Les Tres Bon chef Christophe Gregoire with French apprentices Xavier Rocher, Matthew Burel, Maxim Clair and Luc Masson.
BUNGENDORE purveyors of fine dining and authentic French cuisine, Les Tres Bon, are home-grown proof that a globalised marketplace can coexist with a localised, provincial outlook in the world of modern small business.
The restaurant has taken on four apprentice chefs from France, who will spend the next four months training under owner-chef Christophe Gregoire, learning some of the local chef’s award-winning technique and enthusiasm for French cuisine.
For the four students from France’s Jean Baptiste Simeon Chardin Le Gèrardmer, it’s a chance to study under a master chef and learn some of his tricks of the trade; for the restaurant, there’s the energy that four youthful and enthusiastic apprentices bring to the job.
If the idea of young French chefs travelling to Bungendore to learn the art of French cuisine seems a touch absurd, Les Tres Bon co-owner Josephine Gregoire emphasised that French technique is a serious business in the gastronomic world.
‘‘It’s the equivalent of becoming a doctor or lawyer in France. It’s pretty serious stuff,’’ she said.
‘‘And the priority for them is to pick up in their English skills, and also to see how French cuisine is translated into an international setting.
‘‘With this profession they can go anywhere in the world to work and adapt their skills to the local culture.
‘‘In Bungendore, particularly, they’re not in a major international city, so they get a great insight into a typical Australian country town,’’ Mrs Gregoire said.
Christophe Gregoire said Bungendore was also a good match for the provincial French villages the four apprentices had left behind.
‘‘They all come from villages smaller than Bungendore. They really love it here,’’ he said.
The young chefs will work at Les Tres Bon throughout the Australian winter, before returning to France.