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I L L U S T R A T I O N   B Y   Z A C H   T R E N H O L M

BY DAVID DOWNIE | springtime hit Paris a few weeks ago with mushrooming cafe tables and bright red Michelin restaurant guides upon them, for with spring in the air a Frenchman's thoughts turn naturally to food.

Accompanying the March 3 release of the 1997 "Guide France" came the annual furor over star promotions and demotions. As always, they made front-page news and prime-time radio and TV reports featuring top chefs and the famously discreet Bernard Naegellen, the red guides' director-general. "The French continue to be astonished," exclaimed Le Monde, by the secretive guide's power to make or break the stars of haute cuisine.

This year the peripatetic Alain Ducasse grabbed headlines by winning three stars at his eponymous Paris restaurant (formerly run by mega-chef Joel Robuchon) while losing one at his Louis XIV in Monaco. "Totally unjust," railed Ducasse.

"As regards the so-called 'injustice' inflicted on the Louis XIV," whispered Naegellen, "our inspectors went five, six times and quite simply we noticed a few small imperfections."

Aptly nicknamed the gastronome's Bible, the "Guide France" giveth and the "Guide France" taketh away. Bibendum's unsmiling inspectors are incorruptible; Naegellen unbending. A thousand chefs come to him annually, toque in hand, to plead their case. "We never explain and we never change our mind," Naegellen once told me at Michelin's suitably monastic Paris headquarters.

Once the fuss over Alain Ducasse's missed sixth star had subsided, more troubling issues -- prompted by the fate of former three-star chef Pierre Gagnaire -- resurfaced. Gagnaire went bankrupt in 1995 in the depressed industrial city of Saint-Etienne -- the first three-star failure since the rating's creation in the 1930s -- and became a national cause célèbre. Saint-Etienne's mayor remarked that his city did not want "a restaurant charging 1,500 francs ($300) for a meal when people cannot find 15 francs for their children's canteen lunches." Glum commentators wondered if the age of haute cuisine and the grand restaurant were over.

Following Gagnaire's demise, fellow three-stars Bernard Loiseau in Burgundy and Marc Veyrat on Lake Annecy revealed that they were barely able to meet their $60,000-$70,000 monthly loan repayments on borrowings of about $7 million each. In pursuit of three-star status, they had spent the money on remodeling: Veyrat's Auberge de l'Eridan sports faucets gold-plated by Rolex and a kitchen sink speckled with real gold.

Why? Because Michelin's top rating means not only prestige but an average doubling of sales, plus spin-offs in advertising and consultancy potentially worth millions.

Further revelations of near bankruptcy among starred restaurateurs spurred the Ministry of Culture to pass a law in January officially enshrining celebrity chefs as artists. Included in the law was a $20,000 yearly start-up subsidy for young, up-and-coming chefs.

The measure also provided for controversial government bail-outs to failing star chefs via the French Finance Institute for Cinema and Cultural Industries (IFCIC) -- the same bureaucracy that subsidizes the French movie industry to the tune of several hundred million dollars a year. Suddenly cinema d'auteur was flanked by cuisine d'auteur -- or d'hauteur.

The outcry was immediate: While Jacques Chirac's center-right government was struggling to dismantle bureaucracies, his culture minister, goaded on by a group of three-star chefs (Pierre Troisgros, Michel Guerard, Alain Senderens, Georges Blanc and Alain Ducasse) and the general director of the National Center of Culinary Arts, had created a welfare system for establishments typically charging $150-$300 a head for a meal. Cuisine d'hauteur indeed!

"We can accept the existence of an elitist cuisine," growled French gastronomy's éminence grise, Claude Lebey. "But at the least it should be profit-making. At this rate we might as well subsidize Hermes." Even Pierre Gagnaire, whose plight inspired the measure, called it a bad law. "French society is stuck because the government is expected to fix everything. That's impossible! To each his own responsibility." Without government help Gagnaire opened a chic new restaurant in Paris last November that is booked solid for months. On March 3 Michelin cautiously rewarded him with two stars -- the third will probably be returned next year.

But the most revealing comment came from Philippe Couderc of Le Nouvel Observateur. He termed the law "scandalous ... a step backwards towards the Ancien Regime." This is not, as it seems, a gratuitous remark: The elevation of food to the rank of art began under Louis XIV, a prodigious gourmand. Marie-Antoinette's more naive than cynical quip -- that if the peasants had no more bread then "let them eat cake" -- remains deeply significant. The Revolution was as much about hunger as it was high-minded Liberty, Equality and Fraternity. The Bastille was stormed because it was thought to hold not only arms and prisoners but flour.

