Original subtitles

♪♪

[ Engine revs ]

♪♪

-Have you ever dined in a restaurant?

Cafe. Brasserie.

Maybe you've ordered an entree off the menu.

Something sauteed. Soufflé.

Flambé.

Or maybe you were recommended some wine via sommelier.

And for dessert,

maybe you've had a patisserie or a crepe prepared by a chef.

I could go on and on,

but you get the point.

It's impossible to overstate

how much modern dining owes to France.

-There goes the fries.

-I'm Eva Longoria, and I'm a serious Francophile.

Santé.

Over the past 20 years, my career as an actor

has brought me to France time and again.

It's my home away from home.

But those trips were more about work than joie de vivre.

[ Cheers ]

Now I want something deeper.

This is going to be an adventure.

So I'm setting out to really experience France.

-This is Cabernet Sauvignon. -[ Gasps ] That's my favorite.

To savor its world-celebrated cuisine...

Wow!

...and explore the country's rich history.

Vive la France! [ Laughs ]

Now I'm doing a deep dive into

how French gastronomy rose to dominate the globe

and epitomized great food.

Before the strictness of its culinary rule book

sowed the seeds of discontent.

-That changed the course of French food history.

-But this is no stuffy school lesson.

You know me. I love to eat.

This plate is paradise.

-Paradise.

-This story is told in the form of an unforgettable,

classic seven-course meal.

-Seven was the magic number. -Really?

And with the help of my special guests.

How are you?

Not to mention some top French chefs.

-[ Laughs ] -[ Laughs ]

-We'll find out how one man made French cuisine

the global gold standard.

-Escoffier is the most celebrated chef of that period.

-Why some chefs rebelled against this legacy.

-I wasn't born when someone made up this rule, you know.

-So... -Why not change it?

And how France is still seen as the mother of all cuisines.

Mothers make things better.

You need the mother for all things.

-I'm sold. -Sold.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-I just can't stay away from Paris.

Stretching along the banks of the Seine,

much of the history of French cuisine starts here.

Today I'm going on a unique culinary voyage.

And when I say voyage, I'm not kidding.

All aboard!

I'm about to set sail along this majestic river

on the state-of-the-art floating restaurant

run by one of the world's greatest chefs, Alain Ducasse.

And joining me on this culinary adventure

is another master of French cuisine, Chef Eric Ripert.

-Bonjour, Eric. -Bonjour.

-How are you? -Very good.

-Oh. -Great to see you.

-Good to see you. Thank you for coming.

-I'm so happy to be here.

We're gonna have a great dinner.

-It's gonna be nice. -It's going to be so nice.

-I think we're gonna have fun, too.

-We are gonna have fun. Wait till we get drinking.

-Oh, yeah. Yeah. Of course. In five minutes.

-In five... -[ Laughter ]

-Hailed as one of the world's best restaurants,

Eric's Le Bernardin was among the first

to win three Michelin stars in New York,

which he's held for 20 years.

What age did you start?

-15, in culinary school. 17, I was in Paris in restaurant.

-Wow. -Hello.

-Oh, my gosh. Thank you for coming.

-I'm so happy to be here.

-Bonjour, Chef. -Bonjour.

-Ca va. -Ravie, ravie.

-My other guest is fellow American food and culture writer

Lindsay Tramuta, who I met on

the Paris leg of my French journey.

It's going to be an exciting day

because we're not only going to be eating our way

through the history of French cuisine,

we're going to be cruising down the Seine.

-Spectacular.

-Look at that. It's so amazing.

-Welcome aboard.

Can I offer you a glass of champagne as an aperitif?

-Thank you. -Merci.

-Wow. -Santé, Santé.

-I hope these guys are hungry

because we're about to eat seven courses.

The traditional number for a formal French meal.

Why seven courses?

When did this formality of coursing out a meal begin?

-It has been an evolution.

Before it was everything on the table.

-Like a buffet? -Like a buffet.

And everything was cold at the end.

And in the 19th century,

Escoffier refined the idea of the evolution of your menu.

And seven was the magic number.

-I think I'll be hearing Escoffier's name a lot today.

