THIS BEAUTIFUL CULINARY WINNER AMAZES NOW

ALINEA -- 2016 JAMES BEARD AWARD WINNER

Alinea, Chicago won the 2016 James Beard Award for Outstanding Restaurant. It is extra-special this year because it is the James Beard Foundation’s 30th anniversary. The Foundation's mission is to celebrate, nurture, and honor America's diverse culinary heritage.

Alinea founder Grant Achatz is as much a master technologist as he is a master chef. He was one of the first chefs to incorporate molecular gastronomy into his menus.

Originally developed as a set of methodologies that transform the physical and chemical properties of ingredients, molecular gastronomy aims to create new sensations and experiences.

Achatz’s award-winning restaurant in partnership with Nick Kokonas, Alinea, in Chicago, was one of the first establishments to feature the technological and aesthetic wonders of modern science and art applied to modern food.

Influenced by modernist Spanish chefs like Ferran Adria, Achatz, who trained at the famed French Laundry, with Thomas Keller, dove into molecular gastronomy with full gusto.

New tastes and textures were developed in the form of ethereal foams, fumes, and flavor bursting spheres, now part of the repertoires of many fine chefs around the world, were first introduced to the US by Achatz.

Achatz invented the anti-griddle, a pan that utilizes a brilliant technology that can freeze the surfaces of foods in seconds. Watch the video here.

Presentation is a big part of Achatz techno-art-taste fusion. He and Kokonas partnered with designer Martin Kastner in Crucial Detail, a studio that makes Alinea’s unique serviceware.

There are dishes that enable you to take bites without using your hands. There are plates resting atop pillows that slowly release transfixing aromas. There is a paraffin wax bowl that suspends ingredients, then releases them into soup when you pulling on a pin.

Edible balloons bring out the kid in you, while Achatz’s Picasso-inspired dessert, painted on a silicon canvas, tableside, stuns you with its mastery.

Menus are designed to lead you on a journey, as residual flavors from one course transition into the next in 18-22 courses.

Achatz likes to arrange, mix, and match foods to a central ingredient in an extreme choreographed performance of “flavor bouncing.” His iconic dish Lamb 86 offers lamb prepared 4 ways, paired with 86 tech-inspired condiments and accoutrements, artfully displayed on a large pane of glass.

Alinea, considered by top critics as “the best restaurant in the world,” boasts 3 Michelin stars and a AAA Five Diamond Award. You can book your own Alinea experience here.  And read more about Alinea and Achatz here.

Read more about Beautiful Winners in The Beauty of Olympic Winners Now and The Most Beautiful Nature Photo Competition Winners Now.

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IMAGE CREDITS:

1. Image: Courtesy of Alinea. “Alinea's Corn, White Chocolate, Honey, & Mango.”
2. Image: Courtesy of Alinea. “Scallop, Citrus Aroma, Fourteen Textures.”
3. Image: by Christian Seel. Courtesy of Alinea. “Dark Chocolate: Chicago. Lingonberry syrup & Yellow Butternut with Drops of Sweet Stout Reduction & Smashed Chocolate Balls.”
4. Image: Courtesy of Alinea. “Binchotan, Tokyo Inspiration.”
5. Image: Courtesy of Alinea. “Lobster, Curry, Earl Grey, & Grapefruit.”
6. Image: by Christian Seel. Courtesy of Alinea. “Crab, Lilac, Rhubarb, & Chervil.”
7. Image: by Christian Seel. Courtesy of Alinea. “Squab, Inspired by Miro.”
8. Image: Courtesy of Alinea. “Balloon, Helium, Green Apple. Edible Balloons.”
9. Image: by Edsel Little. “Lamb 86. Alinea.”
10. Image: Courtesy of Alinea. “Pigeonneau à la Saint-Clair.”
11. Image: Courtesy of Alinea. “Milk Chocolate, Pate Sucree, Violet, & Hazelnut.”
12. Image: Courtesy of Alinea. “Dungeness Crab, Squash Blossom, Cardamom, & Saffron.”
13. Image: by BN App - Download now!
14. Image: by Christian Seel. Courtesy of Alinea. “Uni, Served in the Palm Bowl Service Piece.”