After twelve years spent in Alain Ducasse’s various restaurants in France, Jocelyn Herland (39) arrived in London in 2007 to become Executive Chef when Alain Ducasse at The Dorchester first opened. While it must have been daunting to open a new restaurant under the name of the most famous chef in the world –and the only one to have held 19 Michelin stars throughout his career-, he must have made his master proud, by succeeding to receive three Michelin stars in both 2010 and 2011- an achievement only shared with Gordon Ramsay’s restaurant in Chelsea. Here, the Auvergne-born chef speaks to Chic-Londres about his cuisine and favourite addresses in the British capital.

When did you decide you wanted to become a chef? From the age of ten, I wanted to be either a butcher or a cook, and really enjoyed cooking easy dishes for my family. I started learning the trade when I was 18, when I became old enough to decide what I wanted to do without having to follow my parents’ advice, which was to do more academic studies.

How would you describe the British approach to food? First, I would say that the French influence is quite obvious, if only because the culture of gastronomy was introduced in London by Frenchmen, namely the Roux brothers, who went on to train notable British chefs such as Gordon Ramsay, Marco-Pierre White or Marcus Wareing. But what makes London really unique is its capacity to absorb many cultural influences, not only in the variety of nationalities that one can find here, but also in the way that this diversity is reflected on the plate. read more