But, for more than a year now, the chef renowned for his scientific approach to food has been working with the experimental archaeology team based at Hampton Court in Surrey. In a unique project, the historians are attempting not only to show how the cavernous Tudor Kitchens would have looked in their glory days catering for the court of King Henry VIII, but also to use surviving cook books to prepare actual dishes from the Tudor, Stuart and Georgian periods.
It's an unlikely collaboration, perhaps, but Blumenthal has more than just an academic reason for his interest. Last year he took over the Hind's Head in Bray, a fifteenth century pub near to his renowned Fat Duck restaurant. While it also serves food, it's at the other end of the culinary spectrum to its more esoteric neighbour. "The Hind's Head is a village pub, and I wanted to keep it as that," Blumenthal says. "I wanted to serve much more recognisable British recipes than the Fat Duck."
Marc Meltonville and Richard Fitch, the two historians leading the ten-strong Tudor Kitchens team, were already aware of Blumenthal's celebrated experimentation with techniques and flavours when they met him at a food symposium in 2003. Bizarrely, however, they had been struck not so much by the contrasts as the similarities between his uber -modern approach and their more archaic one. Low temperature cooking? Try spit roasting meat in front of a log fire. Savoury ice cream? The Victorian's loved it - especially cucumber.
Small wonder, then, that Blumenthal was intrigued. "We invited him to the Palace, and then he invited us to The Fat Duck, where we tried the tasting menu," Meltonville recalls. "It was stunning, but there wasn't the shock of the new. It was familiar ideas from the past given a new identity. His beetroot jelly was like the old set fruit jellies, for instance. So rather than being shocked, our reaction was, 'It's so obvious, and it really works!'"
Many medieval dishes are either impractical for a modern kitchen or unsuitable for contemporary tastes (Meltonville cites one particularly nasty recipe from 1650 that details how to cook and carve a goose while it's still alive). But Blumethal nevertheless saw possibilities that, with a little adaptation, could work at the Hind's Head. "I thought it would be interesting to take old recipes where the information is scant, with the idea of having three on the menu at any one time."
Which is why he's here now. Blumenthal watches with interest as the archaeology team - none of whom are trained cooks - recreate a feast as it might have been served during the reign of George II; Onion Soup, Lobster Loaves, Chicken the Barbary Way, Scotch Collops (veal steaks in an oyster, anchovy and bacon sauce), Fry'd Potatoes and Chocolate Puddings. When the kitchens were first built in 1514, around 250 servants would have prepared food in them for up to 600 people. Today, they're only a few days each year for historical displays such as this. During them, the historians start the fires and charcoal stoves burning at 8.30 in the morning for what can be a twelve or thirteen hour day, preparing, serving and eating dishes as the public look on (sadly, only the historians themselves get to eat any of the food).
Blumenthal himself has brought along the first of the historical dishes he's adapted for the Hind's Head. Called Quaking Pudding, this is a sort of eighteenth century cross between a crème caramel and blamange, only served piping hot. "They look a bit like silicon implants," Blumenthal jokes, as one is turned out, steaming, onto a plate. Wobbly as a jelly, as well as meeting the chef's own approval the pudding also had to pass muster at tasting sessions with Fitch and Meltonville. "The whole point is they need to quake. It's a trade-off between texture and flavour. It's close to the original, but made with modern implements and knowledge."
He's still working on two other eighteenth century dishes; Beef Royal, where the meat is served in a sauce of red wine, anchovy, truffles and sweet breads (a version of which might even find its way onto the Fat Duck's menu) and Chocolate Wine. A mug of this heated concoction of red wine, port and pure chocolate does the rounds of the historians as they prepare the food - a perk of the job if ever there was one. One taste is enough to produce a stunned look of astonishment, not only at how delicious it is, but that something this good could ever have been forgotten.
Both Blumenthal and the archaeology team at see the collaboration as long term, and it's hard to say who gets the most from it. For the historians there's the kudos and insight of working with one of the country's leading chefs, while Blumenthal himself regards this as more than an opportunity to rediscover lost recipes. "I'm into coming up with dishes, but I'm also fascinated by the cultural and sociological influences of why we eat things in a particular way. It's the whole world of flavour perception. We live in a sensory world, and that would have been the same then," he says.
And with that, he takes his leave of the Tudor Kitchens' roasting spits and charcoal stoves and sets off back to his blow torches and liquid nitrogen.
Information on the Tudor Kitchens and events at Hampton Court are available from www.hcp.org.uk or 0870 752 7777.
Simon Beckett 2005
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