The Tasting Menu Chef

This is the profile with the highest skill and the narrowest tolerance. Nine courses for eight guests means a full day of prep, three people in the kitchen, a plating bench that does not exist in most homes and a table that sits down on time. When those conditions are met the result beats most restaurants, because the plate travels four metres and the pace belongs to the table.

When the conditions are not met, it is the most disappointing format in private dining: lukewarm plates, a chef who never leaves the kitchen, a dining room that hears the washing up. A competent tasting menu chef will tell you this at the first conversation and propose five courses in a kitchen that cannot support nine. That conversation is the best indicator of quality you will get.

Rates are per dinner rather than per day: 900 to 2,500 euros for the chef, plus a commis at 250 to 400 and service separately. Restaurant names carry a premium that is partly about cooking and partly about the anecdote.