Alain Coumont
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Alain Coumont
Alain Coumont (born 4 March 1961) is a Belgian chef and restaurateur, and founder of Le Pain Quotidien. Biography Coumont is the son and grandson of grocers. His grandmother ran a hotel in front of the train station in Huy, Belgium. As a child in Belgium, Coumont spent countless hours perched on a chair, watching his grandmother make bread. In 1977, after a voyage to the United States, where he was impressed by the success of Michel Guérard, he abandoned his classical studies and enrolled in the Hotel School of Namur (city), Namur in Belgium. After graduating, Coumont worked in several highly regarded restaurants including Michel Guérard (Eugenie Les Bains, France), Georges Blanc (chef), Georges Blanc (Vonnas, France) and Joël Robuchon (Paris, France). As a young chef in Brussels, Coumont could not find the right bread for his restaurant. Passionate about quality, he returned to his roots and opened a small bakery where he could knead flour, salt and water into the rustic l ...
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Le Pain Quotidien
Le Pain Quotidien (French for ''the daily bread'') is an international chain of bakery-restaurants. It sells baked goods, bread, salads, sandwiches, beverages, and Open sandwich, tartines. Le Pain Quotidien operates more than 260 bakery-restaurant locations worldwide in 20 countries, including Argentina,Uruguay, Belgium, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, France, India, Switzerland, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Colombia, Turkey, Spain, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Qatar, Russia, Japan, and the United States. The United States, United Kingdom, Belgium and Paris restaurants are fully company-owned and operated, while all other international Le Pain Quotidien restaurants are franchised. A common theme in all Le Pain Quotidien locations is a long, wooden "communal table". History Founder Alain Coumont opened Le Pain Quotidien on 26 October 1990 at 16 rue Dansaert in Brussels. As a young chef, Coumont was dissatisfied with the quality of bread available in Brussels, so he began maki ...
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Belgium
Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. Situated in a coastal lowland region known as the Low Countries, it is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to the south, and the North Sea to the west. Belgium covers an area of and has a population of more than 11.8 million; its population density of ranks List of countries and dependencies by population density, 22nd in the world and Area and population of European countries, sixth in Europe. The capital and Metropolitan areas in Belgium, largest metropolitan region is City of Brussels, Brussels; other major cities are Antwerp, Ghent, Charleroi, Liège, Bruges, Namur, and Leuven. Belgium is a parliamentary system, parliamentary constitutional monarchy with a complex Federation, federal system structured on regional and linguistic grounds. The country is divided into three highly autonomous Communities, regions and language areas o ...
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United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 contiguous states border Canada to the north and Mexico to the south, with the semi-exclave of Alaska in the northwest and the archipelago of Hawaii in the Pacific Ocean. The United States asserts sovereignty over five Territories of the United States, major island territories and United States Minor Outlying Islands, various uninhabited islands in Oceania and the Caribbean. It is a megadiverse country, with the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, third-largest land area and List of countries and dependencies by population, third-largest population, exceeding 340 million. Its three Metropolitan statistical areas by population, largest metropolitan areas are New York metropolitan area, New York, Greater Los Angeles, Los Angel ...
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Michel Guérard
Michel Robert-Guérard (; 27 March 1933 – 19 August 2024), known as Michel Guérard, was a French chef, author, one of the founders of '' nouvelle cuisine'' and the inventor of '' cuisine minceur''. Early life and education Michel Guérard was born in 1933 in the Paris suburb of Vétheuil. At age six, World War II broke out, and he was raised just outside Rouen with his grandmother and then his mother. In town, his mother ran the family butcher shop after his father was drafted. He had the "kind of French country childhood that involved wading into streams barefoot to catch slippery trout with his hands, but also Nazi interrogations regarding the location of his family’s cows." After liberation in 1944, he had an " Escoffier-style feast" at a family friend's home, helping inspire him to stop studying science in favor of apprenticing as a cook. He also learned cooking from his mother and grandmother. Career He related that "watching his grandmother bake pastry inspired him ...
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Namur (city)
Namur (; ; ) is a city and municipality in Wallonia, Belgium. It is the capital both of the province of Namur and of Wallonia, hosting the Parliament of Wallonia, the Government of Wallonia and its administration. Namur stands at the confluence of the rivers Sambre and Meuse and straddles three different regions – Hesbaye to the north, Condroz to the south-east, and Entre-Sambre-et-Meuse to the south-west. The city of Charleroi is located to the west. The language spoken is French. The municipality consists of the following sub-municipalities: Beez, Belgrade, Boninne, Bouge, Champion, Cognelée, Daussoulx, Dave, Erpent, Flawinne, Gelbressée, Jambes, Lives-sur-Meuse, Loyers, Malonne, Marche-les-Dames, Namur proper, Naninne, Saint-Servais, Saint-Marc, Suarlée, Temploux, Vedrin, Wépion, and Wierde. History Early history The town began as an important trading settlement in Celtic times, straddling east–west and north–south trade ...
