Julien DIAZ

Chef : 1 restaurant Chef Julien Diaz has been at the helm of Restaurant Saisons since 2016, one of the jewels in Marseille's new wave.

Presentation

"To eat good food, I started cooking. So I thought it wouldn't be so bad to make a career out of it", says Julien Diaz, who enrolled at the Lycée Hôtelier Bonneveine in Marseille. After graduating with a BTS, followed by a sommelier diploma in 2002, he started out in the dining room of the Hôtel Royal in Évian (Haute-Savoie). In 2004, he moved into the kitchen at the Hôtel Casadelmar in Porto-Vecchio, working alongside Davide Bisetto. There, he progressed from commis to sous-chef, before switching to Le Troubadour, where he was appointed head chef in 2010.

In 2012, on the verge of becoming a father, Julien Diaz returned to Marseille and took the helm at Dock of the Bay. " I also wanted to try my hand at a 200-cover brasserie," he says, returning to Corsica a year later to Chez Charles in Lumio, "where I really specialized in gourmet cuisine". Gault&Millau crowned him Jeune Talent 2015 for the region.

A father for the second time, Julien Diaz decided to return to the mainland. With the help of the Gault&Millau Jeunes Talents Endowment, he opened Saisons, in Marseille. "The main idea was to be able to manage our schedule as we saw fit. In short, to buy our freedom, while respecting a certain culinary philosophy. I use local producers to dictate the menus", a cuisine that immediately earned him a handsome 14/20 rating.

B. G.