A Hungarian chef’s restaurant awarded with a Michelin star in China

Turizmus Online reports that the restaurant of Jenő Rácz, a Hungarian chef, was awarded a Michelin star in Shanghai recently. They have conducted an interview with him asking about his exciting plans for the future and about how he got his Michelin star?

Everyone was expecting another visit from a Michelin inspector at the Tai’an Table restaurant in Shanghai. What they were not expecting though, was that they would get yet another Michelin star, this year too. The restaurant got a ‘Michelin inspection’ in 2016, which resulted in them getting a Michelin star.

The question wasn’t if they would get another visit, but rather ‘who?’, ‘when?’ and ‘how?’.

As it usually happens, the inspection’s big day coincided with one of the busiest and most chaotic ones for the restaurant.

The following is an interview conducted by Turizmus Online with Jenő Rácz, the Hungarian chef of the innovative fine dining restaurant.

Were you prepared?

For gaining another Michelin star? Yes, when the elegant invitation arrived, inviting us to the Chinese Michelin gala. We got invited to the illustrious event taking place on the 20^th of September and we could barely keep it under wraps with Stefan Stiller. He is the owner of the restaurant and my chef companion, because we are the ones in charge of the food creations in the kitchen.

Tell us about the inspectors. Everyone is interested in how an anonymous, secret inspection goes down. Is it true that the inspectors really are anonymous?

Absolutely. At least up to the moment when they reveal who they are upon finishing their meals, and having paid for it.

Then they give you a name card, where it says that they are from Michelin,

with an e-mail address included. Then they wait for the guest area to clear out and they take a look at the kitchen.

What did they have this year?

What most of the other guests did: we served them the current 14-course menu.

You have so much experience, you must have expected them to come around this year as well. Did you have any clues that it would be them?

The day they came there was total chaos. The guest area operated on full personnel with 28 employees. We had a full house that day and a lot of work in the kitchen. Since the kitchen is open to the guest area, after we’re done with the dressings, rules say that we, ourselves, have to serve the guests their meals and tell them exactly what they are going to have. We were in a rush that evening, coming and going, coming and going… The next day we re-watched the previous day’s footage to see how much they had to wait for each course, how much attention we’ve paid to them. We could sigh with relief only after doing this, when we were reassured that despite the full house, everything went well with their table, too.

The French Michelin inspectors, I suppose, weren’t Chinese. How many foreign, Chinese or other Asian guests do you have? In what percentage do Europeans come by?