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Eat your heart out at the 2010 Expo French Pavilion's 6SENS
Twin-Michelin-starred chefs Jacques and Laurent Pourcel are back in Shanghai and the power houses behind 6SENS, the French Pavilion's culinary treat
You don't have to be at 6SENS at the French Pavilion to drool over this dish: Sea scallops carpaccio served with a warm clementine vinaigrette on a baby leeks salad.
“We will have one of the most original experiences in terms of food that you can have at the Expo,” he continues confidently. “We have a very special set up with a 1,200 square meter French-style roof garden on top. It’s going to be comfortable and luxurious.”
While we’re betting that the 2010 Expo’s architecture will wow you at first glance, it’s the gastronomical experience that many countries are hoping will impress visitors with the very best of their cultural accomplishments. Many pavilions have invested heavily in restaurant decor, highly acclaimed chefs, and menus of their top delicacies. The French, as might be expected, are cooking to impress with their own Michelin-starred crew.
Gastronomy over architecture
The 6SENS menu is created by the twin brothers and Michelin-starred chefs Jacques and Laurent Pourcel, who run le Jardin des Sens in the south of France, as well as restaurants in Bangkok, Tokyo, Geneva, Marrakech, Casablanca and Paris. These ambitious, slickly marketed cooks are “inspired by the distinctive flavors of the south of Europe. They use produce from both the land and the sea but their trademark is their savoir-faire in contrasting tastes: hot-cold, soft-crispy, savory-sweet, mild-bitter, etcetera,” according to Laure de Carrière, Press Attachée for Groupe Pourcel.
The restaurant will offer a bistro menu on the terrace (seats 160) and a gastronomic menu in the indoor dining room (seats 120). The gastronomic menu theme is Mediterranean cuisine with dishes like sea scallops carpaccio with warm clementine vinaigrette and baby leek salad or compression of Maine lobster with duck Ham and melon. Bills for the bistro will average RMB 300, while the restaurant will put you back about RMB 500 per person.
We will have one of the most original experiences in terms of food that you can have at the Expo.— Gilles Bihi-Zenou, executive director of 6SENS
The kitchen hopes not only to impress with its menu but also with its state of the art design, which all pavilion visitors can gape at, not just restaurant diners. “The pavilion is conceived somewhat similar to the Guggenheim in New York City,” says Bihi-Zenou, “so you start at the top on the fourth floor and you continue going down to the ground level. At the top, the first thing you see is our kitchen which is designed like a show: we have cameras all over the kitchen and you’ll see it on plasma screens, including one nine-square meter screen. It’s a multi-million yuan kitchen and only to be used for a few months! Basically it’s made to be part of the exhibition.” According to Laure de Carrière, “The view into the kitchen is part of the sensual journey.”
Preparing for the 2010 Expo masses
Over the course of the Expo, the French pavilion is expecting 10 million visitors, which adds up to 6,000 visitors per hour. That means the restaurant staff is going to be pushed to the limit and they’re bracing for it with a team of 140, including 15 French nationals at management level.
“We are going to be serving non-stop from 11am to 11pm and we are expecting very high traffic, especially with the price we have set which is going to be affordable to a lot of visitors,” says Bihi-Zenou.
If the thought of waiting in line for hours on a scorching hot day surrounded by the white cement of the Expo site doesn’t whet your appetite, even for a Jacques and Laurent Pourcel menu, you’re still in luck. The brothers will open a plush new restaurant this summer, Maison Pourcel, in the previous HFZ restaurant location (6-8/F, 35 Shanxi Nan Lu, near Changle Lu 陕西南路35号6-8楼, 近长乐路) in the French Concession.
