Late on a Friday afternoon in August, one of this country’s most famous chefs announced he would close his flagship restaurant — forever. Now, come Saturday night, once the last of the guests have merrily tottered out and the kitchen porter downs his drying cloth, Michel Roux Jr’s Le Gavroche will be no more. It is somewhere that has endured since 1967, making history as the years passed: it was the first in the country to win one Michelin star, the first to win two, and then, finally, the first to win three. No closure can take those records away.
But collecting a galaxy was the least of it. Gavroche’s greatest legacy is witnessed in the chefs who came through its kitchens: Marco Pierre-White, Gordon Ramsay, Marcus Wareing, Jun Tanaka, Monica Galetti, Pierre Koffmann, Rowley Leigh, Paul Rankin, Bryn Williams. They all cut their teeth here. There are more, of course. This is a restaurant that has remained a cornerstone of an entire industry for decades — not bad for a basement named after “the street urchin” from Les Miserables.
