December 23, 2009 |
Short Order
Star Chef Laurent Manrique in Talks to Become Consultant at Country
French veteran Laurent Manrique, one of San Francisco’s most celebrated chefs, is talking to Carlton Hotel owners about taking over the upstairs Country space, once the domain of Geoffrey Zakarian. Manrique, who recently quit his corporate executive job at embattled San Francisco restaurant Aqua, where he’d earned two-Michelin stars three years in a row, was in town a week ago discussing the deal.
The Gascon-born chef is an owner of Café de la Presse and its adjacent wine bar. A practicing Buddist, Manrique created Taste & Tribute, an annual fund-raiser to support the Tibetan Aid Project in rebuilding and preserving Tibet’s cultural heritage, also a passion of his pal, Eric Ripert, chef-partner of Le Bernardin.
If an agreement is reached, Manrique says he would function as creative consultant and become bi-coastal. “I spent ten years of my life in New York.” he said. He came from Los Angeles at 26 to take over the Waldorf’s Peacock Alley in l997. “It will be exciting to have a New York presence,” he said. “New York is electric. Everything goes so fast. It makes me dizzy. Customers are always moving. San Francisco customers always stay the same. I live in Marin County so that’s even quieter.”