Long before anyone had ever heard of Silicon Valley, Emile's restaurant was the height of sophistication in downtown San Jose. Now, founding chef and owner Emile Mooser is selling the restaurant that
bears his name and moving on to a life of cycling, skiing and traveling. Emile's is scheduled to close for a week on New Year's Day and reopen Jan. 9 under new owner Alexandra Dorian with the same name, staff and menu.
The departure from daily restaurant work is bittersweet, says the 73-year-old, Swiss-born chef, who has been cooking professionally for 58 years. ``But it's time. I want to take it easy while I'm still healthy.
As his professional finale, Mooser plans a New Year's Eve gala dinner. Dessert will be Grand Marnier souffle, the dish that has remained on his menu by popular demand since soon after he opened Emile's Swiss Affair at 545 S. Second St. in 1973.
"I know a lot of friends are going to come," he says. "The phone is ringing off the hook."
When Mooser launched his little bistro in a space formerly occupied by a Greek coffee shop, French cuisine was considered exotic in a community known primarily for its disappearing orchards. Lobster pa^te en croute and
filet of beef Wellington were seen as the epitome of fine dining.
Over the years, the restaurant has evolved along with the valley's residents, who become more sophisticated and well-traveled as the Valley of Heart's Delight morphed into Silicon Valley. The menu, though still grounded in French
classics, has branched out to embrace global flavors. Lighter dishes have been added as the chef confronted his own cholesterol issues. The name was shortened to simply Emile's.
Yet the souffle is as popular as ever. "It's amazing, the story of the souffle," Mooser says. As he tells it, the dish was something he whipped up when his family got bored with going out to breakfast on Sunday mornings. They liked it so much, they urged him
to put it on the menu of his new restaurant.
"I did it by hand the first day," whipping the egg whites with a whisk,
he recalls. On the second day, he purchased a handheld electric mixer for the job. In no time, demand was so high, he had to buy a big stand mixer to keep up. "Everybody ordered souffle."
Emile's offers other flavors of souffle, depending on the season, but Grand Marnier is always the star.
The recipe is no secret. Mooser has shared it with many students in the cooking classes and team-building programs he's run for 15 years for companies such as eBay, Google and Apple.
He shares it again here, along with recipes for other restaurant favorites, including braised lamb shanks. The garlic soup grew out of his participation in a mountain climbers' expedition to clean up Mount Everest in 2000.
Mooser enjoys the teaching so much that he plans to continue offering classes and team-building programs as well as serve as a consultant to the new owner of Emile's. Between classes, he'll divide his time among a condo in Campbell, a pied a terre in San Francisco and an apartment in Switzerland.
Life is going to be easier, he says. "My classes are fun. I'm not going to do anything that isn't fun." |
