Why are the majority of the stars in British restaurants given to French cooking?
A. The overwhelming influence is from France. We don’t decide the sort of cooking that Michel Roux does at the Waterside or Ramsay does in his restaurant. They decided that. All we have done is made a judgement about it. But it is true to say that that kind of cooking is much more inventive than, for example, Chinese cooking, which is very much based on tradition… In France they have for many years been continually reinventing their cooking, and that has spread all over Europe. Now that’s a fact – we just follow what’s going on. We say that that’s a good restaurant because they made that ingredient and the marriage of those ingredients taste better than another person. It’s much more difficult in other kinds of cooking to identify that improvement. Article continues below ‘); //–> Q. Is it true that restaurants need to be grandly furnished and equipped to get stars? A. The stars are for the food on the plate… but it is true to say that those people who aspire to cook at the highes
