Take a year old carrot, sauté for two hours in goat butter and chamomile. These words by René Redzep, master chef at noma in Copenhagen, are the inspiration for No Need. The title is deliciously abstract—don’t concern yourself. The text: the names and locations of the world’s 50 highest rated restaurants—some used to excess, others sparingly, foraging for combinations inspired and unexpected. Don’t look for logic. Think kitchens of experimentation, research, daring and lunacy. In the world of Haute cuisine taste is ecumenical, and like the rondeau in the purest Burgundian style—rank is best left to the people who make our tires. Carolers without a map and only the vaguest recollection of the songs they are singing, practiced with boisterous energy, sizzling dishes on beds of benign vegetables, an ensemble just a little inconsequential and a touch unexpected.

Take a year old carrot, sauté for two hours in goat butter and chamomile…

No Need was commissioned by the Chan Centre for the Performing Arts for Nu:BC Collective and musica intima.  (MO)