Marie-Antoine Carême
Encyclopedia
Haute cuisine
Haute cuisine or grande cuisine was characterised by French cuisine in elaborate preparations and presentations served in small and numerous courses that were produced by large and hierarchical staffs at the grand restaurants and hotels of Europe.The 17th century chef and writer La Varenne...
, the "high art" of French cooking: a grandiose style of cookery favored by both international royalty and by the newly rich of Paris. Carême is often considered as one of the first internationally renowned celebrity chef
Celebrity chef
A celebrity chef is a kitchen chef who has become famous and well known. Today celebrity chefs often become celebrities by presenting cookery advice and demonstrations via mass media, especially television. Historically, celebrity chefs have included Antoine Carême and Martino da Como.-External...
s.
Biography
Abandoned by his parents in Paris in 1794 at the height of the French RevolutionFrench Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...
, he worked as a kitchen boy at a cheap Parisian chophouse in exchange for room and board. In 1798, he was formally apprenticed to Sylvain Bailly, a famous pâtissier
Pastry chef
A pastry chef or pâtissier is a station chef in a professional kitchen, skilled in the making of pastries, desserts, breads and other baked goods...
with a shop near the Palais-Royal. Bailly recognized his talent and ambition. By the time he was prepared to leave Bailly, he could stipulate that he should be free to leave his new employer when a better offer came along. He opened his shop, the Pâtisserie de la rue de la Paix, which he maintained until 1813.
Carême gained fame in Paris for his pièces montées, elaborate constructions used as centerpieces, which Bailly displayed in the pâtisserie window. He made these confections, which were sometimes several feet high, entirely out of foodstuffs such as sugar, marzipan, and pastry. He modeled them on temples, pyramids, and ancient ruins, taking ideas from architectural history books that he studied at the nearby Bibliothèque Nationale, thanks to the enlightened attitude of his first employer Bailly. He is credited with the inventions of gros nougats and grosses meringues, croquantes, made of almonds and honey, and solilemmes.
He did freelance work creating pieces principally for the French diplomat and gourmand Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord, but also other members of Parisian high society, including Napoleon. While working on his confections at many private kitchens, he quickly extended his culinary skills to main courses.
Napoleon was famously indifferent to food, but he understood the importance of social relations in the world of diplomacy. In 1804, he gave money to Talleyrand to purchase Château de Valençay
Château de Valençay
Château de Valençay is a residence of the d'Estampes and Talleyrand-Périgord families in the commune of Valençay, the Indre département of France. Although geographically it is part of the province of Berry, its architecture invites comparison with the Renaissance châteaux of the Loire Valley,...
, a large estate outside Paris. The château was intended to act as a kind of diplomatic gathering place. When Talleyrand moved there, he took Carême with him.
Carême was set a test by Talleyrand: to create a whole year’s worth of menus, without repetition, and using only seasonal produce. Carême passed the test and completed his training in Talleyrand's kitchens. After the fall of Napoléon, Carême went to London for a time and served as chef de cuisine to the Prince Regent
Prince Regent
A prince regent is a prince who rules a monarchy as regent instead of a monarch, e.g., due to the Sovereign's incapacity or absence ....
, later George IV
George IV of the United Kingdom
George IV was the King of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and also of Hanover from the death of his father, George III, on 29 January 1820 until his own death ten years later...
. Returning to the continent he followed the invitation of Tsar Alexander I
Alexander I of Russia
Alexander I of Russia , served as Emperor of Russia from 23 March 1801 to 1 December 1825 and the first Russian King of Poland from 1815 to 1825. He was also the first Russian Grand Duke of Finland and Lithuania....
to come to St. Petersburg, where he lived so briefly he never prepared a meal for the Tsar before returning to Paris, where he was chef to banker James Mayer Rothschild.
He died in his Paris house on the Rue Neuve Saint Roche at the age of 48, due perhaps to many years inhaling the toxic fumes of the charcoal on which he cooked. He is remembered as the founder of the haute cuisine concept and is interred in the Cimetière de Montmartre in Montmartre
Montmartre
Montmartre is a hill which is 130 metres high, giving its name to the surrounding district, in the north of Paris in the 18th arrondissement, a part of the Right Bank. Montmartre is primarily known for the white-domed Basilica of the Sacré Cœur on its summit and as a nightclub district...
.
Influence
In his first major position, Carême worked as chef de cuisine to Talleyrand who actively encouraged Carême in the development of a new refined food style using herbs and fresh vegetable, simplified sauces with few ingredients. Talleyrand's became a famous host during the Congress of ViennaCongress of Vienna
The Congress of Vienna was a conference of ambassadors of European states chaired by Klemens Wenzel von Metternich, and held in Vienna from September, 1814 to June, 1815. The objective of the Congress was to settle the many issues arising from the French Revolutionary Wars, the Napoleonic Wars,...
- when the congress disbanded, not only the map of Europe but also the culinary tastes of its upper classes were thoroughly revised.
Carême's impact on culinary matters ranged from trivial to theoretical. He is credited with creating the standard chef's hat, the toque; he designed new sauces and dishes, he published a classification of all sauces into groups, based on four mother sauces. He is also frequently credited with replacing the practice of service à la française
Service à la française
Service à la française is the practice of serving all the dishes of a meal at the same moment.This style prevailed in the courts of French royalty, as it made the greatest impression for all the delicacies of the kitchen to emerge simultaneously...
(serving all dishes at once) with service à la russe
Service à la russe
Service à la russe is a manner of dining that involves courses being brought to the table sequentially....
(serving each dish in the order printed on the menu) after he returned from service in the Russian court, but others say he was a diehard supporter of service à la française.
Works by Carême
Carême wrote several books on cookery, above all the encyclopedic L'Art de la Cuisine Française (5 vols, 1833–34, of which he had completed three before his death), which included, aside from hundreds of recipes, plans for menus and opulent table settings, a history of French cookery, and instructions for organizing kitchens.- Le Pâtissier royal parisien, ou Traité élémentaire et pratique de la pâtisserie moderne, suivi d'observations utiles au progrès de cet art, et d'une revue critique des grands bals de 1810 et 1811 (Paris, 1815)
- Le Maître d'hôtel français, ou Parallèle de la cuisine ancienne et moderne, considéré sous rapport de l'ordonnance des menus selon les quatre saisons. (Paris, 2 vols. 1822)
- Projets d'architecture pour l'embellissement de Sainte Petersburg.
(Paris, 1821)
- Projets d'architecture pour l'embellissement de Paris. (Paris, 1826)
- Le Pâtissier pittoresque, précédé d'un traité des cinq orders d'architecture (Paris, 1828; 4th edition, Paris, 1842)
- Le Cuisinier parisien, Deuxième édition, revue, corrigée et augmentée. (Paris, 1828)
- L'Art de la cuisine française au dix-neuvième siècle. Traité élémentaire et pratique. (Volumes 1-5. [Work completed after Carême's death by Armand Plumerey.] Paris, 1833-1847)
- The royal Parisian pastrycook and confectioner ([From the original of Carême, edited by John Porter] London, 1834)
- French Cookery, Comprising l'Art de la cuisine française; Le Pâtissier royal; Le Cuisinier parisien... ( [translated by William Hall] London, 1836)
External links
- NPR: Antonin Careme: The First Celebrity Chef - All Things ConsideredAll Things ConsideredAll Things Considered is the flagship news program on the American network National Public Radio. It was the first news program on NPR, and is broadcast live worldwide through several outlets...
, 25 May 2004 - Biography Highlights Career of a 19th-Century Culinary Star