“OH wowww!” I couldn’t help exclaiming as my eyes fix on an image of an undulating landscape of green pastures and trees in south-central France.
The verdant plateaus of the Aubrac region extend as far as the eye can see to the horizon, with the only visible building being a tiny traditional shepherd’s hut.
It’s the kind of location where I’d be motivated to wake up at sunrise, collect fresh eggs from the chickens, make oven-baked pastries, pick up some cheese from a local artisan and tend to a pretty little edible garden.
“That’s our place”, remarks Sebastien Bras, smiling with pride, as he shows me a photo of this idyllic French countryside on his phone from across our table in sunny Langkawi. He’s not referring to the hut but to the area where he was born, raised and which has been a source of inspiration for the Bras family who earned gourmet recognition worldwide for their flagship restaurant, Le Suquet.
It’s in the middle of practically nowhere but despite the remoteness of Laguiole (there are just three inhabitants per square kilometer), Le Suquet isn’t short of patrons at all, partly perhaps because it earned and held three Michelin stars for 19 years. Despite famously requesting to be removed from the guide in 2017, Le Suquet is back in the 2019 guide, to the Bras family’s surprise, albeit with two stars this time.
In its praise, the current edition of the Michelin guide remarks: “Aubrac is the very DNA of this contemporary restaurant, where Sebastien Bras is now at the helm. The chef offers up a fitting celebration of produce and the seasons: you can almost hear the earth singing as you tuck into certain dishes.”
BRINGING AUBRAC FLAVOUR
Casually attired, save for the aprons that offer a hint to their vocation, Sebastien and his father Michel, highly revered duo in the culinary world, take a moment out from their afternoon to chat with me at one of the restaurants at The Datai Langkawi, Kedah, with help from an interpreter.
Both father and son are renowned for crafting intuitive and refined cuisine where nature is their defining influence. They have maintained a philosophy whereby “Aubrac is the source of inspiration and nature, the source of creation.”
Inspired by their natural surroundings and the region’s agricultural bounties, the Bras family always endeavours to create locally-sourced dishes, preserve the natural world and conserve precious traditions. These commitments are also in line with those of The Datai Langkawi, which recently hosted the two chefs.
Their presence in the kitchens of The Dining Room at the resort has stirred up excitement and whet the appetite of guests, who have been anticipating their specially-crafted dinner menu themed Rhythms of Nature.
Michel and Sebastien’s eight-course cocktail dinner event kicks off the Signature Chef series which has been re-introduced at The Datai as part of the resort’s reopening last December, leading us to expect further gourmet experiences from other illustrious chefs in the coming year.
For the Bras duo, it’s their umpteenth visit to Asia and their fourth sojourn to Langkawi where this time they’ve discovered a type of heart of palm and ginger flower which they’ll be using to enhance a couple of recipes for the fine-dining event the following evening.
Their nature-embracing ethos has me wondering if we’ll just be dining on gourmet-style roots, shoots and leaves.
The younger Bras soon clears up that misconception, elaborating: “Vegetables and legumes have a strong presence. They’re important in what we do but we’re not a vegetarian restaurant and neither are we vegetarians. Our region is all about agriculture so we have so much produce to use from the land.”
Keen to emphasise that their approach is definitely not a concept, 47-year-old Sebastien adds: “Anything that’s a concept is a bit of a fad. It’s more about putting the plants and vegetables on a pedestal and really showing their value.”
INNOVATION AND IMAGINATION
One of the signature dishes at Le Suquet that best embodies their passion for vegetal and showcases how something beautiful can be created with just vegetables is Gargouillou.
Resembling a botanist’s dream, it’s a vibrant fresh medley of young vegetables, herbs, flowers and sprouted seeds, enhanced with eggnog and meat juices; a remarkable combination of visual, taste, fragrance, colours and textures.
Up to 80 different varieties of edible plant life can be found in this innovative ensemble ranging from endive, chickweed, clover, to pink radish, rocambole garlic, and cauliflower stalk, depending on the season. The story goes that Michel Bras came up with the idea for Gargouillou while he was out rambling on Aubrac in the summer of 1980, a season when the pastures were alive with a myriad of flowers and scents.
In fact, Michel was already at the forefront of the ‘vegetal’ menu back in the 1960s when his nature-inspired cooking style was somewhat avant-garde.
“I was regarded as being a bit crazy in the late 60s, cooking and putting vegetables as the mains,” explains the softer-spoken 72-year-old, adding: “…putting forth vegetables at a time when people were eating more meat and other produce.”
His innovative and creative mind also led him to introduce a unique way of styling and presenting his food. Those dots and swooshes that we see nowadays decorating plates of haute cuisine? Such plate décor began much earlier.
Divulges Michel: “I’ve been doing that for a long time before it became mainstream. I taught myself to plate the dishes differently, creating a presentation that was aesthetically pleasing. It comes from a place of contemplation and I’m also inspired by photography which is one of my interests.”
As a boy, Michel had no inclinations towards a culinary career when his parents opened a simple restaurant attached to a hotel. He wanted to be a scientist. He recalls: “My mother used to take simple ingredients and make fantastic home-cooked meals and it was just locals in the village who came to eat.” But when the matriarch suffered health issues, the eldest of her three kids decided to help out and thus began his involvement in the family restaurant.
Young Michel managed to channel his interest in science into a combination of cooking and baking. Pastries and desserts in particular allowed him to dabble with combinations of different chemistry and different elements.
He adds that he’s also a very athletic person — he’s taking on his seventh marathon later this year! “I’ve also been into photography from a young age, so by combining the science, the sports and imagery, I realised that I was able to express these things in a way, through cooking.”
Unlike his father’s journey, cooking was always in Sebastien’s blood, having been cradled by a culinary family. Being lulled to sleep by the clanging of pots and pans, and the aromas of simmering stock wafting through his childhood, must have shaped his career path. After professional training, Bras junior joined the senior to launch Le Suquet, eventually taking over the operations of the restaurant-cum-hotel and carrying on the family legacy into its third generation.
INSPIRATION FROM THE LAND
Sebastien has his own vision and style of doing things but he maintains the same passion for nature as Michel and stays faithful to his father’s heritage. What remains steadfast and prevented any change in direction is their connection to Aubrac. “This is where we both find inspiration for cooking and the story that we tell from our food comes from this region,” shares Sebastien.
As father and son lead a team at The Datai Langkawi to recreate some of their dishes using certain ingredients from Aubrac, the menu will also add local twists inspired by the hotel’s permaculture garden and surrounding rainforest.
Asked how they transform simple ingredients like a vegetable into something more extraordinary on a plate, Michel shares that it requires careful observation of the product. For example, a courgette is not just a courgette for him. He will look at it, almost ‘listen’ to it and “make something unique so that it becomes like a different produce.”
For Sebastien, in addition to years of technique and a great team, the key, he reveals, is to “…put everything into it - our heart, our soul, into telling a story with the ingredients.” When nature speaks, the Bras family knows how to listen and translate emotions and memories about the land to the plate.
The Datai Langkawi, Jalan Teluk Datai, Langkawi, Kedah. Details at www.thedatai.com
For information on the Bras family and their restaurants, go to www.bras.fr