Why Michelin-starred French chef Pierre Gagnaire is cooking casual Italian food in Hong Kong

• Pierre Gagnaire is bringing homestyle Italian dishes from his restaurant Piero TT in France to Hong Kong
• The Michelin-starred chef talks about the difference between casual dining in Italy and France

French chef Pierre Gagnaire is ecstatic, having just got off the phone with his staff in London, where his restaurant Sketch Lecture Room & Library in Mayfair has been awarded three Michelin stars in the French publisher's newly issued 2020 UK and Ireland guide.

Gagnaire, 69, is here to talk about his bringing Italian dishes to Hong Kong. But why is a French chef serving Italian food?

"It's an opportunity for guests to see another taste of my work," he says. Items including blue lobster risotto, veal chop Milanese, and tiramisu with burrata ice cream flavoured with Campari and lemon are on the menu at Pierre until October 12.

Three years ago Gagnaire opened Piero TT in Courchevel in eastern France, and its homestyle food proved very popular. He opened another in Paris this year.

"I love Spain but it's very complicated to work with them," he says with a chuckle. "But with the Italians, we are very similar and work well together." The chefs in his Piero TT restaurants are Italians who have worked with him before at his French restaurants.

"You can go to small places you have never been, or a pizzeria, and the food is good. In France, we don't have that. It's a disaster, the popular food in France. To eat well, you have to go to a good French restaurant," he says.

He sees a place for both casual Italian fare and fine dining. Of the latter, he says: "It's the way to serve, to communicate to the guest. It should be simple and joyful. If it's too pretentious then guests don't like that.

"The key is the quality of the chef in fine dining, and (chef de cuisine at Pierre) Jacky Tauvry is very talented and he has the feel of my spirit. If you don't have that, it's fake."

Gagnaire observes many young guests from Hong Kong dine in his restaurants in Paris, London and Tokyo. "They don't come every week, but it is a part of their life to have this experience," he says. Yet they appear unfamiliar with two-Michelin-star Pierre.

Surveying the restaurant, he says: "For me this is not a business, it's work, it's a way to connect with the world, with products. We give some peace (to our diners) … In our world it's important.

"When you see the world is (full of) havoc, it's not easy. We try to create something very special and when you come to our place, you can forget the world for two hours."

You can go to small places you have never been, or a pizzeria, and the food is good. In France, we don't have that. It's a disaster, the popular food in FrancePierre Gagnaire

The seven-course Piero TT menu is priced at HK$1,988 per person and is available until October 12 at Pierre, 25/F, Mandarin Oriental Hong Kong, 5 Connaught Road Central, tel: 2825 4001.

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