Chef Ferran Adria has an idea to fund his next project. A California restaurant takes the bug by the horns. And a Boston chef has a counter-intuitive idea about dealing with online complaints.
Idea #1: Find capital in the cellar. Spain’s golden chef Ferran Adria plans to auction the contents of the wine cellar of his former restaurant, elBulli, to help fund his new project, “an experimental center looking at the process of innovation and creativity.”
Idea #2: No monkey business. If there’s one thing worse than serving monkey on your menu, it’s serving endangered monkey. Several restaurants and hotels in southeast China were shut down this week for serving rhesus monkeys, which are a protected species.
Idea #3: Eat bugs. The idea of eating bugs is slowly becoming normalized. But it’s not normal yet, except at the Typhoon Restaurant in Santa Barbara, which has a new menu full of bugs. "The silkworms have a texture like popcorn, except they have a creamy center," said Chef Kevin Oh.
Idea #4: Forget everything you’ve learned about social media. You know all that advice you’ve gotten about social media? How you’re supposed to see online complaints as an opportunity to build a strong relationship with a customer? Marc Orfaly, chef at Pigalle in Boston, didn’t read any of those. After a customer took to Facebook complaining that the pumpkin pie she’d had at the restaurant on Thanksgiving tasted like “vomit,” Orfaly told her to “go f--- yourself.”
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