"Correspondances", Hugo Roellinger's first book

Mathilde Bourge | 10/1/24, 1:15 PM

Hugo Roellinger, chef at Le Coquillage restaurant in Saint-Méloir-des-Ondes, is releasing his first book this autumn 2024. Discover "Correspondances", a book that goes far beyond a simple collection of recipes.

This 1ᵉʳ October 2024, Hugo Roellinger will release his very first book, "Correspondances". Much more than just a collection of recipes, the book allows us to dive into the world of the Chef of the Year 2022, between family dialogues, silver photos and a consuming passion for the sea.

A local, independent book

As with his cooking, Hugo Roellinger left nothing to chance for this first book. " I'd been wanting to get started for three years, but I put it off because I wanted to surround myself with the right people," reveals the chef from Le Coquillage restaurant (4 toques) in Saint-Méloir-des-Ondes. Le Breton chose author Ryoko Sekiguchi for the texts, and Anne-Claire Héraud for the photos. "We worked exclusively in silver, even for the food photos, to fit in with this global approach of the 'long term' and the imperfect. I didn't want 'clinical' photos that didn't correspond to my cooking. Here, we were detached from the immediate result and discovered the shots a week after they were taken," explains Hugo Roellinger.

When it came to publishing, the former merchant navy officer didn't turn to a major publishing house, preferring to collaborate with "Sur la Crête", a Nantes-based publisher specializing in art photography books. "For an entirely local approach, the book is printed in Rennes", stresses the chef.

An ode to liquids

In "Correspondances", readers will discover texts in the form of dialogues between Hugo Roellinger and his wife Marine, who works alongside him on a daily basis, or his sister Mathilde, who now runs the Roellinger spice business.

In it, the chef talks about his relationship with the environment, living together with his crew (the name he gives to his brigade) and his sensitivity as a man who grew up by the sea. "I explain my intimate relationship with the liquid. My daily life, my passion, is of course cooking, but it's also the sea. I've built my cooking around the liquid element, and that's always the link in my dishes," he confides. So, rather than unveil recipes for entire dishes, Hugo Roellinger has preferred to offer a "library of liquids", with broths, infusions, sabayons and other infused vinegars. A unique book that makes every reader an accomplice in the chef's passion for cooking and the ocean!

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