Winner of 10 Emmy Awards, the series “The bear” (“The Bear”, in English) showed the perseverance and setbacks of the Chef Carmy (Jeremy Allen White ) to maintain a professional kitchen in Chicago. With the premiere of the third season in Brazil this Wednesday (17), the work of fiction promises to go further by presenting more about the protagonist’s past.
This is clear from the first episode, which, for about half an hour, recaps memories in kitchens that cemented the chef’s career — and traumas. Punctuated by a melancholic soundtrack, the episode shows not only the behind-the-scenes of some of the best restaurants in the world but also places important chefs in front of the cameras.
Fiction with touches of reality
“The experience was as raw and real as it gets,” he wrote. Daniel Boulud on his social networks. Owner of more than a dozen restaurants around the world, mainly in New York, the Frenchman makes a cameo appearance by impersonating himself on the small screen.
Thomas Keller of the three stars The French Laundry did the same in the series and echoes Boulud’s message. “Although it is a work of fiction, it encapsulates many elements of reality as any documentary could – the community, the dynamics, the beauty, the frustrations and the rewards,” he wrote on Instagram.
Without participation in the work, but a confessed fan of the series, the chef Alex Atala says that “The Bear” is like the “Game of Thrones of kitchens”, compared to the success that the HBO series had with the followers of George RR Martin’s saga. At the helm of the two-star DOM, the chef received journalists at the restaurant for the premiere of the new season and said that many of the scenes are exaggerated in the name of drama, but he sees that it is very accurate in demonstrating “the agonies and joys that we experience in our daily lives”.
Below, check out the real-life Michelin-starred restaurants where the fictional character Carmy worked and the renowned chefs at the helm:
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Daniel (New York)
Opened in 1993, the restaurant now holds two Michelin stars and is located just steps from Park Avenue. A year after opening, the chef Daniel Boulud won his second James Beard Award for his own work at the house of the same name.
In “The Bear,” Boulud introduces Carmy to his recipe for sea bass with potatoes, in which the protagonist cuts the tubers and slices the fish perfectly. “The restaurant shoot for season 3 was done entirely in its natural state — no retakes or tricks,” Boulud said on Instagram.
The restaurant’s cuisine is French and serves seasonal menus. The restaurant currently serves a nine-course tasting menu. US$ 334 (about R$ 1,815 ), which includes New England bluefin tuna and Bolivian dark chocolate mousse. There is a pairing option for US$295 (R$1,600), with a menu focused on wines from the Rhône and Burgundy.
The restaurant is divided into a bar, a lounge, a main hall with neoclassical architecture for up to 150 diners — the same number of employees who make the magic happen — and a “chef’s table” next to Boulud’s office with a panoramic view of the kitchen. The restaurant is open for dinner from Thursday to Sunday.
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The French Laundry (Napa Valley)
In Yountville, a village in California’s famous Napa Valley wine region, a building that once served as a steam laundry in the 1920s became one of America’s gastronomic temples in the 1990s. The chef and owner Thomas Keller is the name behind the The French Laundry which has three Michelin stars, one green star, and a place among the “best of the best” restaurants in The World’s 50 Best Restaurants, alongside restaurants such as Central and elBulli.
The kitchen uses French techniques to bring to life dishes with the freshest ingredients, with two tasting menus that change daily, the “Chef’s Menu” and the “Taste of Vegetables”, in free translation. Open for dinner seven days a week, the experience in the main dining room costs US$ 390 (about R$ 2,115 ) through prepaid reservation.
In the fiction, Carmy interned at the Californian restaurant, where she walks through the vegetable garden and learns how to truss a chicken under the watchful eye of Keller, who also makes a cameo in the last episode of the season.
It is worth remembering that the chef is not new to big productions: he was also a consultant for the Pixar animation “Ratatouille”. Today he is in charge of 11 restaurants and bakeries, including The Surf Club Restaurant, in Florida, and is the winner of nine James Beard awards.
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Noma (Copenhagen)
For food lovers, the Noma continues to carry the nickname of “best restaurant in the world”, as it was included in the select list of “best of the best” of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants and boasts three Michelin stars, in addition to a green star from the guide.
The person leading the venture in the Danish capital is the chef Rene Redzepi who has worked in the kitchens of the former elBulli, alongside Ferran Adrià, and The French Laundry, alongside Thomas Keller. An exponent of new nordic cuisine Redzepi works closely with seasonality, the collection of wild raw materials and fermentation.
Opened in 2003, Noma is currently serving a menu based on the “Vegetable Season,” which runs until September 6 and features vegetables, greens, fruits and wild foods. All reservations for the period are sold out, but you can count on luck and put your name on the waiting list. The menu is available for 3,990 Danish kroner (about R$ 3,170 ), not counting the pairings with juices or wines (between R$1,200 and R$1,600 respectively).
The house will close for good at the end of this year, but the good news is that it will be reborn in 2025 as a “huge laboratory” with work focused on food innovation. The new chapter is dubbed Noma 3.0 .
In the series, Carmy spies René looking at pictures of dishes on a wall and decides to take a photo to send to his brother. The character also appears in the test kitchen alongside other professionals. “We had a great time welcoming you all to our space for a perfect summer weekend in Copenhagen and, among other things, teaching Jeremy Allen White how to properly cut a beautiful piece of calamari,” the restaurant’s official Instagram profile posted.
Spoiler: more chefs on the scene
We won’t go into too much detail, but the final episode of the season brings together a veritable battalion of renowned chefs for a farewell dinner.
Guests include: Grant Achatz behind the acclaimed Chicago-based Alinea; Wylie Dufresne from the now-defunct wd~50, which rocked the Manhattan molecular gastronomy scene; Christina Tosi pastry chef with experience at wd~50 and Momofuku, in New York; Anna Posey pastry chef and co-owner of Elske in Chicago; Rosio Sanchez former pastry chef at Noma and now in charge of two restaurants in Copenhagen; Malcolm Livingston 2nd a pastry chef who worked at Per Se, wd~50 and Noma (and who served as inspiration for the character Marcus, played by Lionel Boyce); Will Guidara restaurateur who was the hospitality guru at Eleven Madison Park alongside chef Daniel Humm; Genie Kwon who was once the pastry chef at the two-star Oriole in Chicago and who now runs Kasama in the city; and Kevin Boehm restaurateur behind the Chicago-based Boka Restaurant Group.
“The bear”
All 10 episodes of Season 3 are available on Disney+.
Source: CNN Brasil
Johanna Foster is an expert opinion writer with over 7 years of experience. She has a reputation for delivering insightful and thought-provoking articles on a variety of subjects. Her work can be found on some of the top online news websites, and she is currently lending her voice to the world stock market.
