Photo by KitschnClassics

D.C. chefs have made their names known in many ways, but have any of them competed in an international competition dedicated exclusively to the French mixture of ground meat and fat minced into a paste and baked within a crust known as pâté croûte? Now we can safely say that one has.

Julien Shapiro, formerly of Society Fair and currently the resident butcher at Range, Bryan Voltaggio’s first D.C. restaurant, wrote on his blog yesterday of his participation in the 2012 World Pâté Croûte Championship last December. Not only was Shapiro the only D.C. chef to take part, but he was the only U.S. chef to put his pâté croûte against those of international contenders. In his account of the event, he was quite critical of his performance:

I was exposed to dizzying level of professionalism and experience and feel that I fell short. Having to bring my wares from so far away put me at a considerable disadvantage, perhaps more so without the ooh-la-la garnishes & flair (though presentation accounted for few of the 200 total points) and I picked #12 at random, placing me last in the tasting, at which point the judges may have had their fill of 23,000 calorie forcemeats. Judges included Regis Marcon (Le Clos de Cimes ***), 2011 winner Eric Desbordes (Le Bristol ***) and numerous MOF’s. My mistakes were significant, but at least my slices stayed together -another contestant’s aspic was too loose and the pastry collapsed when cut. First and foremost, my pastry (80 points) did not achieve enough color, likely a result of baking 3 at once, thereupon lowering the temperature of the oven. Had I cooked it longer at that temp, I would have risked overcooking the forcemeat. I did not have a consistent gap for the aspic either.

Regardless of his criticisms of his own work, we’re proud to see that he represented D.C. in the only way that was appropriate: with the stars and bars on his pâté croûte.