More than 500 people came to watch Ferran Adrià host the first ever Estrella Damm Gastronomy Congress in the U.S. on Monday night at Miami's Culinary Institute in Downtown Miami.
The event titled "The Changing Face of Modern Gastronomy," featured a rather impressive lineup including Adrià, Lluís Garcia, Director of the elBullifoundation and former elBulli Restaurant Director; Fran Agudo, head chef at Michelin star rated Tickets Bar in Barcelona; David Gil, creative pastry chef for Albert Adrià’s restaurants in Barcelona and Diego Muñoz, head chef at Astrid y Gastón in Lima.
After a beer-filled reception, guests took a seat and waited for the man of the hour, Adrià, to make his opening remarks. He told the crowd about his newest venture Heart in Ibizia with his brother Albert Adrià and Cirque du Soleil. He said the restaurant could hold up to 1,000 guests at one time and changes with the season, while Garcia spoke about the elBullifoundation, a creative think-tank for the culinary world with the mantra of "eat knowledge to nurture creativity."
While Adrià did plenty of philosophizing he didn't actually do a cooking demo, but plenty of chefs did. Starting with Muñoz who went demonstrated the latest in Peruvian cuisine followed by Gil and Agudo who demonstrated rather creative dishes from their tapas restaurants to the chef and industry filled crowd. Check out all the action in the gallery above.
— All photos by Eric Saltzman/Chat Chow TV