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Georges Blanc (chef)
Georges Blanc (; born 2 January 1943 in Bourg-en-Bresse in the department of Ain) is a French chef and restaurateur, with two Michelin stars and four toques from the guide Gault et Millau. Private life Georges Blanc is the son of Jean and Paulette Blanc. He has an older sister who was born in 1933. His grandmother Élisa, known as Mere Blanc (Mother Blanc), died at her home in Vonnas at the age of 66. Georges Blanc's two sons Frédéric and Alexandre Blanc participate in the family business. Career In 1962, he graduated at the École Hôtelière of Thonon-les-Bains in Haute-Savoie. Before becoming interested in working as a chef he worked as a flight attendant for Air France, traveling all over the world during one summer. In 1965, after working in a number of renowned places, he did his military service as a chef to Amiral Vedel on the Foch and Clémenceau aircraft carriers. He joined the family business (started in 1872) working with his mother Paulette and then succeeded ...
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Joël Robuchon
Joël Robuchon (, 7 April 1945 – 6 August 2018) was a French chef and restaurateur. He was named "Chef of the Century" by the guide Gault Millau in 1989, and awarded the ''Meilleur Ouvrier de France'' (France's best worker) in cuisine in 1976. He published several cookbooks, two of which have been translated into English, chaired the committee for the '' Larousse Gastronomique'', and hosted culinary television shows in France. He operated more than a dozen restaurants across Bangkok, Bordeaux, Hong Kong, Las Vegas, London, Macau, Madrid, Monaco, Montreal, Paris, Shanghai, Singapore, Taipei, Tokyo, and New York City. His restaurants have been acclaimed, and in 2018 he held 31 ''Michelin Guide'' stars among them, the most any restaurateur has ever held. He is considered to be one of the greatest chefs of all time. Biography Robuchon was born in 1945 in Poitiers, France, one of four children of a bricklayer. He attended the seminary in Châtillon-sur-Sèvre (now Mauléon), De ...
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Flour
Flour is a powder made by Mill (grinding), grinding raw grains, List of root vegetables, roots, beans, Nut (fruit), nuts, or seeds. Flours are used to make many different foods. Cereal flour, particularly wheat flour, is the main ingredient of bread, which is a staple food for many cultures. Maize flour, Corn flour has been important in Mesoamerican cuisine since ancient times and remains a staple in the Americas. Rye flour is a constituent of bread in both Central Europe and Northern Europe. Cereal flour consists either of the endosperm, cereal germ, germ, and bran together (whole-grain flour) or of the endosperm alone (refined flour). ''Meal'' is either differentiable from flour as having slightly coarser particle size (degree of comminution) or is synonymous with flour; the word is used both ways. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, CDC has cautioned not to eat raw flour doughs or batters. Raw flour can contain harmful bacteria such as ''E. coli'' and needs ...
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Salt
In common usage, salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl). When used in food, especially in granulated form, it is more formally called table salt. In the form of a natural crystalline mineral, salt is also known as rock salt or halite. Salt is essential for life in general (being the source of the essential dietary minerals sodium and chlorine), and saltiness is one of the basic human tastes. Salt is one of the oldest and most ubiquitous food seasonings, and is known to uniformly improve the taste perception of food. Salting, brining, and pickling are ancient and important methods of food preservation. Some of the earliest evidence of salt processing dates to around 6000 BC, when people living in the area of present-day Romania boiled spring water to extract salts; a salt works in China dates to approximately the same period. Salt was prized by the ancient Hebrews, Greeks, Romans, Byzantines, Hittites, Egyptians, and Indians. Salt became a ...
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Water
Water is an inorganic compound with the chemical formula . It is a transparent, tasteless, odorless, and Color of water, nearly colorless chemical substance. It is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known living organisms (in which it acts as a solvent). It is vital for all known forms of life, despite not providing food energy or organic micronutrients. Its chemical formula, , indicates that each of its molecules contains one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms, connected by covalent bonds. The hydrogen atoms are attached to the oxygen atom at an angle of 104.45°. In liquid form, is also called "water" at standard temperature and pressure. Because Earth's environment is relatively close to water's triple point, water exists on Earth as a solid, a liquid, and a gas. It forms precipitation in the form of rain and aerosols in the form of fog. Clouds consist of suspended droplets of water and ice, its solid state. When finely divided, crystalline ice ...
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Brussels
Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalities, 19 municipalities, including the City of Brussels, which is the capital of Belgium. The Brussels-Capital Region is located in the central portion of the country. It is a part of both the French Community of Belgium and the Flemish Community, and is separate from the Flemish Region (Flanders), within which it forms an enclave, and the Walloon Region (Wallonia), located less than to the south. Brussels grew from a small rural settlement on the river Senne (river), Senne to become an important city-region in Europe. Since the end of the Second World War, it has been a major centre for international politics and home to numerous international organisations, politicians, Diplomacy, diplomats and civil servants. Brussels is the ''de facto' ...
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Languedoc
The Province of Languedoc (, , ; ) is a former province of France. Most of its territory is now contained in the modern-day region of Occitanie in Southern France. Its capital city was Toulouse. It had an area of approximately . History The Roman province of Gallia Narbonensis fell to the Visigothic Kingdom from the 5th to the 8th centuries. Occupied briefly by the Emirate of Córdoba between 719 and 759, it was conquered and incorporated into the Kingdom of the Franks by Pepin the Short in 759 following the Siege of Narbonne. The term Languedoc originated to describe a cultural region that was not necessarily politically unified. After the decline of the Carolingian Empire political rule fragmented into small territorial divisions. King John of England lost his holdings in northern Languedoc to Philip II of France. He visited the region in 1214 seeking the restoration of those lands. In the 13th century, the See of Rome challenged the area's spiritual beliefs, ...
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