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Title:
The cultivation of taste : chefs and the organization of fine dining / Christel Lane.
Author:
Lane, Christel, author.
Publication Information:
Oxford ; New York, NY : Oxford University Press, 2016.
Call Number:
TX910.G7 L36 2016
Abstract:
"· Traces history of restaurants and fine dining in France, Germany, and the UK · Includes numerous interviews with renowned chefs such as Marcus Wareing, Ruth Rogers, Tom Kerridge, Joachim Wissler, Harald Wohlfahrt, and Christian Jürgens · First systematic sociological study of Michelin-starred restaurants · Provides an in-depth investigation of the working lives of chefs and front-of-house staff · Explores different food cultures · Considers the views and experiences of diners. After many decades, if not centuries, of neglect of fine food and high-level restaurants in Britain, we are seeing a massive explosion of interest in food, cooking, and dining out. Christel Lane's book charts the process of this transformation and examines top contemporary restaurants and their chefs. The Cultivation of Taste presents a comparative study of Michelin-starred restaurants in Britain and Germany, focusing on two countries without an indigenous haute cuisine but which nevertheless have developed internationally reputed fine-dining sectors. It compares their development to the fine-dining culture in France, as well as offering contrasts with that of the US, Spain, and the Nordic Countries. Written from a sociological perspective, chefs are portrayed as part of a complex network, in their relationships with their employees, their customers, gastronomic critics, suppliers of food, and even their financiers. It will appeal to academics in the areas of economic and cultural sociology, and those with an interest in small entrepreneurial firms and their work relations, but also to all those who have an interest in fine-dining restaurants and the chef patrons at the centre of them ..."
ISBN:
9780198758358
Physical Description:
xi, 368 pages ; 24 cm
Contents:
Fine dining restaurant industry in historical perspective -- Michelin-starred restaurant sector today -- Vocation or business? Competing organizational logics and work orientations of chefs -- Fine-dining chefs: iconic figures or work horses? -- Distinctiveness, homogeneity, and innovation in haute cuisine -- Chefs' culinary styles -- Front-of-house staff: hosts, sales persons, or communicators of expert knowledge? -- Supplier relations: quality, price, and trust -- Diners: in search of gustatory pleasure or symbolic meaning? -- Taste makers: the attribution of aesthetic and economic value by gastronomic critics and guides -- Transformation of the fine-dining sector.
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