IF ONLY WALLS COULD SPEAK - Blancpain

Caviar d’osciètre
of provence on a winter’s day in Switzerland.
St. Pierre is a lovely white fish with a
somewhat chewy texture that needs a great
sauce to spice it up. Rochat provided that
with this boldly spicy orange pimento based
sauce, accented by the salty Nyons olives.
The gnocchi served to provide not only a
textural counterpoint to the St. Pierre, but to
cool the palate for the white wine.
Again came a change in the color palate.
From the brilliant orange of St. Pierre, one
was transported to the chartreuse green of
Grosses langoustines de Bretagne frites
Chlorophylle et tomates confites au jus de
flageolets. The menu description does not
fully capture all the elements of this Rochat
creation. Two giant langoustine were encased
in very thin phylo shell, dusted with
almost microscopic flecks of parsley. They
were surrounded by foamy bright green
sauce with green flageolets and bits of the
tomato confites. But there was even more
hidden away. Between the encasing phylo
shell and the langoustine were flecks of herbs,
principally basil. I have often thought of
Rochat as a “yin yang” chef. In each plate he
strives to strike a note and at the same time
offset it with a counter note. Here one had
the natural sweetness of the langoustines,
playing on the one hand against the very
subtle spice of the basil, in turn modulated
by the earthiness of the beans, then propelled
forward by the almost spicy confites
tomatoes. Another candidate for a one dish
meal. Let me come here and eat just this!
The animal rights and PETA crowd can
now avert their eyes or, better yet, seek out
the nearest exit. The meat course was a
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carnivore’s delight and a Rochat speciality,
chamois du Tyrol. The filet was no more
than an inch and half in diameter sporting
a rib bone far thinner than my baby
finger. Where do you find meat like
that??? And what size exactly was this
little creature before he met the butcher?
A rib filet and separate mignon were
served perfectly rare, coated with chutney
and surrounded by a dark spicy classic
game sauce. There is no more delectable
venison to be found on the planet. The
meat simply vaporized on the palate. The
spice of the meat was accented by the
subtle chutney coating. The meat itself was
perfect, but there was a little treasure
sitting by itself on the right upper side of
the plate. This was small layered cylinder
that featured slices of celery root alternating