Grégory BONACCINI

Chef : 1 restaurant Promising and lively, chef Grégory Bonaccini opened his first restaurant, Canopée, in Lyon at just 26, with his partner Mégane Arraud.

Presentation

My grandfather was a baker," says Grégory Bonaccini. Originally, I wanted to go into this profession, but I did an internship, and when I woke up at midnight, I didn't like it! But it confirmed to me that I wanted to work in the culinary professions. With his vocational baccalaureate in hand, he went on to complete a sandwich course at Château Blanchard, in Chazelles-sur-Lyon (Loire). "It was beautiful cooking, with product work from A to Z, pretty dressings..." he recalls.

In 2018, he and his partner Mégane Arraud decided to move to Berlin. "I immediately found a position as head chef. I was 20 years old, a big gamble... I admit, I was stressed!" He stayed there for a year and a half, then left for the gourmet restaurant Panama, also in Berlin, as rotating chef de partie. "We went there as customers, loved the concept of dishes to share and that's what inspired us to do Canopée. We liked it so much that we went four or five times before I put down my CV!"

On their return to France in February 2023, the two partners opened Canopée in Lyon's^1st arrondissement. They were spotted by Gault&Millau as early as May - "I thought it was a scam e-mail. " But it wasn't: the Guide Jaune included it in its book 109 - Le Sang neuf de la gastronomie française.

I. B.