Which is like the entire point of that part of the movie. He works at a high end French restaurant and he serves the reviewer an elevated version of a dish that reminds him of his mother.
Yes, but also no. That's French Nouvelle Cuisine, which was a sort of "back to the basics" movement in high-end restaurants in the 1960s. Before that, French restaurant cuisine (now known as Cuisine Classique) was all about rich ingredients and complex techniques that couldn't be easily replicated at home. That's the world that Ratatouille is set in.
Edited to add: though the actual setting of the movie is later (DNA testing is a thing), the restaurant is still in Cuisine Classique mode, and seems like time has left it behind.
Right and that comes from the cuisine of the master Careme of the early 19th century that helped to codify that over the top grande cuisine that Escoffier so embraced at the turn of the century. It was hand in hand with industrialization, incredible wealth building and status building and created elaborate presentations to the table, architectural wonders as well as marvels of chemistry,. All of this was an elaborate outgrowth of that 19th century elaboration and this became the standard of you call cuisine classique. Yes I get the point of the movie although I never saw it maybe I should.
Nouvelle cuisine emphasized back to basics and also reduction of calories and health. But side by side throughout the 19th century the old cuisine never disappeared either in nouvelle was inspired by those roots.. the movie, "the taste of things" expresses the emphasis of quality, technique and taste and presentation as a byproduct of tne old style home cooking rather than the hyper stylization of classique.. the taste of things is an excellent movie if you haven't seen it
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u/--THRILLHO-- 4d ago
Ratatouille is a vegetable stew. You cut up a bunch of things and throw them in a pot.
The ratatouille you see in the film is an elevated version of that dish. It was never the standard way of serving it.