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费兰·阿德里亚（Ferran Adrià）
For one day last week, the Diamond Ballroom at Hong Kong's new Ritz-Carlton hotel was turned into a lecture hall. The audience was a small group of media and die-hard foodies, and the speaker was Ferran Adrià, the man behind Spain's famed El Bulli restaurant and the world's most influential chef.
He was dressed in a white jacket with gray slacks and black dress shoes, but he wasn't giving a cooking demonstration. Instead, the 49-year-old Catalan pontificated like a philosophy professor on the existential nature of cuisine.
'When does a tomato taste like a tomato?' Mr. Adrià asked. Is it when you cut it and put salt on it? Is tomato sauce natural? He considered several other ingredients the same way too, pondering the hypothetical problem of creating a pastry made of strawberries. 'All of cuisine is an elaboration,' he said.
At El Bulli, Mr. Adrià was a pioneer of molecular gastronomy ─ a term he disdainfully describes as 'marketing.' The three-Michelin-star restaurant, which ranked No. 1 on Restaurant Magazine's World's 50 Best Restaurants a record five times over the past decade, was legendary for its deconstructionist and experimental cuisine.
Then, in July, at the height of El Bulli's powers, Mr. Adrià closed the eatery where he had first become head chef in the mid-1980s.
Which brings us to Hong Kong. It's a mark of the celebrity nature of chefs these days that Mr. Adrià was touring Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong courtesy of the Spanish tourism board, in the hopes of generating interest among Chinese travelers. It was his second visit to China, and he said he hopes to spend more time there ─ studying Chinese cuisine, of course.
'I'm more interested in finding out why dairy products aren't used in a dish than the dish itself,' he said in an interview. 'Why do they [the Chinese] put all the dishes in the middle of the table? Why do they cook vegetables so quickly but fish for so long? Why are there a lot more hot dishes than cold dishes in Chinese cuisine?'
Mr. Adrià's long-term project is a new culinary foundation, which is scheduled to open in 2014 on the site of his former restaurant. It will host a rotating group of 20 chefs who will visit for months at a time. Alongside Mr. Adrià, they will create new dishes and work on different approaches to cooking.
'It's a very strange project…and the most important challenge of my career,' he said. 'It's like if I were a musician who used to do 150 concerts a year and dedicated some time to composing. But then you change, to go to 90% composing and 10% performing. That's what I want to do.'
There were times when Mr. Adrià was tempted to open restaurants in his name around the world like many of his peers ─ Joel Robuchon or Gordon Ramsay, for instance. But he decided against it. 'I would have felt like I prostituted myself,' he said.
Still, he is aware of the business side of his profession.
'The restaurant never made money,' Mr. Adrià said, adding that most of his personal earnings come from consulting and advertising endorsements with firms such as PepsiCo and Spain's Telefónica. Corporate events were also a moneymaker ─ companies would pay up to 115,000 (about $188,000) to spend a full day at El Bulli and witness the chef in his kitchen, creating a sample of his dishes, he said.
He is targeting a fund of up to 8 million to pay for his new project. The site will house an archive, museum and special media presentation lab, all designed by Spanish architect Enric Ruiz-Geli.
While Mr. Adrià said the foundation is unique, he was inspired by Harvard University, where he taught a class in culinary physics last year.
'When one goes to Harvard, there's something that impresses you,' he said. 'That's the spirit of El Bulli, something overwhelming.'
参考译文：
8月底的一天，香港新开的丽思卡尔顿酒店(Ritz-Carlton)的金钻宴会厅变成了讲堂。台下听众是一小群媒体人士和铁杆老饕，台上讲话的是西班牙著名餐馆阿布衣餐厅（El Bulli，加泰罗尼亚语“斗牛犬”之意）的掌门人、全球最具影响力的大厨费兰•阿德里亚(Ferran Adrià)。
阿德里亚身穿白色上衣、灰色休闲裤和黑色正装皮鞋。不过，这位49岁的加泰罗尼亚人并没有做烹饪示范，反而像哲学教授那样讲起了烹调的存在主义本质。
阿德里亚问道，什么时候番茄吃起来味道像番茄？是你把它切开来，撒上盐的时候吗？番茄酱是天然的吗？他还用同样方式剖析了其他几种食材，并探讨了如何用草莓来制作糕点这样一个虚构的问题。他说，所有烹调都是一种阐释。
在阿布衣餐厅，阿德里亚是分子料理的先驱── “分子料理”这种说法他并不喜欢，并鄙夷地将其斥为一种营销手段。阿布衣餐厅是一家米其林三星(three-Michelin-star)餐馆，过去十年曾创纪录地五次荣登英国《餐厅杂志》(Restaurant Magazine)全球50家顶尖餐馆排行榜榜首，这家餐馆以其解构主义和实验主义烹饪风格而享誉世界。
但阿德里亚今年7月份关闭了处于发展巅峰期的阿布衣餐厅。阿德里亚从二十世纪八十年代开始担任该餐馆主厨。
我们在香港见到了阿德里亚。他应西班牙旅游局之邀赴中国北京、上海和香港参加西班牙旅游宣传活动，这彰显了当今大厨们的明星本色。这是阿德里亚第二次访问中国，他表示希望在中国多待一段时间，当然，是为了研究中国菜。
他在接受采访时称，“与菜肴本身相比，我更感兴趣的是这样一些问题，比如为什么中国菜里不放乳制品，为什么中国人把所有菜都放在桌子中间，为什么他们做蔬菜的时间非常短，而做鱼的时间却很长？为什么中国菜里热菜比冷菜要多得多？”
阿德里亚要做的长期项目是创立一个烹饪基金会，计划于2014年在阿布衣餐厅原址开放。该基金会将安排厨师来此进行为期数月的访问，每次人数为20名。大厨们将与阿德里亚一道创作新菜肴，研究各种不同的烹调方法。
他表示，“这是一个非常特别的项目……是我职业生涯中最重大的挑战。好比我是个音乐家，以前每年参加150场音乐会，另外还会花一点时间来作曲。但现在情况变了，要花90%的时间来创作，10%的时间来演出。这就是我想做的事情。”
阿德里亚也曾经想要像若埃尔•罗比雄(Joel Robuchon)或戈登•拉姆齐(Gordon Ramsay)等诸多同行那样，在世界各地开以自己名字命名的餐馆，但他最终还是决定放弃。他说，“这让我有种自卖自身的感觉。”
不过，他也会从商业角度来看自己的职业。
阿德里亚称，这家餐馆从来没赚过钱。他还说，他个人收入大多来自咨询以及为百事公司(PepsiCo)、西班牙电信（Telef口nica）等企业做的广告。公司活动也是一大收入来源。他说，公司会支付多达115,000欧元（约合188,000美元）包场阿布衣餐厅一天，并看他在厨房里做烹饪示范。
他计划最多斥资800万欧元来实施他的新项目。旧址旁将建设一个档案室、一座博物馆和一间特殊媒体展示实验室，均由西班牙建筑师昂里克•鲁伊斯-杰利(Enric Ruiz-Geli)设计。
尽管阿德里亚声称这个烹调基金会是独一无二的，不过他也曾受到哈佛大学(Harvard University)的启发。去年他曾在哈佛讲授一门名为烹饪物理的课程。
他说， 当你走进哈佛的时候，会有一些东西摄住你的心神。阿布衣餐厅的精神也是如此，令人无法抗拒。
