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Marmiton.org
For 11 years, the Gourmand World Media Awards have been the international Oscars for food and wine books.
You will meet there well known chefs coming from all countries, authors, journalists, publishers…..gathered all together for their passion: cooking.
Meeting with Jean-Philippe Blanc, Director of two restaurants in Paris :
Findi George V, 24 avenue George V,
Paris 75008. Tel: 0147201478
(Italian) Spicy Restaurant, 8 avenue Franklin-Roosevelt,
Paris 75008. Tel: 01 5659 6259
His family is very famous in Paris as owners of many quality restaurants. He studied business before going back to basics and starting all over again with the CAP technical cooking degree, in the French Official Public School System.
ChristopheDuhamel. CD :
Jean Philippe, why go back to a cooking CAP after your rather classical higher studies?
Jean –Philippe Blanc. JPB :
I got my baccalaureat degree when I was rather young, and I did not know what to do. Those studies were the opportunity to open new horizons. I had had some short practices in restaurants, but I wanted to start at the bottom.
CD:
why this choice?
JPB :
In France, manual labour is not respected in restaurants or elsewhere. They prefer to push everyone to get their baccalaureat, without any knowledge of what they will do after.
There are many jobs in restaurants. And they pay well. You can make quickly 2000 to 3000 Euros net every month without having advanced degrees.
The problem is that even after the CAP degree, students are pushed to get the baccalaureat, then get a BTS degree. Then, some believe they are stars…. They do not want to go through the various stages of training, and already would like to direct a restaurant.
But it is a job of experience. It is experience that makes you able to manage people. And managing people is the essential part of a good restaurant.
CD :
Working in a restaurant is hard work. I imagine this creates problems today.
JPB :
lack of staff may lead restaurants to offer the fifth menu.
CD :
What is the fifth menu?
JPB :
the fifth menu is when a restaurant gives the recipes to be made to an outside unit which will prepare them for him.
The health rules are excellents but it is something else. The french clients are not ready for that.
CD :
You have published a book called On the Findi road, Italian cooking notebook can you explain this concept?
JPB :
I wanted to publish a trendy cookbook, corresponding to the image of my restaurants, where the reader will find the same atmosphere, the same ingredients. However, I understand a trendy restaurant not to be one open recently, but a restaurant which proved itself on the culinary aspects over time, becoming a sure value for its clients.
That book, I wanted it honest and sincero, similar to its recipes, which are true recipes, made in our restaurant, with a lower cost than made by big chefs. This is similar to our trendy restaurants which propose quality cuisine, but with cheaper products, and much more reasonable costs.
There are also some decoration photos. A trendy spot is one third cuisine, one third atmosphere, created by the décor, the music, the clients, but also one third the service. Service is the key to many things, and if it is not there, the client will not come back.
CD :
According to you, what can be done so that people go more to restaurants?
JPB :
Today people are careful with the quality-price ratio.
However, we sell the mineral water, the coffee, the wines at very high prices. Everyone knows how much is a bottle of water. This creates a trust problem. We notice it: when clients take the daily specials, they are generally more satisfied than if they take the permanent menu. But the pricing structure is not a consequence of wanting to maximize profit, it is a necessity to compensate the increase in costs. When my family started a few dozen years ago, the cost of a meal (without taxes) was 50% for the products (ingredients, wines,….) and 20% for the cost of the staff. Today in most restaurants the cost of the staff is 50% to 55% and the cost of products less than 25%. I tend to think that we should recommend all inclusive formulas which show that eating in a restaurant is an experience, a whole thing, not a product that can be cut in small pieces.
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