El Bulli is Mecca. It is located in Roses on Coasta Bravas in the Catalan region of Spain.
Ferran Adria does not have does not have a formal training. He started as a dishwasher when he was 18 (remember this) in some hotel. The chef de cuisine took him under his wing until he turned 19 when he was drafted into the military and became a cook. At age 22, and this is the most important part - four years into his culinary career - he gets a job at El Bulli...
18 months later he became the head chef.
Five and a half years in the industry and he's already the head chef of a restaurant with one michelin star. Adria would earn the following two more over the next fifteen or so years.
Wowzers!
in 2005 El Bulli was ranked 2 in the Restaurant Top Fifty (Restaurant being the magazine and Top Fifty being out of the entire world). Since 2006 El Bulli has been at number 1.
On top of El Bulli, Chef-God Adria has El Bulli Taller which is a studio slash laboratory. El Bulli closes for six months out of the year and his research team go to Taller and like mad scientists create wonderfully unique dishes and solve culinary problems. Not to be confused with molecular gastronomy.
He has released volumes of "cook books" chronicling everything from 1984 to 2005. I want them all. I also want to read A Day at El Bulli which details a 24 hour experience at El Bulli.
You probably won't be able to eat at El Bulli this year. The amount of reservation requests for the 2009 season has already far exceeded their capacity. Best Restaurant in the world, what are gonna do.
p.s. I'd learn Castilian for the sole purpose of being able to talk to him
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