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| The Bocuse d’Or |
The Bocuse d’Or, the Olympics of cooking competitions, features all this and more in an intense two-day competition that keeps critics, chefs, and cuisine connoisseurs from around the world in awe and suspense.
Named for the chef Paul Bocuse, founder of the competition, the Bocuse d’Or is designed to help the public understand the labor, imagination, and creativity that goes into creating gourmet food and appreciating it as an art form. The competition takes place every two years in Lyon, France, and features 24 of the best rising chefs from around the world.
Each chef (one per participating country) is granted one commis and one advisor, and prepares the assigned dishes in front of a live audience. Each team is given five and a half hours to design and create two intricate presentations, with one based on seafood and the other on meat. Every dish is accented with an original garnish, and presented to the 24 judges.
The dishes are judged based on the harmony of the dish’s flavors, the techniques used, the team’s efficiently, and the final presentation. “It’s a level of international respect,” Chef Thomas Keller says. “It’s important to bring awareness to what so many American chefs are working for. It’s important to our profession and our country.”
Winning History
In past competitions, France has won the gold medal six times, with Belgium, Norway, and Sweden usually in the top three. Team USA, despite entering since 1987, had never won a medal until 2015 when Philip Tessier won the silver medal, with Norway winning the gold and Sweden winning the bronze.
This year’s competition (2017)
This year, Tessier is returning to the competition as an advisor, and will be coaching head chef Matthew Peters and commis Harrison Turone.
For the first time, chefs were required to prepare a vegan dish in addition to the standard fare. Chefs had to include two proteins, Bresse chicken, and crayfish. For the meat dish, teams were required to create an interpretation of the Lyonnaise classis Poulet de Bresse aux Écrevisses. This dish was the theme of the first Bocuse d’Or competition in 1987.
And the winner is…
For the first time in the competition’s thirty years, Team USA won the gold medal. Norway won the silver medal, and Iceland won the bronze.
For Team USA’s meat dish, the team created a chicken with mushroom sausage, braised wings, and two kinds of glazes and sauces. It was served with a chicken liver quenelle with foie grass, corn custard, black-eyed peas, and pistachios, and accompanied by lobster tail with a Meyer lemon mousse. For the sauces, some ingredients were shipped all the way from the United States; the team utilized carrots, Vidalia onions, carrots, peas, potatoes, and black truffles.
“The inspiration for the dishes came from where I’ve come from,” Peters said. “From New York to California.”
This win marks an incredibly significant moment in the history of the competition, and is also an important moment for the team. "There are no words to describe how proud we are," Keller said. "When we started this almost nine years ago, we promised Monsieur Paul [Bocuse] that we would get gold. I'm really, really proud today that we're able to honor him."
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