France's 'pope of gastronomy,' chef Paul Bocuse, dies aged 91
President Emmanuel Macron was among many who paid tribute to France's "pope of gastronomy," chef Paul Bocuse, who died on Saturday at the age of 91.
Bocuse was "the embodiment of French cuisine," Macron said: "His name alone summed up French gastronomy in its generosity, in its respect for tradition, but also in its inventiveness."
Tributes poured in from colleagues too, with Michelin triple-star-holder Alain Ducasse saying: "The lighthouse of world gastronomy has gone out."
Bocuse, who had held three Michelin stars without break since 1965 for Restaurant Paul Bocuse in his home town of Collonges-au-Mont-d'Or just outside Lyon, was a key figure in the Nouvelle Cuisine movement.
He eschewed heavy sauces and stews for short cooking times and dishes that showcased their primary ingredients.
Bocuse insisted on "always the product, the product," chef Matthieu Vannay of the two-starred La Mere Brazier restaurant in Lyon - where Bocuse worked as a young man - told broadcaster BFMTV.
"He used to always say, I heard him say it... 'Cooking [or cuisine] is not modern, it's not classic, cooking must be good,'" Vannay recalled.
Long-serving mayor of Lyon Gerard Collomb, now France's Interior Minister, wrote on Twitter that "Monsieur Paul" - as he was known to his staff - "was France."
"Simplicity and generosity. Excellence and the art of living," Collomb wrote. "The pope of the gastronomes has left us."
Bocuse pressed hospitality and a keen eye for public relations into the service of his cooking throughout his career, as Marc Veyrat, two-time winner of three Michelin stars, told BFMTV.
"He was someone who brought the chefs out of the kitchen, who told them: You are innkeepers, you have to go and see the customers," Veyrat said.
He was also an ambassador for French cuisine abroad, making many trips overseas.
In 2011 the Culinary Institute of America declared him "Chef of the Century," a title he had also won in the previous century from France's Gault and Millau restaurant guide.
As well as his restaurants, Bocuse established a cookery school and catering college in Lyon.
Ducasse said he had lunched with Bocuse on Wednesday at Collonges-au-Mont-d'Or.
"Paul was not well enough to leave his bedroom, but I left that evening confident in the future of that beautiful house that bears and passes on the imprint and the soul of great, flavoursome cooking, the sense of sharing that he so well embodied," Ducasse recalled.
For Macron, his teaching as much as his cooking will establish Bocuse's legacy.
"Up to these last days he never stopped passing on his knowledge, training new generations of French and foreign chefs and keeping a fatherly eye on them," the president wrote.
Alain Ducasse too looked to the future as well as the past, with an appeal to his colleagues: "Now is the moment to mobilize and to transform what he inspired. Let us be worthy of him!" (dpa)
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