Lyon (AFP)

The world of gastronomy is in mourning: Pierre Troisgros, who became famous with his brother Jean for revolutionizing cuisine and making the family hotel-restaurant in Roanne (Loire) a monument to French good food, died on Wednesday at the age of 92.

"Pierre Troisgros died at his home in Coteau (near Roanne, editor's note) at the start of the afternoon," Patrice Laurent, director of Maison Troisgros, who has worked for the company for 30 years told AFP. family.

"His son Michel and his wife went there and are in shock," he added, confirming information from the regional daily Le Progrès.

After the Lyonnais Paul Bocuse, to whom he was very close, and the Poitevin Joël Robuchon, both disappeared in 2018, it is a new sacred monster of French haute cuisine who is taking his bow.

"The crew has a heavy heart this evening. We learn of the death of chef Pierre Troisgros who was the traveling companion of Mr. Paul for 70 years of an extraordinary friendship", the team quickly reacted in a tweet. Paul Bocuse restaurant.

In January 2018, Pierre Troisgros appeared very moved at Saint John's Cathedral, during the funeral of the Pope of the Great Kitchen, to whom he has often been compared.

"He was a giant, the equal of Paul Bocuse, with whom he revolutionized cooking," the Michelin Guide said on Wednesday, also on Twitter.

The famous red guide assures him: "His name will continue to sparkle 3 stars".

"With Jean, he revolutionized cooking in the 1960s. With Paul Bocuse, they took the chefs out of their kitchens. Since then, we go to a cook and not just to the restaurant," reacted to AFP Marc Esquerré, director of the Gault and Millau guides for 24 years.

- Family dynasty -

Born on September 3, 1928 in Chalon-sur-Saône, this man with the invariable mustache and a good-natured smile was brought up with his older brother Jean in the taste of the culinary art by his parents, at the head of the Hotel Modern, opposite Roanne station.

The two brothers, trained in the best restaurants, worked to obtain a first star in 1955. And the restaurant became Les Frères Troisgros, with Pierre in the kitchen, Jean as master saucier and their father Jean-Baptiste in the dining room and in The cave.

Practicing an innovative, creative but simple and sometimes light cuisine, Pierre indulges in original combinations of flavors that foreshadow the New Cuisine, of which the Troisgros brothers will be, with Michel Guérard in particular, forerunners.

The Troisgros house recalls that "from 1962, the brothers made people talk about themselves by imagining the famous salmon with sorrel. First manifestations of what would become New Cuisine, a cuisine + for the time + codified ten years later by Henri Gault and Christian Millau ".

The second star is awarded to the Roanne house in 1965 and the third in 1968. That same year, Christian Millau qualifies it as "the best restaurant in the world", which the Zagat guide also did in 2007.

When Jean suddenly died in 1983, Pierre's second son, Michel, born in 1958, joined his father in the kitchen, before taking up the torch completely in the early 1990s.

Gault et Millau Chef of the Year in 2003, he now works with his son, César, representative of the fourth generation of Troisgros, in the restaurant installed since February 2017 in Ouches, in the countryside, about ten kilometers from Roanne.

The family also opened a brasserie-grocery store in Roanne and an inn in Iguerande, in Saône-et-Loire.

"Troisgros is a name that will remain in the firmament for a long time, a name that shines internationally, even if the Troisgros have not opened an establishment outside France," said Mr. Esquerré.

© 2020 AFP