Cognitive Models for Gastronomic Creation and Innovation

Abstract

Based on the reflections of super-chef Ferran Adrià and his team at el Bulli restaurant, this paper explores how certain creative mechanisms, techniques and procedures surrounding avant-garde gastronomy can be analysed from an enactivist model of cognition in order to: (1) understand creativity in the kitchen; (2) characterise culinary innovation processes; (3) establish whether some of these processes are general enough to be re-used in other fields and so broaden our theoretical understanding of the processes and mechanisms involved in creation and innovation. We present those features that are specific to gastronomy as a creative process to distinguish them from others that are generic enough to form part of a larger family of creative processes. The paper seeks to present new perspectives on both subject-specific and generic creation processes in haute cuisine.