May 22, 2011 Kyiv National University of Trade and Economics held a lecture and workshop of French researcher, Dr. of Biophysics Christophe Lavelle on "Molecular Gastronomy".
The event was held at the Department of Technology and Organisation of restaurant facilities in special laboratory under the supervision of the Rector KNUTE A.A. Mazaraki, Professor, Doctor of Science, Economics, member of the Academy of Pedagogic Sciences of Ukraine, with participation of Vice-Rector for International Relations, V.M. Saj, dean of the Restaurant, Hotel and Tourism business department of KNUTE M.I. Peresichnyj, Professor, Doctor of Engineering Science.
This workshop was attended by scholars, teachers, graduate students and students of II, III and IV courses of "Food technology" and "Hotel and restaurant business" specialities.
Christophe Lavelle -is a scientist of National science-nature museum, Doctor of Biophysics, who studies the mechanisms of regulating gene expression and biological structure of matter. He is an advocate of interdisciplinarity, teaches physics, epigenetics and molecular gastronomy in many higher education institutions (universities Paris 4 and Paris 7, Universities of Aix-Marseilles, Lyon, Lille, Toulouse, SupBioTech, Sc. Po in Paris). He is a founder and president of "Science and cookery" association, "co-organizer of annual meetings "Science, art and cooking", author of books on medical physics (published by Ellipses), is currently working on three books: the Food Science and Cell Biophysics (publishers Belin, Dunod and Ellipses).
He spoke on "Molecular gastronomy" as a relatively new trend, created at the junction of cooking and chemistry, emphasized the role of chemistry in modern culinary arts: from quality of ingredients to their cooking, from the physiology of taste to the process of food consumption, how to divide products into molecules and come up with a completely unexpected flavoring combination.
Christoph Lavel told about unusual ways to serve flavored ingredients, such as espumy (foams) and gel-forming solutions with extraordinary flavor intensity, taking into creative cooking rules: caviar from carrot juice, sand from olive oil, baked lobster mayonnaise and meringue with liquid nitrogen; ingredients that have unexpected combination of form and taste: from pasta with spinach gel to vodka sorbet.
The event was held in a warm atmosphere and ended up with tasting these wonderful dishes.
The lecture was interesting, instructive and had many funny moments. Participants learned theoretical knowledge and mastered practical skills in molecular technology, necessary for the modern professional. Everyone really enjoyed the presentation of the lecturer. And lecturers of the Department showed desire for further cooperation with Christoph Lavel and implementation of molecular gastronomy in academic disciplines.