The Next Big Thing in Food? Modernist Cuisine’s Nathan Myhrvold Shares His Prediction
What’s the next big thing in food? Nathan Myhrvold, the founder of Modernist Cuisine and one of the most brilliant minds in the culinary world, thinks he knows the answer.
“Going forward, we can’t just rely on importing new foods, we have to invent them. And we will,” he said. “Invention is always how we’ve developed new cuisines.” Myhrvold went on to predict “a golden age” of new foods and new ways to eat them.
He told this and more to Yahoo Food Editor-in-Chief Kerry Diamond during an interview at the SXSW SouthBites conference in March. The video of that talk, titled “Cracking Cuisine: Breaking a Few Rules (and Eggs)” was just released on YouTube this week.
Ferran Adria, the revered modernist chef, once joked on Charlie Rose that Myhrvold was the smartest man in food because he wasn’t dumb enough to open a restaurant. Instead, Myhrvold, a trained chef, runs the Modernist Cuisine think tank/publishing house/kitchen laboratory in Bellevue, Wash., where he hosts a series of private dinners for friends and special guests. Bill Gates, Myhrvold’s former boss at Microsoft, told The New Yorker, ““I don’t know anyone I would say is smarter than Nathan.”
Photo: Yahoo Food
During the talk, Myhrvold also explained how we’re in the midst of a major shift regarding all things food. “People are interested in food, they’re supporting great restaurants, they’re supporting better ingredients,” he said. “It takes a huge societal change to really shake up those parts … What we’re seeing isn’t just a few high-end restaurants. It’s a movement and I think that’s going to improve every part of the food world.”
Check out the video above to learn more about Myhrvold’s landmark “Modernist Cuisine” books, his early days working with Stephen Hawking in Cambridge, and his work digging for dinosaurs. You’ll also learn a quick tip for how to fry herbs in, yes, your microwave.
Photo: Modernist Cuisine
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Yahoo Food hangs with Nathan Myhrvold at the Modernist Cuisine Lab
