Haute cuisine innovations: the role of the master-apprentice relationship

The master-apprentice relationship has a long history in all areas of human education beginning from the old Greek Sophists in the West and various traditional schools in the East. Today, however, this form of knowledge transfer seems to have widely disappeared. One of the very few areas in which the master-apprentice relationship still flourishes is the field of Haute Cuisine. This field is also a particularly appropriate area to follow the process of culinary innovation. This paper investigates this unique form of knowledge transfer exhibiting features unavailable in any other form and being crucial for innovation. The present conceptual paper is the prelude for empirical research based on interviews with elite chefs.