Xavier Thuizat & Thierry Wasser, two noses for a unique menu

Xavier Thuizat, Executive Head Sommelier at the Hôtel de Crillon, and Thierry Wasser, Guerlain's Nez, worked together on a menu. An unexpected collaboration in the olfactory world of cuisine, fine wines and molecules! The result was a meal program based around the senses, and in particular the sense of smell, for a total immersion in the world of gastronomy, the senses and the art of perfumery.

How did you come up with the idea of a menu dedicated to the senses, and olfaction in particular?

Thierry Wasser: We met at a dinner party. A few months later, Xavier contacted me to come up with this sensory menu.

Xavier Thuizat: I came up with the idea for this menu because wine tasting involves all 5 senses, starting with the touch of the bottle, which provides an initial analysis of the wine. I wanted to highlight the development of the senses that evolve during tasting. They enable us to live a unique experience and rediscover flavors. Olfaction plays a big part in this.

How did you work together?

TW: Xavier organized a tasting of 5 wines and a surprise, a Cointreau from the 60s. We tasted them together, the aim being to identify the salient features of each vintage so that guests could enjoy a different experience and enter into the intimacy of each wine.

X.T .: During the wine tasting, I presented Thierry with aromatic wines with which we had fun capturing an aroma that allowed us to heighten our senses tenfold. We amplified the wine's salient marker for a four-dimensional tasting experience.

Have you worked on Guerlain fragrances?

T.W. We didn't start from the Guerlain fragrances at all, nor did we make any kind of accord with them. I simply used my knowledge to taste and decipher each wine to find the molecule corresponding to its aromatic profile, its soul as it were. We did this tasting together, then I took out my "toolbox" and submitted these molecules to Xavier. These are not perfumes or creations, but the simplest scent that represents the salient marker of the wine being tasted. Together, we chose these taste markers.

How did you go about this?

T.W.: The Dom Pérignon Plénitude 2, 2004, which is often described as having a toasted bread, yeast and citrus flavour, made me think of acetyl pyrazine.I was reminded of the acetyl pyrazine, which recalls the toasted, ricey, nutty side. For Frédéric Emile's 2013 Riesling, very floral with a pleasant hydrocarbon note and a hint of lime blossom, I went for an aurantiol base with notes of orange blossom, neroli, lime blossom, mimosa and tuberose. As for the Gevrey-Chambertin 2017 - Frédéric Cossard, it has notes of rose and honey characteristic of the phenylethyl alcohol molecule, and so on for each bottle. Bridges were naturally built with the dishes.

X.T. The dinner followed the same dynamic as the creation of a perfume: after an explanation of the research into the different aromas of the wines and the discovery of the perfume fragments selected from Thierry's olfactory universe, we gave way to the menu with the food and wine pairings.

How did you incorporate the work done with Thierry Wasser into the creation of the dishes and wine pairings?

X.T .: It was important to create a link between the essences, the wines and the dishes created by Boris Campanella, chef at L'Écrin (4 toques). For example, one of the main courses was a sweetbread with peas, to which we added rose notes that we had identified with the Gevrey-Chambertin 2017 - Frédéric Cossard.

Would you like to take part in a sensory dinner soon? Go here: www.rosewoodhotels.com