Thomas DUMONT

Chef : 1 restaurant This Jeune Talent Hauts-de-France 2023 is developing a cuisine that is both technical and committed at Hyacinthe, his first restaurant in Amiens, opening in 2022.

Presentation

"What drew me to cooking were those moments of conviviality," says Thomas Dumont, whose family is in the Amiens region. " I spent a lot of my time on the Picardy coast," where he thrives on looking for mud worms and fishing in Saint-Valery-sur-Somme, never far from his grandparents, farmers and hunters.

When it came time to choose a career path, he was offered the choice of sales or cooking. He chose the former, then spent ten years as a humanitarian, before switching to the latter in 2013. As his first experience, he trained directly with Cyril Lignac, at Le Chardenoux: "I got right to the heart of the matter". After two years, while working as a rotating chef de partie, he left to work in a number of different establishments.

Thomas Dumont slowed down when his daughter was born in 2016. For a time, he worked in charcuterie at Maison Vérot in Paris, then in butchery at Benjamin Darnaud's Viande & Chef, where he learned to cut meats. On the strength of this experience, he joined Hélène Darroze's brigade at the Marsan gourmet restaurant. He was in charge of meat and fish for six months, before opening Jòia in 2018, again under the guidance of Hélène Darroze. He then worked at Maison Rostang, in the pantry and meat department and, during the Covid period, at Montmartre's historic brasserie, La Mère Catherine.

In May 2022, back in Amiens, Thomas Dumont opened Hyacinthe: "I'd been thinking about it for a long time. What I want most of all is to make the food I want, with the products I want", a cuisine he doesn't hesitate to describe as "committed cuisine, which I try to make technical". A successful gamble, as evidenced by the toque and Jeune Talent Hauts-de-France 2023 trophy awarded to him by Gault&Millau.

T. L.