He transformed fine dining from a jumble of different plates

all at once to a sequence of distinct complementary courses

to create an elegant gastronomic journey.

-Escoffier is like the-- -The godfather of the rules?

-Yes. -He set the rules?

-Yeah. -Definitely.

-Well, we should check out the menus.

-Ah, sure.

-Yes. Let's see.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven.

♪♪

Our seven-course feast has been designed by Alain Ducasse's

on board team to tell the gripping story

of French cuisine.

♪♪

-Head Chef Jean-Philippe Behrens

is launching our culinary journey

with two contrasting appetizers or amuse bouche.

♪♪

You know what I love?

I love many things about French cuisine,

but what I love is an amuse bouche.

This concept of entertaining your mouth before we even begin.

-The idea is to tease you a little bit.

-Yeah. Yeah.

-It's to prepare your palate, too.

-As well. Yes. -For what's to come.

-Yeah.

-And you can start to drink wine, which is a good idea.

-Also an amuse bouche. -It's an amuse bouche for sure.

-Yes.

Not just to tickle our taste buds,

our amuse bouche are a glimpse of what lies ahead,

symbolizing two key moments in French culinary history.

First up is quenelle with Nantua sauce.

Made from a sea bream mousse,

these light dumplings are grilled till golden

and served with a rich crayfish sauce.

Oh! It has a sauce.

♪♪

-That is lovely. -Yes. It's very mild.

-Yeah.

-It's very delicate. It's like a pillow.

-Mm-hmm.

-A light pillow of seafood, right?

-Yeah.

-And then it goes very well with the sauce.

-Yeah. What's the sauce Nantua?

-So Nantua is a sauce with béchamel

and a reduction of crayfish that gives you this color.

And this fantastic flavor.

-Typically made with pike, quenelle with sauce Nantua

epitomize the 19th century heyday

of haute cuisine defined by Auguste Escoffier's

classic dishes with rich sauces.

-That's another hallmark of haute cuisine,

is, you know, a lot of cream, butter.

So the fact that it has béchamel is like, classic.

-I want ten more of these.

-That when they succeed, they're really teasing your taste buds.

-Yeah.

In contrast,

our second sea bream dish is stripped back with no sauce,

just pieces of raw fish marinated in salt,

sugar and lemon and dressed with caviar.

Oh, my God, this one's so good.

-It's really good.

-Mmm.

There's a great pop in your mouth from the caviar.

-Mm-hmm, the caviar, of course brings a luxury to the dish.

And the dorade is so fresh you can serve it like this.

In the '70s,

chefs decided to honor the quality of the ingredients.

So the product has to be very, very fresh.

-Mm-hmm.

This simple dish represents the late 20th century backlash

against haute cuisine when chefs rejected the status quo,

moving to lighter, fresher cooking.

How did the French cuisine community react

when new things were being done?

Because I consider French food so by the rules and very rigid.

-Yes, it was a revolution.

-A number of chefs really pioneered this.

That period was very much about letting the flavors

of the product really shine.

-Wow.

I can't believe that was just the amuse bouche.

I also like that we've moved through the history

a bit with just the amuse bouche.

-Yes. -It's a good teaser.

-Yeah, it's a good teaser of what's to come.

Off to our next course. Only six more to go.

-I'm ready.

♪♪

♪♪

-And we're off. -Oh, look at this.

-Oh, yes. -And we're off.

-So special. -We're moving.

-It's nice. I mean, look at this.

-Fantastic.

-My guests, Eric, Lindsay, and I are setting sail

on our voyage through culinary history,

starting all the way back in the 17th century.

You can't cruise down the Seine without making some waves.

And the same can be said for the first

French culinary influencer, Louis the 14th.

He propelled French gastronomy so far forward

like no other before him.

♪♪

In fact, Louis the 14th is such a big deal,

the team are dedicating two courses to his story.

For the soup course,

Chef Behrens is making a lobster bisque with juicy chunks

of lobster tail dressed with ginger, red onion and basil.

Well, let's sit. Come and sit.

-Okay. -Okay.

-So we can have our next course.

