'There's Nothing Like the Mediterranean'
Chef Yannick Anton didn’t used to worry about food waste nearly as much as he does now. An instructor and executive chef at Le Cordon Bleu Ottawa, he has spent his career working at high-end restaurants, from Michelin Star establishments in his native France, to working with Montreal chef Martin Picard at Le Globe and opening the storied Le Baccara at the Casino Lac Leamy. And for his work in producing fine French cuisine and sharing French culture in Canada, the U.S. and France, he was recognized in June with an award from the French government.
Asked to produce a dish that speaks to his culinary philosophy or approach, he broke the rules and made three, to get every possible bit of goodness out of his many ingredients.
The chef, who cares deeply about sustainability, was recently honoured with L’Ordre du Mérite agricole, for outstanding contributions to agriculture. It is one of the highest civilian honours the French government gives, and he received it at the French Embassy in Ottawa. For his dish that would kick off the interview about his award and career with edible Ottawa, he wanted to choose something with strong Mediterranean influence, coming, as he does, from Nice, France.
“It’s based on my Mediterranean influence, because I come from Nice, and Nice having been in Italy 200 years ago, there is a lot of Italian influence [in the cuisine], so [it's] fresh produce, tomatoes and fish. That's why I put a lot of emphasis on fish.”
He cooked a piece of sea bream, a fish found regularly in Nice, skin on. It’s a relatively thin fish, so he seasoned the fillet and grilled it on the skin side only, to make sure it didn’t overcook.
“The idea in Mediterranean cuisine is not to put too much stress on the ingredients and just respect them,” Anton says.
For the vegetable, he chose zucchini, which he says is very popular in Mediterranean cuisine. He sliced it finely — almost grated it — braised it in thyme and olive oil, put it in a circular mold to form a patty shape and then topped it with a flourish of thinly sliced zucchini cooked in salted water. To garnish the fish, he used pieces of roasted artichoke heart, dollops of homemade muhammara and dots of a deep green gel he made with the artichoke leaves and xantham gum. There were also edible flowers, basil, green peas and pea shoot fronds, all served on a drizzle of sauce he made from the fish bones and a langoustine carcass.
Because he likes to use every edible part of his ingredients, he also made a brandade with the fish trimmings and topped it with fava beans (another well-loved Mediterranean vegetable) and langoustine foam.
For his third dish, he lightly cooked a langoustine, and served it atop a combination of red seaweed — an ingredient he uses increasingly as the world pushes toward more plant-based food — muhammara, spring peas, sliced zucchini, basil oil and buttermilk.
“The langoustine is slightly raw on the top to make sure it’s nice and moist,” he says.
A lifelong goal
Anton says he knew from an early age that he wanted to become a chef. “In France, around the age of 14 or 15 is when you decide what you want to study,” he says. “For me, cooking was inside me. I had some family members in the business and I was always interested. I started studying at that age two times a week.”
After he finished in public school, he enrolled at the Lycée Hôtelier de Nice. It was a two-year program during which he did a stage in Provence. He started his career working under Chef Michel Devillers at his acclaimed restaurant, Les Dents de la Mer. He says he learned a lot from Devillers and would spend the next seven years working his way up through the ranks, perfecting his love of preparing seafood and honing his culinary techniques. He also worked at L’Orangeraie and later at La Palm D’Or, a two-Michelin-star restaurant at the Hotel Martinez in Cannes.
While he was working in the south of France, he met a few Canadians and became curious about working in Canada. In 1994, he decided to emigrate, accepting a sous-chef position at Le Globe, working alongside executive chef Martin Picard, who would later open a beloved sugar shack and his Au Pied de Cochon restaurant in Montreal.
In 1996, Anton moved to Gatineau to become part of the opening team for Le Baccara, the restaurant at the Casino du Lac-Leamy. He then spent five years working in restaurants in the U.S., including in Florida and Greenwich, Conn., before returning to Canada. When he did in 2003, it was to join former colleague, chef Philippe Wettel at the Westin Hotel while also working for the then-Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, where he would cook for visiting dignitaries of the federal government.
In spite of remaining in North America for 30 years, he still goes back to Nice on a near-yearly basis.
“I miss the sea,” he says. “The Atlantic Ocean isn’t the same. There’s nothing like the Mediterranean.”
An only child, the 53-year-old returns to Nice to visit his parents. They used to come to Canada every two years but stopped when travel became too difficult.
Mentors and mentoring
Asked about his mentors, Anton names Georges Roux, “a famous chef” from Paris who helped him hone some “very French techniques.” Roux is himself a recipient of an award from the French government. Anton says they never worked together long-term, but Roux helped train him for competitions and events. Anton has participated in many events for the James Beard Foundation in New York and also the World Gourmet Summit in Singapore in 2007.
Anton was appointed executive chef at Signatures, the restaurant at Le Cordon Bleu Cooking School, in 2006, but when the pandemic hit, the restaurant closed and it has only re-opened for special events. Given that, he started teaching at the school, a first for him, and now he is the mentor, not the mentee.
He says the question he asks when his students finish their schooling is whether he would hire them if he owned his own restaurant and was looking for kitchen staff .
“Sometimes it’s tough for them,” he says. “But maybe some of them, when they get out in the real world, will realize what I was trying to teach and why. I hope they’ll learn that the tough lessons were valuable.”
One of the rewards of his job was helping to develop the plant-based program at Le Cordon Bleu, something on which chefs are increasingly focusing.
“Local is very important, and more and more so,” he says, adding that using the most of every product is always his goal these days. That, and to make sure guests are enjoying his food.
“I love to cook for people,” he says. “[I want] to share food from where I come from and to present something that makes people happy and creates good memories.”
He also spends a lot of time researching and finding inspiration for his profession. He used to go out to eat a lot, as another way to get inspired, but he says he does less of that these days. “I’ve mostly stayed on the flavours of the Mediterranean,” he says.
Award “agricole”
At the end of June, Anton received one of the highest civilian honours given by the French government. It recognizes his contributions to promoting French culture in Canada.
“I’m deeply honoured to receive it,” Anton says. “It’s the achievement of a career. It’s not like a competition where you’re good one day and not the next. It’s recognizing all the effort I put into the industry and promoting French cuisine in Canada and, especially in Ottawa. So thanks to the French ambassador for that.”
The chef says he was taken aback by the award and was “not expecting it” at all. “It was a great surprise,” he recalls thinking when he first heard he’d be honoured. “The first thing I did was thank my mentors and everyone who helped me get to where I am today — the chefs who taught me.”
Someday, if not already, his students will no doubt do the same for him.
Le Cordon Bleu
453 Laurier Ave., E., Ottawa
lecordonbleu.edu/ottawa | @lecordonbleuottawa
