• Alexandre Mazzia is the only new three-star chef in the 2021 edition of

    the Michelin Guide

    , for his restaurant AM in Marseille.

  • A traveling cook, he offers a long-term meal of twenty succulent and high-quality bites, served on tables without tablecloths and without fuss.

He is a chef who thinks outside the box, who was crowned this Monday by the

Michelin Guide

for its 2021 edition. A chef who has traveled a lot. And whose dishes take us far, far away…. "I am proud to tell you that I am a cook", simply dropped Alexandre Mazzia at the end of his thanks for his third star. A cook, yes, but a “cook-explorer”, who does not hesitate to cross any obstacle to compare the textures and flavors that he has brought back from his many travels. Or to fight against all odds - both against the Covid-19 pandemic and against a somewhat finicky administration - to be able to continue its activity at the helm of a food truck instead of its confined stoves.

Last November,

20 Minutes

was treated to a soup of toasted bread with onions and Comté matured for 36 months, a pelamide with satay accompanied by a semolina with orange blossom, spices and fresh herbs. , a fondant with madeleine and tangy lemon.

All accompanied by verbena mint tea served lukewarm.

Not to mention the croq-mazz, a croque-monsieur with milk-fed veal, white balsamic pickle, spicy hummus and smoked eggplant caviar made in just 60 units, for 12 euros.

About twenty small creative portions

“Cooking for the food-truck or for the restaurant doesn't change anything. Passion, rigor and fervor are the same. It's just a little bit different exercise, my staff also really enjoy it. The most important thing is to know how to bounce back ”, then rejoiced Alexandre Mazzia.

So what about the AM restaurant? 

20 Minutes

 had the chance to have lunch there, when the Marseille chef was named Chef of the Year 2019 by the

Gault & Millau Guide.

The menu then consisted of around twenty small, creative and tasty portions, brought in in clusters and finished at the table. "With my team, we try to conceive your meal as a trip", explains this native of Congo, who spent the first fourteen years of his life by the sea, near Pointe-Noire.

“I try to put as much of my story as possible in my kitchen,” he explained.

By small touches, so that one keeps the memory of a moment, more than of a single dish… ”An unforgettable memory, between a very conceptual“ smoked eel and chocolate ”, signature dish neither salty nor sweet, of a confusing sandy consistency with its notes of metal and iodine on the finish;

a “line hake” without seasoning but accompanied by a puree of “burnt-smoked Jerusalem artichokes”;

a "langoustine in cassava ravioli", which almost gave the impression of wriggling in its envelope;

a "spoonful of raspberry harissa" which prepared the passage to the other side of the mirror, that of the sweet stages before arriving safely, at the café ...

Spices, smoke and chili

“My cooking is based on a tripod: spices, smoke and chili,”

Alexandre Mazzia

explains to

20 Minutes

.

This allows me to create bridges between the ingredients, to achieve a correctness, a balance, to find docile and pleasant fragrances, to absorb an excess of acidity… What I do, we like it or we don't not like, but I do it with my heart, my experience and my sensitivity.

»Everything that has enabled him to reach the highest peak in gastronomy today.

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