♪♪

Merci beaucoup. Wow.

The bisque base is smothered

with an intense lobster broth

combined with lightly whipped cream.

Look at that color.

-Yes. -I love anything with cream.

Let's taste this.

Mmm. Mm.

That cream makes it a little bit tart.

-Brings a little bit of lightness.

The illusion of lightness in a dish.

This is really delicious.

-Mm-hmm. -Louis the 14th loved seafood.

So this dish would have been most likely a second course

during a big banquet.

-A food lover, Louis the 14th, known as the Sun King,

transformed messy medieval style dining

at the Palace of Versailles.

Introducing new customs like serving food at the table

in elaborate displays.

♪♪

Why was Louis the 14th so formal?

-When he was inviting some head of states

from other countries,

he wanted to show off the culture of France.

♪♪

-He really set a standard for not only formal dining,

but it was a form of political theater.

-Right, to show an image of power.

Central to the pomp of these banquets

were beautifully presented dishes,

with the fish course often a high point.

So I want to see how the team are preparing ours.

-Bonjour, Chef. -Bonjour, Eva.

-Stéphane Duchiron is Executive Chef

at Alain Ducasse's Versailles restaurant.

♪♪

-I just wanna...

Oh, yeah. That's very citrusy, that herb.

Wow. I would put that in a cocktail.

-Yes. -[ Laughs ]

♪♪

-Oh, wow. I've never seen this.

The bass is enveloped in a blanket of puff pastry,

which Chef Stéphane sculpts into a work of art.

-Stéphane then bakes it in the oven

while I return to my dinner guests.

♪♪

I checked on the fish.

It's going to live up to the grandeur of...

-Louis the 14th.

-Of Louis the 14th, yes.

♪♪

[ Gasps ]

-Wow. -Wow.

-How do you even cut into this?

[ Laughter ]

-Oh, that sound.

-I know this needs to be an ASMR video.

[ Laughter ]

♪♪

-When the puff pastry is light like that, it's such a delight.

-It's a little bit of tableside theater.

-Stéphane serves the fragrant baked sea bass

with some of the flaky pastry and a traditional beurre blanc,

an emulsion of white wine and butter.

-Merci, Chef. -Merci.

-Bravo. -Merci.

-Merci. -Okay.

-This is magnificent.

♪♪

-Oh.

-The texture of this fish is so delicate.

-It melts in your mouth.

-It's so light and fresh.

-Because it cooks very slowly.

So the flesh relax while it's cooking.

And you have the puff pastry,

which adds the texture to the dish.

So this is the perfect dish.

-I find it incredible that we are still enjoying food

from the Sun King's table four centuries later,

but this gourmet fare was just for the elite.

As this, you know, grand movement was happening

in the court.

What was happening with the common folk?

What were they eating?

-They were eating this. -Bread.

-Bread. It was a big part of the meal.

It was a big difference between the court and the king

-and -- and the people. -The people. Mm-hmm.

-And therefore-- -Hence the French Revolution.

-That led to the French Revolution.

-For nearly a century,

the Sun King's culinary influence spread

to the households of the aristocracy

until the French Revolution

and the end of the Ancien Régime

changed the course of gastronomic history.

-Emerging from these private kitchens,

these skilled chefs opened their own establishments.

They introduced the public to haute cuisine,

and the French restaurant industry was born.

Now you have customers and clients.

And so that feedback of evolving a recipe

or evolving product into something else

-probably exploded. -For sure.

-Yeah.

-That changed the course of French food history.

It led entirely the way to a new chapter of restaurants

and eventually in the way that we know them today.

-That's exciting. -Yeah.

-What happens next?

♪♪

♪♪

We have red wine. Our first red wine.

-Santé. -Santé.

-We're halfway through our seven-course meal.

Time for our main course,

which takes us into the 19th century.

All right, so our plat principal is Beef à la Rossini

in Périgueux sauce.

-It's a very luxurious dish made with beef and foie gras,

and then sauce Périgueux, which is made with espagnole sauce,

which was defined by Escoffier.

♪♪

-Escoffier was the most celebrated chef of that period,

who codified a lot of the rules of dining.

