Paris (AFP)

"My wife sells me for 24 hours," jokes Mauro Colagreco. Spending a day with the Argentinian chef in the "best restaurant in the world", or planting a tree in his garden, is one of the gastronomic experiences put up for auction for restaurant owners in difficulty.

Faced with the Covid-19 crisis which hit the sector hard, the ranking of "50 Best Restaurants" has given up publishing its prize list, judging that in 2020 "they are all equal before the crisis".

On the other hand, on July 3, he launched a fundraising campaign to support the most vulnerable.

"There has been a kind of united tsunami. It is the first time that we have world auctions of such a scale, more than 130 lots will be put on sale from July 3 to 12," explained the AFP Hélène Pietrini, director of World 50 Best.

Several great chefs responded present with highly symbolic proposals influenced by their thoughts during the months of confinement, beyond meal offers in their Michelin-starred restaurants.

"Containment has brought us closer to nature and planting a tree on which will be engraved the name of the person who will win this prize is a very strong message. His children will be able to admire it," Mauro Colagreco told AFP in a video exchange from the garden of his restaurant, surrounded by century-old trees. He harvests fruit, vegetables and aromatic herbs every day that make the singularity of Mirazur cuisine, on the Côte d'Azur in Menton, crowned "best restaurant" in the world 2019 in the 50 Best ranking.

The other lot "it's 24 hours with me, my wife sold me," says Mauro Colagreco.

- Champagne tasting -

The chef will discover his world through his garden, his research cuisine, his producers and his friends and will take his guest for lunch to a place he appreciates. Not to mention a dinner at Mirazur with the new post-containment menu based on the phases of the moon.

One of the pioneers of vegetable cuisine, the Frenchman Alain Passard, offers a meal for 12 friends in the heart of one of his vegetable gardens, improvised according to the morning picking.

Alain Ducasse, another French star, will introduce you to the cuisine of "naturalness", the concept of his three-star Parisian restaurant at the Plaza Athénée with avant-garde desserts from the best pastry chef in the world 2019 Jessica Préalpato designed in this spirit.

At the George V, another Parisian palace, three of its starred chefs will be mobilized for an experience that will start aboard a luxury car (but hybrid) driven by the Italian chef Simone Zanoni to the hotel's vegetable garden in Versailles. He and his colleague Alan Taudon will then give a master class in the hotel kitchens on the preparation of pasta and seasonal vegetables picked by the winners. In the evening, a champagne tasting with three-star chef Christian Le Squer will be followed by dinner in his restaurant.

In San Francisco, the French chef Dominique Crenn, 3 stars, will receive on her farm, where she practices fermentation, bee breeding and olive oil production, before lunch at the bistro and dinner at the restaurant .

The initial price of the lots goes from less than 1,000 euros for a lithograph by Alain Passard to several tens of thousands "for experiments lasting several days with flights included".

In several lots, there will be "a lot of time" spent with the chefs, "an experience on which it is difficult to put a monetary value", underlines Hélène Pietrini.

The funds will be redistributed to the restaurants that will apply. Priority will be given to eco-responsible establishments in countries where the government has not helped the sector much.

© 2020 AFP