French Garden

by Charlotte Martinez (France)

I didn't expect to find Hong Kong

It is a French garden in the middle of December.  We’re making our way between the bright green leaves of clovers and lettuces and the warm silence of winter. He wanted that garden, and now he’s the one growing it with his patience and secrets. « When I first wanted to plant it, nobody believed in it because the air here was too polluted, the soil too bad, the space too narrow. But Nature is wise you know, I firmly believe that if something was wrong, nothing would have grown here. » The pristine white of his shirt erupts at the peak of neighboring skyscrapers. Some letters were embroided at the place of his heart, with a Bordeaux thread. They draw the name of Ricardo Chaneton, Chef of Petrus, the restaurant that looks upon Hong Kong from the top of legendary Shangri La. From that green hollow hung between the city and the sky, we can clearly see the dyke standing here between Chefs and Nature: mountains were scattered like pearls in the middle of the China Sea, and did not leave much space for mankind. That latter logically preferred using that scarce resource to ensure the commercial and warlike prosperity expected from such a special place. As a result, the current demographic pressure is only superseded by the price of a square meter roof… or land. The simplest exercises already require to bring raw materials from far away, and that process is tremendously amplified when you’re serving French Cuisine in Hong Kong ultra demanding ecosystem. The Chef knows that for now, he has to deal with that breach in his ideals. « When you’re running a French restaurant in Hong Kong, you cannot mention Nature without thinking about all the machinery you switch on to carry products from France… Cooking here only with local produces remains an absolute dream. » However, something special in Ricardo shines a lucky star for the world around him: that pilgrim’s rod of passion, with which he draws ways to places others call « Impossible ». That garden is an illustration of it: his manner to do his part, but a giant step for an industry in which the gigantic Shangri La, whose seeds have grown in every megalopolis of the planet, is now thinking about replicating that initiative. That garden was also planted to serve the Chef’s cuisine: hydroponics, that art of growing vegetals without soil, free him from the city and let pure flavors flourish. Since he was passed the torch of great Alain Passard, Ricardo has been a total beam in that legacy of saluting Nature and French Cuisine. « I’m in love with French Cuisine because it wrote History. Even more today, in an era where we tend to think that we invented everything, whereas we’re just resurrecting ancient principles brought to life by geniuses centuries ago… » What a majestic tribute. France is today at a moment of its History where it has to look beyond its frontiers, but as well dig into its own depth to prevent its fabulous traditions and savoir-faire from eventually ending up in a wing of the Louvre. The act of transmission, repeated so faithfully everyday by a Venezuelan Chef at the top of an Asian enclave is another miracle grown in that garden. His hunger of grasping until the last crumb of beauty in what we call French Cuisine is not just another piece in the firework of wonders our tiniest country keeps inspiring to the most talented artists on Earth. It gives hope that something bigger than alterity binds mankind together beyond cultures and words. Before lunch, Ricardo warned me: « I have a hard time being understood with my cuisine. » Yet, he recreated for me, in a plate, a scene from my childhood that none had ever heard about. When saying goodbye, I apologized for letting him speak French the whole time, promising him I’ll speak his mother tongue when I come back. He replied not to be worried: « As long as we will talk about cuisine, we will always speak the same language. » With these words he went back to his garden, to tell his secrets to the flowers that surely answered with a smile.