand why the media was so critical,” she says. “Everything he and his team was doing was unique, new for New York diners. Personally, he is very much in touch, never grand or arrogant, and has a terrific sense of humor. But he also is extremely French. He is reticent and cannot backslap anyone. He didn’t reach out and, if anything, did not want to make a splash.
“As a result, there was a lack of communication and the media felt excluded. They were not used to being told `You’ll never get in!'” Nor were customers used to being told the restaurant would be closed on Saturday and Sunday and serve lunch only Wednesday and Thursday.
According to her and various reviews, Ducasse worked quickly and very hard to smooth the food preparation and polish the service.
Over time the menu was reshaped and the movement of serving carts no longer resembled a bumper car competition. But the spotlight was on him continually.
“He listened to the criticism,” Magrino says, “and did not comprehend when it took an angry turn. For a time, he couldn’t buy a break.”
To relieve the situation, Magrino sought exposure for different elements of the Ducasse dining experience, pointing out the policy of giving each party its table for an entire evening and drawing attention to details such as the purse stools and a wall of roses that is replaced weekly.
Visibility encouraged
Internally, she pushed for increased access to the restaurant. Friday lunch and Saturday dinner have been added, along with a relative bargain: a three-course prix-fixe lunch menu at $65. She also urged the chef to become more visible in the dining room and he has. She helped channel support for him among prominent New Yorkers and introduced key people to the restaurant.
During his Chicago visit, Ducasse said that “critics are indispensable. Customers respond to reviews and come to our restaurants. Of course when the review is good, it is better for business than if it is bad. But even after a bad review, new customers will come. And they will come back if you do your job with passion and dedication, if you have a permanent desire to do your best.”
As for the high prices, “to survive I need special products and a talented staff. The customer has to pay for that. I also am selling something very rare in New York: space and time.
“My cooking is contemporary haute cuisine based on beautiful, seasonal products. My techniques are French, but 95 percent of my ingredients come from this country. Finding the best products wherever I am is an obsession. I must have the best produce, the best fish. And I must pay the price.
“I have not changed what I am doing in New York. It has evolved. Achieving harmony takes time and 18 months is a short time. But I am satisfied we have achieved a good base.”