The phenomenon of the grand restaurant dates to the French Revolution, when the cooks of ousted aristocrats suddenly found themselves out of work and set up independently. They distinguished themselves with flair from the humble cuisetots (cooks), whose repertoires were limited to regional -- i.e., peasant -- dishes: Thus was cuisine d'auteur born. Their restaurants were the forebears of today's two- and three-stars, where masters of the sauté pan create culinary performance art. As Pierre Gagnaire says, when it comes to Michelin stars and celebrity, what counts is "the quality and uniqueness of the chef." It is not enough to cook great food, top chefs must also be performers, selling "dreams" (Loiseau) or "emotions" (Gagnaire).

So why, with such a glorious pedigree, are France's grand restaurants failing? The reasons are economic and societal, for France is painfully reinventing itself. To start, the 6-year-old crisis continues, with high unemployment, low growth and widespread pessimism. Gourmets who would have gladly blown $200 on a Lucullan feast now think twice, from guilt about conspicuous consumption or because they can no longer afford it.

Less obviously, French cuisine d'auteur might be the victim of its own success. An export industry, it is, as Pierre Gagnaire says, "widely copied and pillaged." By definition it can be (and is) produced by skilled auteurs anywhere -- in New York, London or Sydney. France no longer has a monopoly. Many of its practitioners are falling behind dynamic chefs in what were once considered barbarian outposts: England, the United States, even Australia.

Ironically enough, the Michelin guide may be indirectly responsible: Star status can stultify chefs whose livelihood depends on maintaining their stars and who live in fear of Bernard Naegellen's "small imperfections." More worrying, a Michelin-inspired sense of terror, expressed to me by dozens of starred chefs, often leaks its chill into the dining room.

Increasingly, the extravagant decor and starched atmosphere of many multiple-starred restaurants seems out of step with the times. While Michelin continues to reiterate that its stars are "for the cooking, not the decor," and vigorously denies rewarding only luxury establishments, I cannot think of a single un-luxurious two- or three-star place.

As to what "luxury" means to Michelin, one former inspector confessed to me that he thought most grand restaurants in France were "hideous" and added that one in particular brought to mind "a high-class brothel." Even food critic Patricia Wells, no enemy of the multiple-star brigade, told me she found several to be "temples of bad taste" and "theme parks of gastronomy."

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with the fact that many grand Michelin-starred establishments have become the culinary equivalent of the Loire Chateaux, or the French answer to Euro Disney. Foreigners make up 50 percent of the guests, and Americans and Japanese alone buy a third of the guide's 600,000 annual copies. Alternatively, these establishments are men's clubs where corporate managers wine and dine each other. Despite the decline in the business lunch, "there are still people who feel it's worth it to eat in a grand restaurant every day," says Gagnaire. "Worth it in terms of quality, prestige, PR, business. It's an investment, like buying fine clothes ... But the middle class cannot afford to go to these restaurants anymore."

Recognizing that the real competition is from more affordable and casual bistros, some starred chefs have begun serving home-style dishes, or have created "baby grand" spin-offs with a bistro theme. Alas, I have yet to be overwhelmed: There is nothing more deadly than a faux bistro.

In terms of economics, at least, Michelin has finally sniffed the breeze: The 1997 guide includes "Le Bib' Gourmand," a smiling Bibendum-head symbol for "good food at moderate prices," a welcome addition. The bad news: There isn't a single Bib' Gourmand in Paris.

Is the age of the grand Michelin-starred restaurant really over? Doubtless the shaking out will continue, particularly among pricey provincial two-stars -- the most endangered species. But haute cuisine, like the French language, is indeed an expression of French culture, and is widely perceived as a bulwark against "culinary barbarianism," i.e., fast food. It will be preserved by hook or crook.

Should it? "It is impossible to separate the future of (French) cuisine from that of (French) society as a whole," wrote Jean-Claude Ribaut in Le Monde. And he may have a point. "A strong economy means an accomplished culture and a triumphant table. Michelin once again keeps alive with delectation the memory of a golden age." Ribaut might have added, though, that until the French economy bounces back, dollars and yen are doing their part.
March 25,1997

David Downie is a contributing editor for Departures and Appellation magazines. He has written for numerous publications, including Saveur, Travel & Leisure, Town & Country and The Observer. In July 1997, Rizzoli International will publish his latest book,"Enchanted Liguria -- A Celebration of the Culture, Lifestyle and Food of the Italian Riviera." He has resided in Paris since 1986.

Are the Michelin guides the final word on French cuisine? Award your own stars in Table Talk.

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