I have heard it not the first time - fine dining is dead. Well - Ferran Adrià closed El Bulli some time ago - not because it was not successful [we might consider, that El Bulli was the most successful fine dining restaurant, which was not in a metropolitan area]. I guess Ferran had still 20 to 50 people on the waiting list, for any diner he was accommodating. But he is also a person, who is strangely connected to trends [yes he is also a culinary trend setter, but to be a trend setter, you have to have a feeling for the overall crowd psychology]. In the current economical climate a fine dining establishment has a hard time: the US is not completely out of the crisis - still struggling - but Europe is even worse, with their Euro crisis - and Asia doesn't see the growth rate as previous years. A lot of people just don't want to expend that much for a single dining experience, when the times are unsafe - others don't want to show off, that they still have it and "are...