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Ferran Adria in a white apron and chef’s shirt

Ferran Adria is considered by many to be the best chef in the world. Without a doubt he is one of the most original and creative. Gourmet magazine called him the Salvador Dalí of the kitchen. His restaurant El Bulli was named by prestigious Restaurant magazine as the best restaurant in the world; and in 2006 it was named the best restaurant in the world by the Top 50 Restaurant, a title it has retained ever since. Ferran Adria will undoubtedly go down in culinary history. He was born in 1962 near Barcelona, ​​Spain. He studied in Barcelona, ​​and at the age of fourteen he enrolled in a business administration school. At eighteen he was completely bored and he dropped out to put on uniform jackets and wash dishes in a French restaurant at the Hotel Playafels in Castelldefels, Spain. It was in this restaurant where he learned classic French culinary techniques and read The Practical – The Spanish equivalent of Escoffier’s classic the culinary guide.

After a short stint working at Club Cala Lena in Ibiza in 1981-2, Adria returned to Barcelona and began working as a kitchen helper in the world famous Finisterre. He did his mandatory service in the Spanish Navy at the Cartagena Naval Base, working on the staff of the Captain General’s own kitchen; and it was here that he was first put in charge of running a kitchen himself. After leaving the Navy in 1983, Adria had the opportunity to try out a chef’s shirt at El Bulli in Roses, Spain. He was immediately offered the job of line cook, and a year and a half later he became head chef. Before his arrival, El Bulli was a great unknown. Located in the small town of Roses, at the end of a narrow, winding street on Catalonia’s Costa Brava, it has earned three Michelin stars since Adria took over the kitchen and is only open from mid-June to the end of December. The other six months of the year, Adria travels the world in search of new creative ideas.

At the end of the eighties, Adria began to experiment with cooking, what is known as Molecular Gastronomy: the application of chemistry to cooking and culinary practice. His creations are always a surprise and a delight to his customers, but excellent taste is ultimately the final criteria, and Adria himself refers to his cooking as “deconstructionist” rather than molecular. His objective is to delight the diner with surprise and novelty, contrasting flavors, textures and temperatures, served in meals of up to thirty dishes. He says that the clients of El Bulli do not come to eat, but to live a unique experience. His best-known invention is culinary foam, now used by gourmet chefs around the world. Culinary foam is made from natural flavors, either savory or sweet, that are mixed with a natural gelling agent and packed in whipped cream canisters that are powered by nitrous oxide. The most popular culinary foams are foamed beetroot, foamed mushrooms, and foamed espresso. In addition to working in a white apron at his restaurant and doing his scientific research, Adria has published several cookbooks, including One day in El Bulli, Cooking at homeand ElBulli 2003-2004.