I'm very, very lucky, I'm very lucky. David, present me. Lisa, the renai words, and you
are here. Vas a traducir mis palabras, no? This is not very good, I'm sorry, but, well.
When renai called me and invited me to come, renai said, I remember one time when you talked
about fear. I said, I don't really remember that, but I can tell you at this very moment
I've got a lot of fear. I'm afraid of being the last one to speak today. I'm afraid because
I don't speak English. I'm afraid because I'm not cooking in front of you. I only feel
safe when I'm cooking, not when I'm talking. I'm afraid that you may not get the message
that I'm trying to communicate to you. But I'm especially afraid of these really awful
blue pants that I'm wearing. Will the young people in this audience raise their hands?
I've been here two days learning, and so what am I going to teach you now? Because I've
lived it. I want to teach you all to be afraid. You are never too old to be afraid. You are
never too old to be afraid. I'm going to show you, this is the definition of fear. A feeling
of agitation and anxiety caused by the presence or immanence of danger or a feeling of disquiet
or apprehension. I'm going to add my own definition of fear. Creative engine. When
you overcome your fear and when you transform it into a creative element, you get your dreams.
For that you don't have to be young, you just have to believe in your dreams. You know that
I was one of the first people who earned a living creating in the kitchen. And I am young. I'm
only 44. I've been doing this for 30 years, but I'm still alive every day. So we're going
to take a look at my fears.
In June of 2011, Elbuye closed and opened my first cocktail bar. It's not a restaurant.
I'm afraid to make a restaurant compared to Elbuye and I make a mistake. When you are
making mistakes, you learn. Open a cocktail bar. I'm afraid of doing a bad copy of Elbuye's food. I'm afraid of not being up to par with the cocktails. I'm afraid of not explaining the concept well.
I'm afraid of not knowing how to develop the project. Actually, no, I wasn't afraid of developing the project. And eight months after I opened that restaurant, I turned it into something totally freaky.
Only 16 people, 41 courses in two hours, 20 minutes, mixed together cocktails and finger food. I can see it's not easy to start, but the people told me about Elbuye. I know, of course, it's Elbuye, but the weight I have in my back was very heavy.
So I was carrying this very heavy burden on my back because of Elbuye's reputation. But it's true that by the day that we closed that restaurant, it was something incredible. But it's closed.
So I'm going to show you some examples of what we were doing because I know here, I know that all of you, the only pictures you have in your mind are of Elbuye. And I want you to see how one chef can cook in many different styles.
No silverware. We didn't use any silverware. All 41 courses with your hands.
So with this kind of cooking, with this kind of cuisine, if you don't have really good technique, you're going to have some issues.
Three months before, three months after, open 41. Nair, 10 meters, 5 meters.
Tickets. The name is Kitchen. It's more nice. It's a horrible name, but easy to remember.
With tickets, I was really afraid. Elbuye was just about to close. It was my first really personal project. I was the pastry chef of Elbuye. And that's what people knew me as.
And for just about everybody else, I was the brother of him who shall not be named.
And at the same time, there were tons of expectations that were about me, which made me only more afraid.
I was afraid of people not getting the concept, which they really didn't.
But I had the ability to overcome this fear and those expectations. And within two weeks after we opened, give people what they wanted.
What people wanted was a sort of neighborhood version of Elbuye. So we gave them a neighborhood version of Elbuye.
So in these last 20 days, I've closed 41 degrees. Tickets have taken over the space.
This is very funny, but it's an example of the past that has gone the things now. This is a tomato tartar. I make only six months tomato tartar, I think, in the restaurant.
But I believe it's a typical traditional place in Spain. You go and know how many restaurants you can...
So the kitchen there has changed over time. Now we've got about 40 people working in it.
And I make the pastry. I make the past in 41. Now I have the most beautiful pastry in Barcelona.
Well, no contento contener miedo.
I wasn't content just to be a bit afraid.
