After five decades at a job, most people are ready to retire, or at least slow down. Legendary chef Alain Ducasse, on the other hand, takes on new projects every year while insisting that he’s not actually working. “I’m fortunate enough to do only what I’m interested in,” he says. His passions have included three dozen restaurants around the globe, hotels, cookbooks, and chocolate factories. Ducasse took a few moments from his worldwide schedule to answer a few questions for Desert Companion. This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Many great chefs have developed their skills and careers in your kitchens. What do you look for in a young chef?
The culinary technique isn’t an issue; in my brigades, chefs de partie or junior sous-chefs already have an excellent technical level. What makes the difference is all the rest: the ability to lead a team, the interest for the cultural dimension of food, the creativity, the adaptability to various work contexts … soft skills are really key. They are exactly the ones I look for to choose the head chefs of my restaurants.
This summer, as part of the 50 Best Restaurants Awards, you held a dinner at your Las Vegas restaurant Rivea, bringing together two chefs from your restaurants. These kinds of pop-ups and collaborations are becoming more common. How do they benefit diners and chefs?
These four-hands events are extremely exciting for both food lovers and chefs. For the former, it’s an opportunity to expand their food experience. At a global level, the entire culinary scene is made of such encounters, influences, and exchanges. And for the latter, it’s a way of enlarging their experience, not only by working with their fellow chefs, but also by discovering a new venue, a new ambiance.
Rivea combines French and Italian techniques and dishes. Is there something about French training or cuisine that makes it especially adaptable to fusion dining?
What is crucial is the incredibly large array of techniques that French cuisine has fine-tuned — during centuries. (Whether you’re) in Europe, in the Americas, in Africa or in Asia, you can always start with local ingredients and use French techniques to elaborate excellent recipes. Which leads us to the second point: “Fusion” does not interest me. Most of the time, fusion is synonymous with confusion. What is exciting and promising is to see chefs in countries that are emerging on the global culinary scene who use French techniques to prepare recipes which are part of their cultural, traditional heritage. They don’t betray their cultural roots: they make them blossom.