Next Menus at Next Restaurant

There had been much speculation about the next iteration of the shape-shifting NEXT restaurant, including some buzz about a possible El Bulli menu – but here’s the dish, right from Grant Achatz himself – being interviewed in Time Out Chicago:

So basically Dave [Berand, Next’s chef de cuisine] and I were going ‘All right, we did Escoffier and then challenged ourselves with Thai—which, side note, we don’t claim to be Thai experts but it was our version of it—so we did those and now what?’ … So he was like ‘What if we try to create a menu based on a book of children’s poetry?’ and I’m like ‘Oh Jesus, talk about taking a risk, now we’re opening a huge can of worms.’ But at the same time I thought it was really cool idea, very creative.

So Childhood next, Kyoto in spring 2012, Sicily in summer 2012…what about El Bulli?

So coming up in October is going to be a tribute to Childhood! I can only imagine what forms that will take. But to be honest, I’m really looking forward to the Sicily menu.