Success Is the Sum of Small Things
Fernand Point, the legendary French chef of La Pyramide, once said:
“Success is the sum of a lot of small things done correctly.”
I think about that sentence quite often when visiting restaurants, because a great restaurant experience is almost never about one spectacular dish or one exceptionally charming waiter. It is about everything coming together, from the moment you make the reservation until the moment you walk out of the door.
The reservation is easy, you are welcomed with a smile, the table is clean and comfortable, the menu arrives quickly and the wine preferably before the food. The bread is fresh, the glasses are polished, the music isn't too loud and somebody actually knows which dishes are vegan or gluten-free. The plates arrive more or less together, nobody asks you every four minutes whether everything is okay, but somehow somebody does notice when your glass is empty.
And yes, the food needs to be good too.
Then comes the bill, correct and preferably without having to wave your arms for fifteen minutes.
None of these things individually makes a restaurant great, but together they determine almost everything. A beautiful interior cannot compensate for indifferent service, brilliant food becomes considerably less brilliant when half the table has finished before the other half receives its main course, and even a Michelin-level kitchen leaves a strange aftertaste when the toilet looks as though nobody has visited it since Tuesday. ## THE MAN BEHIND THE QUOTE
Fernand Point ran the legendary three-Michelin-starred La Pyramide in Vienne, a historic town on the Rhône, only about 30 kilometres south of Lyon. It is an interesting little detail because Lyon would later become one of the great culinary capitals of the world, partly thanks to chefs influenced by Point.
La Pyramide still exists today and holds two Michelin stars, more than seventy years after Point's death. That alone tells you something about the legacy he left behind.
Point wasn't simply a famous chef. He became one of the great teachers of modern French cuisine, mentoring people such as Paul Bocuse, Alain Chapel and the Troisgros brothers, who in turn influenced generations of chefs.
Perhaps his most interesting lesson, however, wasn't a recipe or a cooking technique. It was attention.
Greatness, in Point's philosophy, came from doing small things correctly, every day, again and again. That applies just as much to the waiter polishing a glass as to the chef preparing a sauce, and probably explains why some restaurants with relatively simple food can give you a wonderful evening, while another restaurant with an expensive interior and technically perfect plates somehow leaves you cold. ## THE INVISIBLE DETAILS
I sometimes visit restaurants where you can almost see where the attention stops. The chef has clearly worked incredibly hard on the plate, but nobody has looked at the entrance for weeks. Or the owner has spent a fortune on beautiful chairs, lighting and handmade ceramics, while the waiter cannot tell you what is actually in the dish.
One mistake hardly matters. Neither does a second one.
But eventually all those little things start adding up, and suddenly you understand why an evening that should have been wonderful somehow wasn't.
That is also why, when reviewing restaurants for Hotspots Algarve, we look at four different parts of the experience: food, service, price and ambiance. A restaurant can serve food worthy of a 9.5, but when the service scores a 6, it simply isn't a 9.5 restaurant.
Guests don't experience departments, after all. They experience an evening.
And strangely enough, it is often the smallest details we remember afterwards: the waiter who remembered what you were drinking, the chef who came out of the kitchen because somebody had an allergy, the extra chair brought without anyone having to ask, or, negatively, that dirty glass you kept staring at throughout dinner.
Fernand Point died in 1955, but his lesson may be more relevant than ever in a restaurant world that spends enormous amounts of money on design, marketing, Instagram and increasingly sophisticated kitchens.
All useful, of course.
But the real magic still happens in hundreds of tiny moments: at the door, at the table, on the plate, in the timing and sometimes simply in a smile.
Get enough of those small things right and, without quite knowing why, your guests walk outside saying the four words every restaurant owner ultimately wants to hear:
“That was really good.”