-So he created this dish?

-He didn't create it, but he popularized it.

-By the late 1800s,

a new bourgeois class with gourmand taste

was creating an explosion in the restaurant industry.

There were no standardized recipes or techniques.

Enter Auguste Escoffier,

who in 1903 wrote a book of rules and recipes training chefs

to deliver a consistent level of professional cooking.

-Escoffier said, "Okay..."

-Key to Escoffier's haute cuisine

were sauces adding unity and depth to his dishes.

He classified the top five essential mother sauces

for chefs to master.

So I have asked Eric to give me a lesson.

-Okay, Eric.

Please explain to me these five mother sauces.

-So mother sauce is the basic,

and you can add ingredients in it and you change the flavor.

-Then it becomes something else.

-Something else.

-The pinnacle of haute cuisine,

the five mother sauces are still used

by classically-trained chefs today.

They include the egg-based hollandaise

and the classic tomato.

Is it made of tomatoes?

-It's made with tomatoes.

-The remaining three sauces are made

with a base called a roux.

-So we're going to put the butter here.

-A mix of melted butter and flour.

You know, I always did this,

and I never knew it was called a roux.

-Oh, you never knew? -No.

This is just how I would thicken my gravy.

-Yes, of course.

-Simply adding milk to the roux

creates the most widely used of the five sauces, béchamel.

And what are your favorite things to do with béchamel base?

-I make cauliflower gratin with it.

-Really? -Yes, at home.

-Next is the velouté,

where instead of milk, the roux is mixed with stock.

-It's almost like a soup.

-And finally, the most refined of the mother sauces

is the espagnole,

which is the base for our upcoming sauce, Périgueux.

So we will be eating this one.

-Oh, for sure we're gonna eat this one.

-Okay.

-It's basically a reduction of veal stock--

-And veal broth.

-Veal broth, very dark, already very reduced.

-Hence the color.

-I like that it's called mother sauces,

not the father sauces.

You know what I mean? Mothers make things better.

You need the mother for all things.

-Eva, I agree with you. -[ Laughs ]

-I'm sold. -Sold.

-Mother sauces.

Chef Jean-Philippe transforms our espagnole mother sauce

into a refined Périgueux with Madeira and black truffle.

♪♪

Beef Rossini is made with filet mignon,

foie gras and black truffle tailored by Escoffier

to please the lavish taste of the bourgeoisie.

Wow, look at those truffle.

-It looks beautiful.

-It looks like chocolate. -The proportions are amazing.

In between the foie gras and the beef, the truffles.

But also you have a crouton that brings a bit of texture,

but also will drink the juice of the beef.

-This is gorgeous.

And as with all classic haute cuisine,

the dish is tied together with our luxurious sauce.

That's a thick sauce.

-This is beautiful.

♪♪

-Mmm. Oh, that's nice.

Mm, that lean filet mignon with the fatty foie gras

is a good combination.

-It has the texture that is very velvety.

But foie gras brings a lot of richness to the dish.

-With the sauce that creates a softness too.

I mean, it's just delicious.

-Mm. -Wow.

-This is the eye of gourmandise in cooking.

All the elements are beautiful and delicious.

And I think this dish represents Escoffier

-and his success very well. -Mm-hmm.

Did Escoffier have an influence on you?

-Oh, for sure. -Yeah?

-He basically codified the way you organize your kitchen

and the way you serve as well in the dining room.

-Escoffier's haute cuisine needed an efficient workforce

to deliver his recipes in his strictly ordered, coarse format.

But with no organization,

kitchens were chaotic and lawless.

-I've always...

-To bring these rowdy rebels under control,

Escoffier created an army-like brigade system with a hierarchy

and clearly defined roles.

So what exactly is the brigade system?

-The brigade system is an organization.

Escoffier is coming from military.

And he keeps the same words.

Not a general, but a chef, sous chef and chef de partie.

And with all the parts, the meat, the fish,

the vegetables, the sauce.

-A game changer.

His system is still widely used today.

-We need this brigade system because if you want to,

to push out of the limit and to have something more creative.

