SOME say the love of food is the root of all diets, but there should be no objection to people who eat like sparrows—if only they’d stop that everlasting chirping about it. To chirp about food, however, puts one at a great advantage, especially if you’ve been trained to be next in line to become a celebrity chef.

To be best in the world is a worthy undertaking. Enter Chef Hylton Le Roux. He won’t chirp to you about stardom because he has yet to join the pantheon. Foremost, he has to open his own restaurant, although he may be sampled through his catering firm, Pi Catering. His name is also relatively not yet known, except to a rarified community of dining enthusiasts.

If Le Roux will set plates in a Michelin-covered territory—assuming he leaves the Philippines, the nearest would be Hong Kong—he has yet to win those coveted stars, or he can simply go beyond that paradigm. He can be a revolutionary or a reactionary, but in either case he has to be good. What is good?

Le Roux may be on his way to celebrity status sooner than any of our local chefs. After all, he has learned the tricks of trade of two of the most infamous and influential gastronomers on the planet, Gordon Ramsay and Heston Blumenthal. A singular issue can bring him to stardom, but will he be too much of a derivative of the earlier chefs? Of course not.

Excel while it’s still early

Already geared to carve a name in the local food scene, Hylton Le Roux presents Modern European Cuisine at The Establishment at The Fort in Bonifacio Global City for a two-month residency as guest chef.  With a nouvelle menu ongoing up to July 16 at The Crystal Room, The Establishment’s fine-dining outlet, diners may enjoy a tasting experience distilled from Le Roux’s apprenticeship under two of the universe’s best-rated chefs. It’s like tasting two for the plate of one.

Le Roux is a South African in his mid-30s who has apprenticed with Gordon Ramsey in the three Michelin-starred The Savoy Grill at the Savoy Hotel London. After eight months of instilling the lessons of Ramsay, known infamously as perhaps the most ill-mannered chef through the reality-TV series Hell’s Kitchen, Le Roux packed his apron, said we’re quits to Ramsay, and transferred to the molecular gastronomy school of the more relaxed Heston Blumenthal, OBE, at the three Michelin-starred The Fat Duck in Bray, Berkshire, also in England.

As chef de partie of the latter, Hylton experienced in 2005 The Fat Duck’s reign as the world’s best restaurant as voted by Restaurant magazine readers. His master Blumenthal may not be a household name in the Philippines, but among the world’s chirpiest diners, the name will send spasms of heavenly shivers until you taste his molecular cuisine and spout orgasms. But there’s a caveat: The merits of the molecular are still being debated.

What is molecular cuisine?

“I hope to bring molecules to the country one day,” said Le Roux, referring to the building blocks of chemically altered cuisine where molecules are manipulated to give diners an avant-garde tasting experience. Examples of molecular cuisine go by names like Snail Porridge, Parsnip Cereal, and Egg-and-Ham Ice Cream.

Although Blumenthal derides the term as “complicated” and “elitist,” Le Roux has learned the secrets of the molecular kitchen. These techniques include cooking chocolate soufflé in a vacuum to increase the size of bubbles, and enhancing air pressure to amplify the sounds created while eating courses, such as the crunch of pastry. Le Roux became a disciple of low-temperature, ultra-slow cooking of up to 24 hours so as to contain the juices, flavors and fat content of meat.

The exciting field of the molecular also involves the use of gels, spheres, emulsions and other chemical oddities to create novel courses like liquefied olives, foamed filet mignon and other avant-garde concoctions.

At The Establishment

FOR The Crystal Room, known primarily for its pan-Asian cuisine, Le Roux divulges a modernity without the need for bizarre experimentation.

Diners may expect starters and salads like Goat Cheese and Truffle Mousse with Tomato Jam and Aged Balsamic; Seared Foie Gras with Almond Puree and Poached Cherries; Warm Salad of Sweet Potato Gnocchi, Crispy Pancetta, Oyster Mushrooms, Parmesan and Pesto Oil; Seared Tuna Niçoise Salad; Roast Butternut Soup with Asparagus Spears and Truffle Oil; and Broccoli and Watercress Soup with Poached Egg and Crispy Bacon.

For the main course, Le Roux has whipped up four sumptuous choices: Seared US Angus Beef Tenderloin with French Beans, Confit Leeks, Onion Jam, Jus and Brown Onion Puree; Roast Lamb Rack with Confit White Cabbage, Butter Poached Asparagus, Potato Gratin and Jus; Roast Chicken Breast with Wild Mushroom and Parmesan Risotto; and Olive Oil-Poached Salmon with Chorizo, and Crushed Potato Tarragon, Beurre Blanc and Broccoli Puree.

Desserts include Crème Brûlée with Pistachio and Almond Biscotti; and   Dark Chocolate and Espresso Mousse with Whipped Cream and Toasted Almonds.