In France, south of Bordeaux, the Maison Claude Darroze restaurant is fully booked. The eatery, a well-known spot for Girondine gastronomy for decades, has gambled on dropping its Michelin star status. "Starting a strategy with more attractive prices, of course, inevitably affects the wallet, brings more flow, more people coming," says restaurant owner Jean-Charles Darroze.
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00:00Is it a star-studded kitchen or not, that's not for me to decide, it's Michelin's guide.
00:08But I wrote to them explaining that we were going to change the concept, that we were going to focus more on this type of cuisine.
00:13And they called us to explain to us that yes, indeed, they were going to remove the star from us, which is what I also wanted.
00:21So if one day we deserve to find a star, all the better, but that's not the goal at all today.
00:26The goal is to please my customers and to make a cuisine that I like and that I feel that my customers like too.
00:37Indeed, the fact that we started a strategy with more attractive prices,
00:43when it hits the wallet, it makes us more crazy, more people come, more regular locals.
00:51We know a lot of people in the room, which is pleasant and which makes the place more alive than before.
01:02We will always work in the same way with the products, the arrivals, the freshness, the local,
01:08as the great chefs do, exactly in the same way, this approach.
01:12But by taking shortcuts, that is to say that we will spend less time on the plates
01:17or bring details, small accumulations of small details that will make,
01:21that we will sublimate a dish to the point of making it star.