In Shanghai, the upset the final word recital of chef Paul Pairet in his ultraviolet restaurant | EUROtoday

On Mar 21, 2025

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QIt is the explanation, the closure of a restaurant all the time has one thing transferring. On March 29, after nearly 13 years and three,000 providers, the French chief Paul Pairet will, as soon as and for all, are the stoves of Ultraviolet, in Shanghai. Three stars within the Michelin information since 2018, labeled among the many 50 finest eating places on the earth, its immersive desk has marked modern culinary historical past.

Chance of the calendar, this closure comes because the prepare dinner with the unbeatable cap is making ready to make his return to M6. The sixteenth season of Top chefof which he is among the emblematic faces, begins on Wednesday March 26. The first episodes of this new classic, which sees two cooks deemed to affix the casting, had been boxed a number of months in the past. Paul Pairet will subsequently be, that day, removed from the units: in China, within the metropolis the place he has labored for twenty years, to decrease the curtain on what he himself defines because the mission of his life.

Ultraviolet, someplace between James Bond And Squid sport

With Ultraviolet, the chief from Perpignan, 60, despatched waltzing all of the codes of experiential eating places. He went additional than a few of his illustrious predecessors, such because the Spaniard Ferran Adria (El Bulli in Roses) or the Briton Heston Blumenthal (The Fat Duck in Bray) and confirmed the best way to others, together with the Danes Rasmus Munk (Alchemist in Copenhagen). Paul Pairet, from a really younger age, mentioned that he would in the future open a restaurant for ten covers. That’s precisely what he did. It might have been in Miami and even in Paris-in the corporate of the restaurateur Jean-Louis Costes and the designer Philippe Starck-it was finally within the Chinese megapol, with the success that we all know.Read too Pomellato is uncovered to Shanghai

In 13 years, the idea has not moved. It is a tasting menu clocked in several interactive work, utilizing all of the senses. Music, artworks, popular culture, smells, sounds, gestures and, in fact, cooking. The dinner’s framework is simply revealed to the friends on the final second, after a minibus journey: a big backlit desk and ten white armchairs, in the midst of a 1,000 sq. meter hangar, coated with projectors, cameras, pregnant and lightweight spots, someplace between a scene of James Bond and an episode of the phenomenon collection Squid sport. The Grand Manitou watches the whole lot about cooking and orchestra, surrounded by round thirty collaborators, its millimeter scenography.

False scallops, actual delight

No false be aware will disturb the menu “D” which shall be served to us, one of many 4, after the “A”, the “B” and the “C”, imagined because the opening and which have been working since. To develop a brand new one, Paul Pairet and his groups phosphored nearly two years. The first sequence of this dinner, which is able to final nearly 4 hours, revolves across the sea. Among essentially the most putting dishes, a big pink shrimp nestles in an American bisque with a pronounced style, pulsed by uncooked districts of Pomelo. Above floats, in transparency, a small conventional Chinese donut, seasoned with bearnaise and basil. This appears to be positioned on an nearly invisible plastic movie that have to be pierced to style the crustacean. A edible movie? It is, in reality, a clear and ultrafine open ravioli.

The desk then turns right into a sandbank beneath the impact of sunshine video games. Arrives an enormous scallops that we consider is served within the uncooked state. It is a trompe-l’oeil. The higher half has been reconstructed from a muslin of the identical mollusk, giving the impression of a nicely -closed shell. Then advances a small timpani carrying a movie of icy water from the ice floe, topped with a caviar quenelle. It is important to attend a number of moments earlier than it breaks and divulges, beneath, a tuna and oyster tartare, scented with shiso and wasabi, all smoked with jasmine. The parade of those playful and impactful creations is finished at a superb tempo. Everything is scrumptious.

Gras in bladder and sweet broth

After the prehistoric interlude of a beef marrow, flambé reside, inside a XXL bone, we’re invited to depart the room for an intermission of ten minutes. On the best way again, shock. The two giant doorways open onto a totally reshaped setting. By the magic of visible and sound results, the room took on the tunes of stylish salons from a rustling Parisian mansion of whispered worldly. The phantasm is ideal. White tablecloth and candlesticks, very actual, had been launched. It is the massive restaurant of Louis de Funès, with out Mr. Septime. Paul Pairet performs the other with this sequence in tribute to the good traditional French delicacies.

The spirit of Antonin Carême, Mothers of Lyon and the good Paul Bocuse blows on these dishes of resistance, all grandiose. The chief’s genius is to perpetuate and greet this heritage whereas cultivating his style of step apart. The preparation strategies are thus reversed for duck foie gras (bladder poached) and poultry galantine (cooked within the tea towel), terroir tandem of infinite delicacy.

The rossini beef fillet arrives entire earlier than being reduce into thick slices. Each comprises completely symmetrical foie gras and truffle inserts, a tapening technical feat and above all, as soon as once more, a deal with. Paul Pairet’s malice resurfaces on the time of rinsing the palace. At the underside of a bowl, six small bears -shaped candies, in actuality a consumed of frosty greens, quickly discover themselves diluted in a vegetable broth. Between Franco-Chinese Flamby to swallow and reinterpretation of pork with bitter sauce, traditional Cantonese labored for dessert, the candy partition appears a tone beneath. She doesn’t atmate the credit score of this meal. On the screens of the room now scrolls the standard finish of finish closing every dinner. The credit of a superproduction the place malice and sensitivity, innovation and nostalgia, know-how and sense of spectacle are put on the service of style and emotion. She sincerely embraces us.

The final tango in Shanghai of Paul Pairet

A number of days earlier than the black display, Paul Pairet doesn’t but be overwhelmed. “It is kind of uncommon to comprehend your goals. With Ultraviolet, I did, he confides to us. For the second, I savor these final moments, even when there’s, in fact, a bit nostalgia. Multiple causes led him to make this choice. “It is each structural and cyclical. There are monetary components, as a result of even whether it is in stability, a mission like this completely requires funding. I additionally produce other issues to develop, different wishes. And then, the arrival of colossal work within the constructing we occupy served as a set off. This is a choice that I’ve fastidiously thought out and introduced for a yr. In this place and in relation to what we did there, I knew that I needed to cease. So I’ve no regrets. »»

To uncover

The kangaroo of the day

Answer

Impossible to think about an Ultraviolet 2, later, with a brand new investor? “Nothing is ever,” smiles the one who’s at present creating a restaurant idea in Singapore. In Shanghai, he plans to proceed the exploitation of his Polux bistro and his glamorous brewery, Mr and Mrs Bund. In Paris, he’ll proceed to collaborate with the Crillon within the Nonos model, his Palace steak home. But at this second, his thoughts is at his final meal on March 29 at Ultraviolet. The listing of friends appears to be like, with, amongst different issues, a number of of its accomplices Top Chef – Philippe Etchebest, Glenn Viel, Stéphane Rotenberg and, maybe, Hélène Darroze-but additionally the Marseille chief triple star Alexandre Mazzia.

He additionally counts on the presence of a liked one: Léo, his son twenty years outdated. “He must already answer me on the phone, and that is not won!” He laughs. Before saying, extra solemn, worry the pinch to the center. “I hope not to crack,” says the principle actor of this extraordinary gastronomic movie. Who had the whole lot of a bit masterpiece.

https://www.lepoint.fr/gastronomie/a-shanghai-le-bouleversant-ultime-recital-du-chef-paul-pairet-dans-son-restaurant-ultraviolet-21-03-2025-2585283_82.php