I opened Peruvian Japanese Nikkei restaurant.
What am I doing opening a Japanese Peruvian restaurant?
But when I got to know Nikkei cuisine, I was really moved by it, excited by it.
I believed in two young chefs.
We've always believed in young chefs and I continue believing in them.
The young are not the future, they're the present.
I've never encountered someone who wasn't worthy. If you have humility and passion, you're worthy of being in the kitchen.
My chef de cocina in Tickets, he has 23. My partner in Pacta, he has 24.
My partner in the Mexican, he has 26. In this case, I'm not afraid.
For example, I don't like to make a mini-degustation in Pacta. I don't like to make, but I need it.
I remember with Robuchon saying, la fusión tiene que salir para la difusión, y no la confusión.
Fusion has to serve to diffuse and not confuse.
And that was our project, not to confuse things.
It's a beautiful restaurant with 32 seats, and without a doubt, it's brought us a lot of joy.
This restaurant too has continued to grow and to change over time. The restaurant of today is not the Pacta that we opened.
This is a ceviche, of course.
The truth is that I don't really know what this is either, I don't remember.
It's a lot of plates, and well, no happy to this. In July, three months after, open the place I like open.
But I'm afraid.
But I dare to do was open a traditional place.
I had spent my entire life saying that I was holding onto the bar
of tradition to support me as I reached out for innovation.
And now I had my tradition.
And that's where I'm happiest.
There's a difference of concept. 41 is 7% before tourists, and this is only 20.
So here are my fears about this traditional place, Bodega.
First of all, how is I going to explain it to foreigners what the hell of Spanish Bodega was?
They weren't ever going to understand it.
So I was really afraid that the restaurants were so physically close to each other
that there would be this kind of shock between tickets, the modern, the innovative, and Bodega, the traditional.
The truth is that, yeah, I was really afraid, but I'm also having a great time with it.
Oh, look at that.
Real ham.
Real ham.
So this restaurant, we're doing about 160 covers a night.
This is the message I really want to impart to the young people here, which is all of you.
Fear protects you from any mistakes.
And then there are some people who say that because my last name is Adria.
So that I don't think the same way as other people, because with this fear I still keep opening one place after another right next to each other.
No happy with that.
Last Tuesday, opened my new restaurant.
Old boy.
Again, young and old.
I'm crazy from the Mexican cuisine.
I'm half Mexican myself.
I'm fear here, of course, that the Mexicans don't come to eat and that they don't see a Mexican restaurant anywhere.
So what I'm really afraid with this one is that Mexicans will come and eat in it and say this is not a Mexican restaurant.
For me, people have to sort of succumb to the magic when they enter a restaurant.
The complexity of ingredients we all know about.
The tortilla that we had today was twice as good as anything I'm making these days.
And the good thing is that I know that.
So these are two restaurants.
One is a taqueria and it was very important to him because he believes that you don't have to make everything so sophisticated that even the most basic combo foods should be.
These should be well made as well.
And this is the restaurant next Friday.
I'm in a lot of fear, yes.
Very beautiful.
What I want to do with this restaurant is show present day an authentic contemporary Mexico.
These are some of the dishes.
This is the restaurant in the taquerias street food.
The Mexican is 100 meters to the tickets and this is 120.
I'm fear when I make 41, I close 41 and I'm more fear for open enigma of course.
But this fear is going to make me courageous and that's the message I want to communicate to young chefs here.
I've done my penance from the transition of El Buye to becoming Albert Adria.
I have my team and I have the desire and the strength.
So the truth is I don't care about this. We're going to open.
So to sum up,
being humble is one of the key things that will make you afraid.
Fear will also make you thoughtful.
It's not the same there as over there.
Fear makes you respectful.
Honest, it makes you honest.
No one great who is an honest.
And it makes you daring because when you overcome your fear, you can take on Dracula yourself.
So to all of you young people here today, I can only say one thing.
