Miguel Sánchez Romera, a distinguished neurologist and Michelin-starred chef, has recently returned to Catalonia after years of international travel, including time in the United States and China. Born in Córdoba, Argentina, to Spanish immigrants, Sánchez Romera arrived in Catalonia fleeing the Videla dictatorship. He trained as a doctor and specialised in neurology, practising at Policlínica de Granollers.
Simultaneously, driven by a lifelong passion for cooking, he opened L'Esguard restaurant in Sant Andreu de Llavaneres, which earned a Michelin star. There, he developed a unique culinary style that defied easy categorisation within the dominant Catalan cooking schools of the time. Speaking with him reveals a humanist scientist.
The Brain's Resilience and Modern Stress
After 48 years in neuroscience, Sánchez Romera believes it is clear that human life is centred in the brain. He explained that all bodily manifestations, perceptions, feelings, and expressions originate there. "The brain is really almost perfect. I would say perfect," he stated, adding that it is designed to adapt to any life situation, distinguishing humans from animals.
He noted that the brain understands stress and has mechanisms to avoid it through reasoning. There are two ways to combat fear: confronting it or fleeing. Both trigger an alarm state, which is stress. The brain recognises that prolonged stress is harmful and seeks ways to exit that situation. However, if stress becomes repetitive, it turns into self-aggression, potentially leading to inflammation, which is a product of progressive brain degeneration. Sánchez Romera believes modern life often runs contrary to the brain's intended function.
Catalan Cuisine's Lost Foundations
Sánchez Romera also reflected on his culinary career, which he describes as being "a doctor who cooks." He observed that in the world of haute cuisine, particularly in recent years, imagination often fails to align with reality. This continuous acceleration creates emotional and physical stress, with the brain manifesting what it does not understand physically, such as ageing.
He recalled the period between 1996, when he opened L'Esguard, and 2005, a time he described as a "very beautiful thing in Catalonia." This era, coinciding with the Catalan culinary revolution, was intense and interesting, but he feels it failed to establish solid foundations for gastronomy, haute cuisine, and food as a phenomenon. He believes this lack of solidity stems from a departure from Catalan cuisine's cultural roots.
"We came from a cuisine that I considered, and continue to consider, one of the most important cuisines in the country, which is Catalonia," he said. He views cuisine as pure culture, a shared social emotion that should benefit society, but he feels this did not happen. While acknowledging that everything evolves, he believes something has been lost.
Respecting Culinary Origins
Sánchez Romera has always considered Girona's cuisine, specifically, to be one of the great cuisines of the Iberian Peninsula. As a doctor, he met many rural people, and observed that the connection to the land that some of his patients had has since diminished. Catalonia, with its sea, impressive meadows, rivers, lakes, low and high mountains, and mild climate, possesses everything necessary for exceptional cuisine.
He stressed that if one wishes to transform such a cuisine, careful consideration is needed. He agrees with using Catalan cuisine as a pretext for innovation and creation, but insists on a margin of safety, out of respect for its cultural identity. He explained that Catalan cuisine is essentially a product of its territory and people. He recalled patients who invited him to their homes, where he discovered dishes like escalivada made over an open flame, representing its pure, natural origin. While escalivada has undergone many transformations, he argues this is not creativity linked to culture, which is what he had hoped for. His own culinary expression, he said, stemmed from respecting these Catalan culinary origins.
Chef as Artisan, Not Artist
Sánchez Romera does not consider chefs to be artists. At best, he believes, they can be artisans, creating high-level craftsmanship. Cuisine, he argues, is a cultural manifestation and perhaps a major craft, but never an art form. He recounted meeting Salvador Dalí, who told him: "The day art approaches cuisine and can be eaten, there will be nothing greater." For Sánchez Romera, cuisine can be a demonstration of reflective hedonism, but not a work of art like painting or sculpture.
Balancing his roles as head of neurology in Granollers and a Michelin-starred chef in Maresme presented challenges. Initially, he went unnoticed for the first two years. Medicine was his serious commitment, not a hobby, especially given the diagnostic technical possibilities available at the time. His priority was medicine. When he gained recognition as a chef, he tried to convince patients it was not him, fearing it could affect the absolute faith patients place in their doctor. However, from 1998 to 2000, he realised he would eventually have to choose between his two careers.
He felt like an anomaly. While the formula for success worked for some, he found that his ethical obligations as a doctor conflicted with the media-driven world of haute cuisine. Doctors cannot lie to patients, nor can patients lie to doctors, a code of ethics he felt was often ignored by figures who thrived on media attention or whose businesses succeeded through chance. He found grandiloquent epithets like "the best restaurant in the world" to be absurd.
Sánchez Romera attributes much of the fanfare in the culinary world to living in a time where things lacking evidence risk being captured by imagination. He believes ego has been superlative in cuisine, leading to an overvaluation of the chef's work. This has created a very small world, benefiting some while others have lost the opportunity to continue working in a field they believed offered everything. He rejects victimhood, stating he has been a fighter and has experienced two emigrations.
Moving forward, Sánchez Romera's return to Catalonia suggests a renewed focus on his roots and a continued critical engagement with both neuroscience and the culinary world, advocating for authenticity and ethical practice in both fields.
