Alexis Gauthier - I Lost 99% of My Customers Going Vegan, Feuding With Jeremy Clarkson & Why Michelin Is Stuck in the Past!
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Who is Alexis Gauthier and what is his culinary background?
Well, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, welcome back to the GoTo Food Pod brought to you by Blink, the UK company. They're revolutionizing the POS game, Ben and Alexius, and we are joined by one of the greatest chefs in the country. He trained under Alain Ducasse, held mission stars for over a decade, and served as a judge and BBC's Mars Chef. But he's also, and maybe his biggest legacy is the fact that he is a classical French train chef and he uses these techniques, but he's now got rid of meat and fish from his restaurants. He's become one of the most famous. famous vegan faces, creators, chefs, lovers in the world. It's Alexis Gaetier. How are you, sir?
Very good. Thank you very much for inviting me. Of course. I'm so pleased to be here. Thank you. Well you didn't find
me you're off to Nice next week. We're very jealous. But you're from Avignon, you're from Silapont d'Avignon. That's right. Can you dance all day?
Yeah, no, you can't. You can't dance because you know it's cut into two. Oh really? Um so it's quite dangerous. But um growing up in Avignon is uh the wonderful thing, but living in London is much, much better, honestly. Yeah. What's the food scene like in Nice nowadays? The food in Nice is uh very touristy, obviously. Yeah. Um but the the traditional Nice was cuisine is a fantastic cuisine if you are like me plant based because it's not turned toward the sea, it's turned toward the hills. So you get all the specialty from Nice which are made of chickpeas and uh vegetables uh from um uh Swiss chard and uh it's it's wonderful. It's uh the vegetables they are amazing and uh so it's very Inspirational. What
about Le Columbore?
Have you ever been there? Um I think I have been there, yes, a long time ago. You're not a fan of it? I mean I obviously the the the it's it's a beautiful place and wonderful uh selection of uh artwork. And uh I don't think people go there for the food. No. They go there to um enjoy the the the hospitality of uh of the village and uh looking at the beautiful uh swimming next
to a a coolder or a Exactly, that's ridiculous, yeah. Very cool. We've managed to prize you away from your restaurant which you opened in twenty ten in Romney Street. It was the previous home of Richard Corrigan's legendary Lindsay House. We've had Richard on the pod, tricky day. Apparently that place was crazy. I mean, did it maintain some of the craziness when you when you took it over?
Yes, of course. Um I mean he's a legend um of the industry. And he was running a crazy restaurant and we took over running a crazy restaurant. And we had some customer who used to come and say, Oh yeah, uh I had my table on the first floor at the Lindsay House, so can I have my table and uh So it was um it was a bit of a challenge. Yeah.
But you maintain some of the traditions. You still have to ring the bell when you come to the floor. Absolutely. Absolutely.
I mean the building cannot be um used otherwise. You have to ring the bell so it feels like the only club in London where you don't have to be a member. Yeah. Um and uh and then obviously because it's a protected building, there is no lift, so all the food from the kitchen downstairs uh has to go up uh via the stairs with runners going up and down. Wow. So you imagine when people on the first floor are having a testing menu with ten or twelve. Yeah. And we serve I don't know, um um I don't know uh thirty thousand, forty thousand customers a year in this building. It's it's a lot of steps. Everything's run up that everybody's got beautiful lean legs and everybody looks super fit. Yeah, yeah. And when you work at Gauchiso you do not need to have uh gym membership because y you are gonna go up and down the stairs all day long and it's wonderful for your health.
That wasn't something you were like re like worried about or retent of in the beginning, when you saw the site.
Now when I saw the site I was that's exactly the site I wanted to have. Um I mean I couldn't I had to pinch myself because um uh Richard had had left the place about a year before. Yeah. And it was just after the two thousand and eight um um financial crisis and everybody thought that restaurants in London were dead.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
Who is Alexis Gauthier and what is his culinary background?
0:04–7:50
2
How did Alexis’s early life in Avignon shape his cooking philosophy?
7:50–15:46
3
Why did he decide to remove meat, fish, and dairy from his menus?
15:46–24:16
4
What happened to his customer base after going fully plant‑based?
24:16–33:45
5
How did he rebuild Gautier Soho around compassionate French gastronomy?
33:45–43:09
6
What are the economic challenges of running a fine‑dining restaurant in London?
43:09–50:53
7
How do vegan chefs handle tricky ingredients like wine, honey, seaweed and figs?
50:53–58:07
8
Does Michelin encourage innovation, or is it holding back vegan cuisine?
58:07–1:02:05
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