PAUL BOCUSE

Lyon

Visited by Henning Høholt, fotos Tomas Bagackas

Paul Bocuse (in choclate?), at the Lyon Tourist office, – where they a few days before the Football EM not were prepared that there could arrive foreign journalists
. They could only show the press to take contact with the press office, that don´t work.  (Wake up).

LYON/FRANCE: For somebody excellent food is a festival, and in this case Lyon is very well known for its outstanding cooks and famous kitchens
.  Paul Bocuse is today the most famous name in the french kitchen world. In Lyon you find also the world famouse International Food Academy, at the corner of Place Bellecour.

Wikipedia tells:

Paul Bocuse (pronounced: [pɔl bokyz]) (born 11 February 1926) is a French chef based in Lyon who is famous for the high quality of his restaurants and his innovative approaches to cuisine. A student of Eugénie Brazier, he is one of the most prominent chefs associated with the nouvelle cuisine, which is less opulent and calorific than the traditional cuisine classique, and stresses the importance of fresh ingredients of the highest quality. Paul Bocuse claimed that Henri Gault first used the term, nouvelle cuisine, to describe food prepared by Bocuse and other top chefs for the maiden flight of the Concorde airliner in 1969
.

Contribution to French gastronomy

Bocuse has made many contributions to French gastronomy both directly and indirectly, because he has had numerous students, many of whom have become famous chefs themselves. One of his students was Austrian Eckart Witzigmann, one of four Chefs of the Century and the first German-speaking and the third non-French-speaking chef to receive three Michelin stars. Since 1987, the Bocuse d’Or has been regarded as the most prestigious award for chefs in the world (at least when French food is considered), and is sometimes seen as the unofficial world championship for chefs. Bocuse has received numerous awards throughout his career, including the medal of Commandeur de la Légion d’honneur.

Editor Henning Høholt, Kulturkompasset, by the Institute Paul Bocuse – Restaurant and Kitchen School at the corner of Place Bellecour in Lyon, foto Tomas Bagackas

The Culinary Institute of America honored Bocuse in their Leadership Awards Gala on 30 March 2011. He has received the “Chef of the Century” award
. On 4 July 2012, in the New York Times the Culinary Institute of America announced they will change the name of their “Escoffier” Restaurant to the “Bocuse” Restaurant, after a year-long renovation.

In 1975, he created the world famous soupe aux truffes (truffle soup) for a presidential dinner at the Elysée Palace. Since then, the soup has been served in Bocuse’s restaurant near Lyon as Soupe V.G.E., V.G.E. being the initials of former president of France Valéry Giscard d’Estaing.

Restaurants

Le Nord, one of Bocuse’s chain of brasseries in central Lyon

L’Auberge du Pont de Collonges, the main Restaurant in Lyon

Bocuse’s main restaurant is the luxury restaurant l’Auberge du Pont de Collonges, near Lyon, which has been serving a traditional menu for decades. It is one of a small number of restaurants in France to receive the coveted three-star rating by the Michelin Guide. He also operates a chain of brasseries in Lyon, named Le Nord, l’Est, Le Sud and l’Ouest, each of which specializes in a different aspect of French cuisine. His son, Jérôme, manages the Chefs de France restaurant inside the French pavilion at Walt Disney World’s EPCOT.

Bocuse is considered an ambassador of modern French Cuisine. He was honored in 1961 with the title Meilleur Ouvrier de France. He had been apprenticed to Fernand Point, a master of classic French cuisine; and Bocuse dedicated his first book to him.

INSTITUTE PAUL BOCUSE:

Baul Bocuse Academy, Lyon

Open to the public, l’Institut restaurant-école located in the heart of Lyon allows students to practice cooking and service in live situations in the brasserie.

It’s at 20 place Bellecour, near its training hotel, ‘Le Royal’, that Institut Paul Bocuse has opened a unique venue for learning: l’Institut restaurant-école. The transparency of the venue enables students, under the watchful eye of their guests, to stage restaurant service in the kitchen and dining room. With this asset, Institut Paul Bocuse, the school of hospitality and culinary arts management, is serving the transmission of the French know-how in gastronomy and hospitality
.

Pierre-Yves Rochon, an internationally renowned interior designer in the field of luxury hotels and restaurants, is the patron of l’Institut restaurant-école and the School of Cuisine that he imagined and decorated around the notion of transparency.

Coming from 40 nationalities in several different programs, the students in International Hotel and Restaurant Management and Culinary Arts and Restaurant Management are put in the limelight, under the direction of Charly Terrade, Director of operations, Chef Cyril Bosviel and Paul Dalrymple, Maître d’Hôtel.

The kitchen and pastry kitchen can be observed from the dining room. This concept creates additional demands on these young students who are seen ‘live’ by their guests. The cuisine at l’Institut restaurant-école is contemporary, convivial and tasty, guided by local produce from the ‘terroir’. This new venue for learning completes the practical and managerial education taught in the Saisonsrestaurant-school in Ecully.

With l’Institut restaurant-école, Institut Paul Bocuse is following its role as an Ambassador of French know-how in gastronomy and hospitality through this address, by allowing this heritage, on the UNESCO register of the Intangible Heritage of Humanity, to be shared far and wide.

l’Institut restaurant-école is open from Tuesday to Saturday for lunch and dinner.