-But Escoffier knew good restaurants also needed

great service,

so he continued his military regime into the dining room.

-The beautiful roasted chicken.

-Oh, my gosh.

-And this, my friends,

saw the dawn of the intimidating French waiter.

♪♪

It's not just me, is it?

They are scary.

with a rigid chain of command,

Escoffier's front of house Brigade system

provided seamless service in the dining room.

-So everyone has a role in their position.

So this was then also applied abroad in other cultures?

-Yes.

You have the captains,

which are called maitre d'hotel in France,

the chef de rang, and the commis.

-So there's this hierarchy to the brigade system?

-Yes.

-When you started out, did you work your way up the system?

-Oh, yes, of course,

-I started as line cook-- -Wow.

-And then chef de partie much later,

and I became a chef about 10, 11 years.

-Into the profession. -Into the profession, yes.

-Wow.

-Now I get why Escoffier is known as the father

of modern cuisine.

His strict rules of fine dining

are still seen all over France today.

From the brigades to the food and even the sauces.

The sauce is the star of the plate.

Because you can feel and taste the truffle in the sauce.

-It's also harmonious, right?

The sauce brings all the ingredients together.

It's paradise.

-This plate is paradise.

-That's it.

We'll rename it.

♪♪

♪♪

-The first half of the 20th century

was unstoppable for French gastronomy.

They were basking in the glory of Escoffier's legacy.

The French brigade system became the global standard,

French techniques became the cornerstone

of culinary education

and not to mention the rise of the Michelin Guide.

♪♪

-I've always been fascinated by the Michelin-star system.

How did a tire company decide who is the best of the best?

-I mean, I think you have to remember

how they started even reviewing restaurants,

and it's because they were encouraging people

-on the motorway to take breaks. -Right.

-I actually have a little surprise here.

I found this 1978 guide.

So it's not the oldest, obviously,

because they started attributing stars in 1926.

-Oh, really?

♪♪

To encourage travel and therefore tire sales

on France's expanding road network.

Michelin Tires created a restaurant guide using

the standard set by Escoffier

to award stars for quality and consistency.

-So one star would be good cooking in its class.

Two is excellent cooking worthy of a detour.

-Ooh.

-And then three stars worthy of a special journey.

-Oh, like a destination? -Yeah.

-Is it still the same qualifications today?

-Those are still how they write.

-Yes, it is the same qualifications.

-What started out as a travel guide

soon became the benchmark for haute cuisine,

creating the first ever celebrity chefs.

Over the 20th century,

Michelin started to issue guides around the world,

including New York, awarding three stars to Eric's

modern French restaurant, Le Bernardin.

When you started out,

did you aspire to become a Michelin-starred chef?

-I always wanted to be the chef that I am today.

I wanted to be the chef of a big brigade

who can create those great dishes

and have people potentially traveling to come

and have a very specific and special experience.

-To just see you.

-Well, not to see me, to eat the food.

-Yes, but you are the food.

This is your story that you tell.

-Yeah, it's my story for sure.

-Still the gold standard,

these days Michelin doesn't just award stars

for Escoffier-style fine dining,

which brings us to our fifth course.

A risotto of seasonal fruits and vegetables.

♪♪

-Merci beaucoup. -Je vous en prie.

-[ Gasps ] Oh, my goodness, it's beautiful.

I love a colorful plate.

-This is a signature dish of Monsieur Ducasse.

♪♪

-Mmm.

-It's a texture explosion. -Yes.

-'Cause there's like the softness of vegetables,

the little structured fruit, and then that grain.

It's like a party.

-A little bit. Yeah. A party.

-A little texture party happening in my mouth.

-It's inspired by nouvelle cuisine.

-Wow.

-Vegetables and fruits are assembled together.

So that way you can taste every flavor

-from every vegetable and fruit. -Right.

-In the '70s,

chefs decided to honor the quality of the ingredients.

Less sauce.

And it's lighter.

Nouvelle cuisine was a revolution

before it was a dictature from the Escoffier era.

You were not able to express yourself.

You couldn't put cilantro if it was tarragon

because it was not authorized.

