French chef who helped transform Britain’s restaurant scene
Albert Roux, who has died aged 85, had a passion for fine dining that dated back to his childhood in Paris, said The Times. “I’m afraid I was always exposed to good food and can’t resist it,” he once confessed. “I’m overweight, I have a bad back, and I suffer for it...” In the 1960s he brought his love of French cuisine to England, and with his brother Michel, he revolutionised the “staid British restaurant scene” when he opened Le Gavroche in London. Serving such unashamedly luxurious dishes as gruyère-clad soufflé Suissesse and a lobster mousse with caviar and champagne butter sauce, it was the first British restaurant to win one, then two and finally three Michelin stars, and it attracted a suitably glamorous and upmarket clientele.
But Roux was not just a “gifted chef”, said
Jay Rayner in The Guardian. He was also an
“astute” and exacting businessman. While
Michel was content mainly to concentrate on cooking, Albert ran the family business empire. This included a brasserie, a contract catering firm, a company that made vacuum-packed sous-vide dishes for chefless bistros, a hotel and a high-end butcher, as well, of course, as numerous restaurants. These provided a training ground in excellence for a new generation of chefs, many of whom later set up restaurants of their own. Marco Pierre White, Gordon Ramsay, Rowley Leigh and Marcus Wareing are among the many culinary stars who were tutored by the Roux brothers.
Albert Roux was born in Burgundy in 1935, the son of a charcutier, and brought up in Paris where his mother sold sausages in the local markets. Aged 14, he left school and took up an apprenticeship with a pâtissier. He considered entering the priesthood; instead, at 17, he married his sweetheart, Monique. Decades later, he reflected that he had taken the right course: he would have made a “very bad priest, because I am – was – a philanderer”. He came to England for the first time in 1952, where he worked for Nancy Astor at Cliveden. He later worked at the British embassy in Paris, and as the chef to the racehorse trainer Major Peter Cazalet.
After nine “happy years” with Cazalet, he decided to launch his own restaurant, and invited Michel, who was working as a private chef in Paris, to join him. Together, they toured London’s best restaurants, and were shocked, but also delighted, by their mediocrity. Financed in part by members of Cazelet’s rich circle, they opened Le Gavroche in 1967. Early clients included Charlie Chaplin and Ava Gardner, said The Guardian. But it was so hard to get ingredients in London, Monique would drive to Paris, pack the car with foie gras and poulets de Bresse, and smuggle it back.
The brothers worked side by side for nearly 20 years, opening restaurant after restaurant. There was considerable tension, and some furious rows, and in 1986 they decide to split their interests. Michel kept the Michelin-starred Waterside Inn in Bray, while Albert held onto Le Gavroche. They continued to appear on TV cooking programmes together, where audiences were amused by their testy banter, in their still strong French accents. In the 1990s, Albert sold most of his other businesses, in order to focus on his consultancy work; he handed Le Gavroche to his son, Michel Jr, and continued to help run the Roux Scholarship, for up and coming chefs. He is survived by his third wife, Maria Rodrigues, and by his two children by Monique. Michel Roux died last year.