Michel et Sébastien Bras
The Bras embrace the Aubrac
By Laurent Feneau

Perched above Laguiole, on the plateau of Aubrac, Michel and Sébastien Bras are intently aware of the open and generous nature surrounding them which they interpret from season to season. Pastoral murmurs for a sensual and savoury ode.

"We have the deserts we deserve (…) those which are able to break us and eradicate our soul (…) or, on the contrary, those which lift and elate us, making us kings in a space full of harmony and achievement." This desert, described by Patrick Million* is the Aubrac. A world of rocks and light which inspire Michel and Sébastien Bras on a daily basis. Up there, on the high plateaus bathed in sunlight and overlooking Laguiole, fathers, sons, women and children all live and work according to the seasons.
It all started a little lower down in the valley, in Lou Mazuc, at the inn of Michel's parents. At this restaurant catering to workers and local breeders, this future chef first worked as a pastry chef. Self-taught, he learned how to cook with his mother before opening his first restaurant, and then a second - presently with three stars - in 1992. Perched at an altitude of 1,200 metres, this gem of contemporary architecture is a refined design of the milk-shed, typical of the regional shepherd huts. Basalt, shale, granite, and slate are all combined to form enormous spaces, creating an incredible view overlooking the Aubrac landscapes.
In the early morning hours, after passing through the kitchen with around 30 cooks already busy at work, there is an office whose patio door leads onto a wind-blown pasture. There, as every morning, the family deals with the daily business at hand. The walls, covered in photographs, are like a long storybook which Michel proposes to tell.

The big book of nature
"Totally understanding the Aubrac has been a long and slow process. The mystery which enveloped this plateau when I was a kid was far from being the playmate it became as a teenager," he explained, handling a tiny bird's nest that he found on his way. "As a child, I was present for the annual autumnal tree cutting ritual and watched the men who came down from the state forests. I envied them. They came from another world up there, a place that I imagined to be inhabited by I don't who or what." As a teenager, this blacksmith's son learned the "basics of nature" from each season that passed. "In the spring I looked out for the sap rising in he branches of hazelnut trees, and picked the red and black berries in the brambles. In the autumn, the flowery scents made room for the fragrances of the undergrowth."
This was Michel Bras' background and upbringing which makes it understandable how even today he entertains a close relationship with nature. He has the childhood capacity of being wonderfully surprised, and of seeing only the good sides of his work. He is over sixty and yet his face, "sculpted" by walking, is that of a young man. Walking is a daily routine which allows him to carefully take in the Aubrac landscapes and essentially helps inspire his recipes. "There comes a time when physical effort allows the body to secrete endomorphines and you suddenly feel in a secondary state, where everything comes undone and is exposed to you. That's when nature whispers things to me … "

Divided into four hands
There have been no spectacular events to tell of in Michel Bras' kitchen, just many years of trekking along various taste trails and always finishing with a plate resembling a landscape. The infamous "gargouillou" - a recipe which will be celebrating its twenty years in 2007 - is one of his ultimate emotional cooking dishes. By tasting it and looking at the forty, or so, vegetables, herbs, plants and flowers which make it, is like experiencing a total symbiosis with the surrounding nature. A perfect culinary understanding.
When Michel handed over the restaurant to his son, it may well have been perceived as expecting too much from someone the father still affectionately calls "Sébas", but in Aveyron, where family businesses are rampant, it's a normal situation. Even more so in that this transmission could not be slower! Trained at the Institut Bocuse in Lyon, Sébastien has been working alongside his father since 1995. "I began as the pastry cook, but dad never let me make even one mistake." "Probably because I never allowed myself to make any," Michel murmurs lovingly.
Today the son is officially in charge of the kitchen but this doesn't mean the father has hung up his apron. Both are behind the stoves cooking away with similar inspirational ideas floating in the air between them … the Aubrac air, of course.

Songs from this rich earth
And what could be more normal? "We have shared the same working approach for years," confides Sébastien. Nonetheless, Michel gave his son "a ten-year lead". But if the technique is there, how is it possible to pass on this incredible natural inspiration? "It's all a question of upbringing," answers Michel, "I raised Sébastien to be in total harmony with nature and he grew up with this wondrous daily rapport with the region's glorious landscapes."
Behind the stoves on the upper plateaus, the Bras' cooking is like a concert. They create renewable emotions, exposing themselves in their culinary dishes which reflect their symbiosis with nature, shared souvenirs, and songs of this rich earth and of men … rarely sung with two voices. "We each have our own approach even if our ideas end up being the same. We also have competitions of who can be the most creative with a simple product like a potato. Why don't we make a dessert with it? asks the young chef. In the end this became the potato wafers with hazelnut butter which is on the menu today. He adds, "creating is in fact a very intimate thing which is always part of us, Michel, or me."

What if Aubrac was the centre of the world? …
Passing the helm is never easy. To be in the kitchen without really being in it, Michel has found a solution: his vegetable garden where, with his wife Ginette, he grows over 300 vegetables, herbs and plants. "It kills me, but I manage to arrive at the kitchen with my basket in hand!" He follows on to say, with a slight fiery look from his blue eyes "I fell in the vegetable pot when I was younger. That's why today, inventing my gargouillou with these products which incarnate life and good health, just gives me extraordinary strength."
Over the numerous trips they make each year, the father and son discover other extraordinary gardens. In India, the fragrances of the different herbs in curry. In China, the head lettuce which the Bras' serve, the heart accompanied with milk skin and nut bread crust. Throughout their discoveries they have fun building bridges between the different cuisines. "In Rajasthan, milk is used like in France. In Indonesia, people eat banana leaves - in the restaurant we serve our desserts in gentian leaves …."
So each time that Michel and Sébastien leave, it's to really just appreciate returning even more, and to discover with great pleasure that "Aubrac is like the centre of the world." Or perhaps its the other way around.

"From the garden to the market … mere paths of pleasure"
"The vegetables in my garden are never the same. The weather, the region and the moon are all elements which annually present me with totally different ranges of colour, taste and texture. Going to open markets is also an important part of my life. The day I find myself physically unable to enjoy this ritual, I think I'll stop cooking. What absolute heaven to hear the market gardeners tell their latest adventures! How wonderful to hear the odd squeaking of courgettes rubbing together … I love to turn them over in my hands, tear off the small leaves, pick them up, inhale their fragrance... When I get back, I like sharing my latest finds with my fellow cooks, especially when discussing these foodstuffs carries us miles away to sugar loaf, buck's horn plantain, wild garlic… I show them my freshly fragrant corollas"

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