-Seeking creative freedom,

some of France's top emerging chefs

started to reject the doctrine of classic haute cuisine.

♪♪

-There is a lot of different chefs Michel Gérard,

Paul Bocuse, Les Trois.

These kind of chefs start to really break the rules.

♪♪

-Inspired by the '60s counterculture,

these young chefs shook up the status quo,

leaving many of the older generation

appalled at this rebellion.

-I can tell you that my grandfather,

when he saw the Nouvelle cuisine arrived,

he was completely upset. He said, "It's bullshit."

It's a... So, there was a generation, you know,

who were completely against that for sure.

-Nouvelle cuisine started to appear

on Michelin-starred menus, creating a new trend.

But inevitably, some chefs went overboard.

And soon this new movement became a victim

of its own success.

♪♪

♪♪

-It became a caricature and a bad word

because you ended up with three string beans parallel

-to each other, barely cooked. -Oh.

-With a tiny piece of chicken. -I remember this now.

-Yeah, yeah, yeah.

-And they will come to the table with all the formality.

Put a gigantic silver cloche on top.

-For three green beans.

-Everybody at the same time.

-You'll be like, "Oh." -Oh, that's it.

-There, that's-- -So it went too far.

-It went too far. They went too extreme.

-Yeah.

-It was lampooned even by Paul Bocuse himself,

who famously said, "Uh, not a lot on the plate,

everything on the bill." I think that tells you a lot.

-As nouvelle cuisine snowballed,

food journalist Gault-Millau tried to define what

it stood for in Ten Commandments.

-The tenets of nouvelle cuisine

were like, "Thou shalt not overcook."

-Oh, my God, they're even in thou shalt not?

-Oh, yeah. -Oh, wow.

-They weren't messing around. -They were serious.

-"Thou shalt use fresh quality products."

"Thou shall eliminate rich sauces."

"Thou shalt be inventive."

-Wait, wait, wait. Wait.

Why would you have harsh rules about not having rules?

-It was a way of understanding this movement,

but it ended up creating another rule book

when they wanted to move away from a rule book.

-Yeah.

-But then we find some balance again.

And Nouvelle cuisine has been very influential still today.

-As the extremes of nouvelle cuisine died out,

its core values of creative freedom

and fresh produce have remained,

leaving their imprint on many top chefs today.

♪♪

-Alain Ducasse took the best of nouvelle cuisine,

and he created a new style without the stupidity

and excess of it to elevate every ingredient

and creating something harmonious with contrast.

And we have a dish

that really represents the best

of what nouvelle cuisine left behind.

♪♪

-Bon appetit. -Bon appetit. Santé.

-Bon appetit.

-[ Laughs ]

-We've docked back at the Eiffel Tower to pick up a VIP

who's joining us for our next course and chapter in our story.

-Mory. -How are you?

-How are you? -Bonjour, Mory.

-Bonjour.

-Ça va. -Ça va.

♪♪

-Mory Sacko is one of France's most cutting-edge chefs.

So I'm dying to know his thoughts on

how French cuisine got to its place on the world stage today.

-We have been talking about the l'histoire

of French cuisine.

-And I love that you're here

because your generation is such a big part

of redefining what has been laid before you.

-Yeah. Hello, Nina. -Hello.

-For your sixth course,

we are breaking with the traditional menu.

And there will be small plates with some cheese.

-Thank you. -You're welcome.

-Thank you. -We're breaking the rules.

-Yeah. -[ Laughs ]

-In classic cuisine,

the sixth course often serves cheese as a bridge

between the main and dessert.

But the late '90s saw a new rebellion

against Escoffier's rules,

rejecting the formality of one course after another.

This movement, dubbed gastronomy,

often serves small plates together.

♪♪

-Bistronomy was the last super big

new movement in culinary here.

-Bistronomy? -Yes, bistronomy.

-Like bistro and gastronomy. -Mixed.

-Mixed together. -Bistronomy.

-Yeah.

-A lot of chefs didn't have the budget

to open a restaurant

and invest in silverware and crystal and tablecloths.

They care about cooking great ingredients,

but caviar and truffles, it's so expensive.

