Annie Féolde is a French chef, best known for holding three

Michelin stars The Michelin Guides ( ) are a series of guide books that have been published by the French tyre company Michelin since 1900. The Guide awards up to three Michelin stars for excellence to a select few establishments. The acquisition or loss of a ...

at her restaurant Enoteca Pinchiorri in

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany Regions of Italy, region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilan ...

, Italy. She was the first female chef in Italy to win that level of accolade, and only the fourth ever.

Career

Born near

Nice Nice ( , ; Niçard dialect, Niçard: , classical norm, or , nonstandard, ; it, Nizza ; lij, Nissa; grc, Νίκαια; la, Nicaea) is the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes departments of France, department in France. The Nice urban unit, agg ...

, France, Annie Féolde's parents ran a hotel. Her father came from this background, whereas her mother's family were farmers. Upon completing secondary school, Féolde left home and moved to

Marseille Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Fra ...

, where she worked for La Poste, and was then transferred to

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

. She began to travel further to improve her language skills, first to London where she lived with a family to look after their Labrador Retriever. She hoped to repeat the same situation in

, Italy, as she had in London, but the family there had agreed to house two women and the other one got there first, leaving Féolde without anywhere to live upon arrival. She started working at a local restaurant instead in order to cover her living costs. This meant that she couldn't afford to go to an

Italian language Italian (''italiano'' or ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire. Together with Sardinian, Italian is the least divergent language from Latin. Spoken by about ...

school as planned, but instead learnt the language from interacting with customers. She met

sommelier A sommelier ( or or ; ), or wine steward, is a trained and knowledgeable wine professional, normally working in fine restaurants, who specializes in all aspects of wine service as well as wine and food pairing. The role of the wine steward in fin ...

and wine collector Giorgio Pinchiorri a year later in 1970. Together they opened Enoteca Pinchiorri, with Féolde as

head chef A chef de cuisine (, French for ''head of kitchen'') or head chef is a chef that leads and manages the kitchen and chefs of a restaurant or hotel. A chef patron (feminine form ''chef patronne'') (French for ''boss chef'') or executive chef ...

. They grew the restaurant from a wine bar serving snacks to a full restaurant serving hot food by 1974. She appeared on Italian television for the first time at the request of food critic Edoardo Raspelli, who inspired her to develop a modern take on

Tuscan cuisine Italian cuisine (, ) is a Mediterranean cuisine David 1988, Introduction, pp.101–103 consisting of the ingredients, recipes and cooking techniques developed across the Italian Peninsula and later spread around the world together with wa ...

. She won her first Michelin star in 1981 at Enoteca Pinchiorri; the duo only found out when Pinchiorri bought a copy of that year's ''Michelin Guide'' from a newsagent. The second star came the following year, and the third in 1992. This made Féolde the first female chef in Italy to win three Michelin stars, and only the fourth woman ever. The same year, arsonists set fire to the

wine cellar A wine cellar is a storage room for wine in bottles or barrels, or more rarely in carboys, amphorae, or plastic containers. In an ''active'' wine cellar, important factors such as temperature and humidity are maintained by a climate control system ...

at the restaurant. Following an assessment of the damage, Féolde convinced Pinchiorri to keep the restaurant open and not shut down permanently. To celebrate 40 years running Enoteca Pinchiorri, an autobiography of both Féolde and Giorgio Pinchiorri was published in 2013 entitled ''Pinchiorri a Due Voci'' (Eng: "''The Pinchiorri Duet''"), written by Leonardo Castelucci. In 2017, she appeared as one of the judges on the television series '' Top Chef Italia''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Féolde, Annie Living people French chefs People from Nice French emigrants to Italy Year of birth missing (living people)