La Dame de pic shines under the stars
Date: 25-07-2017
Anne-Sophie Pic (born 12 July 1969) is a French chef best known for gaining three Michelin stars for her restaurant, Maison Pic, in southeast France. She is the fourth female chef to ever win three Michelin stars, and was named the Best Female Chef by The World's 50 Best Restaurants in 2011.
Chef Anne-Sophie Pic grew up with an intuitive love of food. Growing up in France, she was surrounded by the notion of good food thanks to her chef father, Jacques Pic, and grandfather, chef André Pic, who owned France’s top five-star hotel and three Michelin star restaurants, Maison Pic, located in Valence. Her grandfather, Andre Pic, was particularly known for a crayfish gratin dish, and who first gained the restaurant three Michelin stars in 1934.
After initially rejecting the family trade by embarking on a career in management, Anne-Sophie realised her dream to follow in the footsteps of the men in her family in 1992 at the tender age of 23. Returning to Maison Pic to begin her training, Anne-Sophie was wholly unaware that just three months later she would become head chef when her father sadly passed away. In 2005 much to chef her disappointment the restaurant lost its third star. Within two years, however, a hard-working Anne-Sophie re-established what she felt symbolised her ‘father’s star’, when the restaurant regained its three Michelin star status in 2007. This was only the fourth time anywhere that a female chef had achieved three Michelin stars.
Since, Sophie has opened two additional restaurants, Restaurant Anne-Sophie Pic in Lausanne, Switzerland, which was awarded two Michelin stars in 2009 and restaurant La Dame de Pic which received its first Michelin star in 2013.
In 2011, she received the Veuve Clicquot World’s Best Female Chef award, and was named a Chevalier (Knight) of the French Legion of Honour. Pic is the only woman in France to currently hold three Michelin stars (for her eponymous restaurant in Valence).
Her last adventure is the opening of Le Dame De Pic restaurant at the new Four Seasons hotel in London. The London opening is an outpost of her Parisian restaurant of the same name and is already establish as one of the best gastronomy place in London. God save the Pic!
