Although my parents were working class, food was at the heart of our family and we ate like kings. Once a year, my parents would take all five of us to a Michelin starred restaurant for the experience, and as a treat. French working class people always ate well and treated themselves, because it's integral to our national culture, where everyone aspires to eat well.
When I arrived in England and opened the Quat' Saisons way back in 1977, I brought this culture with me. We won our second Michelin star in our little Quat' Saisons, where the kitchen was 2.5 metres square, and the restaurant had no frills whatsoever: just plain red and white tablecloths, cheap prints on the wall, and only the image of a cockerel to remind anyone who had any doubts that the restaurant was French.
When I opened Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons it was a shock, as all the values that my parents taught me were in contradiction with my new surroundings. In Britain food was exclusive and class led, luxury was signalled by gold, by heavy carpets, chintz and portraits of ancestors looking down at you in a disapproving manner.
The protocol of the table was so stifling that guests would sit upright on the edges of their seats, and talk about education, schools, the weather or other mundane subjects - and never, ever about food. I watched my guests eat their soup, a dreadful gesture of this spooning away perpendicularly to their upright body, then remarkably bringing the spoon to their lips, and never slurping or making any noise. (The very idea of sipping the soup completely ignores the fact that a little slurp will bring oxygen into the mouth, cooling down the soup and developing its flavour and taste.)
I didn't want to create a French nose bag restaurant, nor just a place for a few rich people; but a place where anyone in Britain could come to celebrate a special moment in their lives. I wanted to make luxury as inspiring and inclusive as food in England was class-bound and exclusive. I also knew that, though everything I wanted to achieve has been lead by ideals, it must be commercially viable.
So I set up a huge programme of change - I created a small French revolution, and no doubt upset a few ancestral taboos on the way:
When I arrived in England and opened the Quat' Saisons way back in 1977, I brought this culture with me. We won our second Michelin star in our little Quat' Saisons, where the kitchen was 2.5 metres square, and the restaurant had no frills whatsoever: just plain red and white tablecloths, cheap prints on the wall, and only the image of a cockerel to remind anyone who had any doubts that the restaurant was French.
When I opened Le Manoir aux Quat' Saisons it was a shock, as all the values that my parents taught me were in contradiction with my new surroundings. In Britain food was exclusive and class led, luxury was signalled by gold, by heavy carpets, chintz and portraits of ancestors looking down at you in a disapproving manner.
The protocol of the table was so stifling that guests would sit upright on the edges of their seats, and talk about education, schools, the weather or other mundane subjects - and never, ever about food. I watched my guests eat their soup, a dreadful gesture of this spooning away perpendicularly to their upright body, then remarkably bringing the spoon to their lips, and never slurping or making any noise. (The very idea of sipping the soup completely ignores the fact that a little slurp will bring oxygen into the mouth, cooling down the soup and developing its flavour and taste.)
I didn't want to create a French nose bag restaurant, nor just a place for a few rich people; but a place where anyone in Britain could come to celebrate a special moment in their lives. I wanted to make luxury as inspiring and inclusive as food in England was class-bound and exclusive. I also knew that, though everything I wanted to achieve has been lead by ideals, it must be commercially viable.
So I set up a huge programme of change - I created a small French revolution, and no doubt upset a few ancestral taboos on the way:
- Never say no
- Share my vision with everyone, so each team member owns it
- Create a culture of welcome, of well being and nurturing your guests
- Remove haughtiness and replace it with warmth - I had to work with my team to get them to share the same vision of creating a place of joy and celebration
- Train, train, train people so as to empower them, and make them confident and strong. Let us give respectability to our industry
- Demonstrate that we have a culture of mutual respect, and the ability to share generously our knowledge
- Make it clear that, while the standards of excellence don't change, the details do
- Teach the sommeliers not to inflict their knowledge on the guests, but to share it with them
- Change the dress code completely. Remove gentlemen's jackets, undo their ties. Help them to be less British, and simply enjoy a great meal and special moment, in a warm environment without the stuffiness.
We have more than 90,000 guests per year without ever sacrificing these ideals; and the commercial imperative works hand in hand. All these encouragements translated into a burst of life in the restaurant: huge commercial gains, and our profile today shows that 50% of our guests are, like my parents and our family, here for an infrequent, perhaps once in a lifetime treat. Our car park has 50% small cars in the car park and 50% Rolls Royces, Porsches and Aston Martins. Equally at the heart of the Le Manoir we have emphasised elegance rather than ostentatious luxury.
The culture of welcome does not mean merely wearing a broad smile. It means having real sympathy for people and complete control of your craft. We actively welcome children, we cater enthusiastically for vegetarian guests, and we're as pleased to celebrate civil partnerships as weddings. As to the dress code, the three-piece suit is still evident, but looking at the guests, from just-married young people to older couples, we see examples of the entire spectrum of contemporary dress, and everything feels so right. It is right.
And yes, to achieve all this, I had to fight: Food writers who didn't want to accept these changes. Chefs who did not want to cook real food for children, and emphatically did not want to cook for vegetarians - vegetables and herbs were alien components of the meal, uninteresting and creatively unchallenging. And even my managers who understood luxury as consisting of chintz and gold taps. So my republican values have served me and le Manoir well. It has helped me to make luxury inclusive, and Le Manoir's table a true feast. And these changes have also made thousands of people who would have not otherwise come to us decide to come.
But beware. Bad habits creep back fast. One of my managers changed the dress code to "casual dress allowed, but be respectful to other guests". That is how a carefully cultivated change of culture can be lost in translation.
Best
RB
Next week: RB returns to the stoves
The culture of welcome does not mean merely wearing a broad smile. It means having real sympathy for people and complete control of your craft. We actively welcome children, we cater enthusiastically for vegetarian guests, and we're as pleased to celebrate civil partnerships as weddings. As to the dress code, the three-piece suit is still evident, but looking at the guests, from just-married young people to older couples, we see examples of the entire spectrum of contemporary dress, and everything feels so right. It is right.
And yes, to achieve all this, I had to fight: Food writers who didn't want to accept these changes. Chefs who did not want to cook real food for children, and emphatically did not want to cook for vegetarians - vegetables and herbs were alien components of the meal, uninteresting and creatively unchallenging. And even my managers who understood luxury as consisting of chintz and gold taps. So my republican values have served me and le Manoir well. It has helped me to make luxury inclusive, and Le Manoir's table a true feast. And these changes have also made thousands of people who would have not otherwise come to us decide to come.
But beware. Bad habits creep back fast. One of my managers changed the dress code to "casual dress allowed, but be respectful to other guests". That is how a carefully cultivated change of culture can be lost in translation.
Best
RB
Next week: RB returns to the stoves
This kind of philosophy is what is needed in more domains rather than Michelin starred restaurants!
Great work pioneering it!
Came upon this by chance.
Your vision is so apparent in your television programmes. we watch in envy the general bon hommie of the kitchen and comment how lovely to work in such a place.. Happy staff equals a happy work place equals wonderful food. We really wish that we could afford to come to this wonderful restaurant for the whole experience. Never mind, perhaps the lottery, anyway its on our wish list. Please keep up your enthusiasm, you really have revolutionised cooking and eating.
Kind regards
Beryl Couling