THE award of a coveted Michelin star to a picturesque restaurant set in a 17th-century farmhouse outside Béziers, in southern France, was a noteworthy achievement.
Le Relais de Pigasse, on the banks of the Canal du Midi near the village of Ouveillan, had been open only two years. Furthermore, its owner is an Englishman, Robert Eden, great nephew of the former British Prime Minister, Sir Anthony Eden.
Mr Eden, 39, was already a successful wine producer in the Aude department, along the western edge of the Mediterranean. The Michelin star award, in February, was an unexpected bonus.
Yet he had little chance to savour his achievement, for it was tinged by tragedy. Jean-Jacques Benet, a talented French chef who had acted as consultant to Le Relais de Pigasse, was killed in a car crash. Then another accident, this time involving the head chef, Eric Saint Denis, left him unable to work in the kitchen.
For Mr Eden, it was distressing twist of fate. The Michelin inspectors will soon return and they are not the sort of people to show mercy in such circumstances. Any drop in standards will be penalised by the removal of the cherished one-star rating, and they accept no excuses.
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Despite the 19 years that Mr Eden has spent in the Aude, he retains a singularly British phlegm. When he was left without a chef, he methodically set about finding another one. As a result the restaurant stayed shut for much of the winter and the local newspapers that wanted to write about the only Michelin-rated establishment in the area were told to wait. “They kept phoning up and I was saying, you’ll just have to come back later,” he said.
It was a long search, but it ended with the recruitment of Franck Renimel, a chef who had worked in well-known restaurants in southern France.
Four months later, Le Relais de Pigasse is operating again with the sort of smooth and subtle innovation that the French demand of their gastronony. Yesterday there was a mushroom cappuccino with a hint of cocoa and foie gras. This was followed by mullet served with fleur de courgettes and butter juice with peppered mint and ginger peel. For dessert there was crystallised beet with beetroot and sweet potato ice cream and lemon and thyme sorbet.
The food was washed down by Mr Eden’s Chateau Maris — a red wine rated highly by the world’s most influential critic, the American Robert Parker.
As the Canal du Midi glided past buildings that date from 1684, Mr Eden looked up, with a twinkle in his piercingly bright blue eyes. “Did you enjoy the meal?” he asked, confident in the reply.
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He will have to wait six months before he knows whether Le Relais de Pigasse will keep its star, or even been given a second one.
Yet he appears relaxed in a situation that would have other restaurateurs on tenterhooks. Yesterday, in the middle of a summer that may prove critical to the destiny of Le Relais de Pigasse, he turned up for lunch wearing a red T-shirt with the Michelin man on it.
Then he thought it might look out of place in the photograph and laughingly asked the mâitre d’hotel to provide a more elegant garment.
If there were any incognito Michelin inspectors watching, they might have been surprised. But that is not of concern to Mr Eden. “I’m not doing this for Michelin,” he said. “I’m doing this for the customers. I want them to have a really excellent meal and to go away happy.”
This has been his philosophy ever since he opened Le Relais de Pigasse as a showcase for the wines that he produces organically in nearby vineyards. His accountants scoffed at the project, saying that no one would want to pay £50 for a meal in a run-down farmhouse outside Ouveillan.
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Yet Mr Eden went ahead, renovating the farmhouse, installing an £80,000 kitchen and serving high-class meals. “The analysts told me to serve £10 meals, but there are hundreds of restaurants around here doing that,” he said. “ I wanted to do something different and set up a gastronomic restaurant. I like elegance. I like elegance in my wines and I like it in my food.”