-In the early '90s,

a major recession in France caused thousands of restaurants

to close, paving the way for fast food.

The pressure to maintain the formal standards

of haute cuisine grew too great for some chefs.

In 2003, depressed and under financial strain,

three-starred Bernard Loiseau took his own life.

With the crisis of haute cuisine laid bare,

chefs rebelled by opening more modest bistros

with simplified menus.

-So this bistronomy movement, did this influence you?

-Oh, wow.

-Merci.

-Mmm. -Mmm.

-Oh, yeah, spicy mayo. -Oh, wow.

-Ooh.

-It picks up.

-Yeah.

-I mean, it's okay. I love spicy food.

-No, I love spicy.

-Yeah, I like that.

-That's true.

-Well, I'm moving on to the cheese to calm down this spice.

-Mmm. It is so creamy and fluffy.

-That cheese is really good. -I know.

-The way they whisk it is almost like a whipped cream.

-Okay, I'm gonna try the broth.

I haven't tried it.

-The broth is nice. It's a bit spicy.

-Is it spicy because of the ginger?

-I think so. The ginger kicks a little bit.

-What do you think, Mory?

-As bistronomy evolved into the 2000s,

the internet and cheap travel opened chefs' eyes

to a more global view of gastronomy.

♪♪

-I see life with no boundaries,

and I don't want to define myself about where I'm from.

I've been trained in France.

I've learned many things.

My heart is here in Marseille,

but what I enjoy the most is away.

-Yeah.

The revolution in French cooking

sparked by the economic crisis of the '90s,

created a new freedom for chefs like Mory.

He combines classical French training

with Japanese influences and his West African heritage.

-You are-- -Many things.

-Many things all at once and it's beautiful.

-Yeah.

Mory, thank you so much for coming.

-I'm so happy you were here to talk with us.

You can take the cheese with you.

Leave the wine.

-[ Laughs ]

♪♪

♪♪

-Hey, you guys, we made it!

We made it to the seventh course.

I'm excited about this dessert

because we talked about the rise, the fall,

the resurrection of French gastronomy.

And I want to see how French cuisine is evolving.

The dessert is representing what the future holds

for French gastronomy

experimenting with a French classic.

-That's cool. -Isn't that amazing?

-I like the mystery.

♪♪

-Two top students from the Ducasse Culinary School

have reimagined the classic Strawberries in Chantilly cream,

a dish made popular by Escoffier.

Their version has a base of sliced strawberries glazed

with a strawberry confit.

What's that?

Then, with a flourish of theatrical wizardry,

they pour liquid nitrogen over the Chantilly,

giving it a whole new form.

♪♪

-That's lovely. -[ Gasps ]

Oh, wow!

♪♪

-It's like popcorn. -Yeah.

♪♪

-This is our version of strawberries and Chantilly,

which is with the liquid nitrogen.

And it's based off milk,

which is kind of lighter and kind of healthy.

-Thank you, ladies. -Thank you very much.

-Thank you. -Bravo.

-Wow. -Oh, my gosh.

Mmm.

-Mmm.

-I love it.

I love the flavor.

-Mm-hmm. It's very light and delicious.

-Yeah.

-And you can taste the strawberries.

-I just think it's so playful to take something so simple

like the whipped cream,

the Chantilly and to do it in this format.

-So Eric are you confident about the future

of French gastronomy?

-I am very confident about French gastronomy

because I see the new generation

and the older generation keeping the traditions,

but at the same time moving forward

and adopting new technologies and being creative.

♪♪

-We are succeeding and we are moving on.

And we are in a 21 century. It's the beginning.

Can't wait.

-Ah! Bravo, équipe!

-Well, thank you so much.

You helped us tell the history of French gastronomy.

Felicitation. Merci.

[ Applause ]

♪♪

-After this meal, and talking to my guests,

what can I say? France has it all.

Amazing produce, techniques,

traditions and the talent to train the chefs of tomorrow.

So what's next?

Having created a culinary canon that dominated the world,

France had to break with its own rules to survive.

Now, with unlimited creative freedom,

the sky's the limit for French cuisine.

♪♪