Roland Passot
Passot at a staff appreciation dinner
Born
Villefranche-sur-Saône, France
Culinary career
Cooking styleFrench
Rating(s)
Current restaurant(s)
  • La Folie, Left Bank,LB STEAK Santana Row, LBSTEAK Bishop Ranch, San Ramon, MESO Mediterranean restaurant, Santana Row
Award(s) won

Roland Passot is a French chef and restaurateur. His most well-known restaurant, La Folie, was open in San Francisco from 1988 to 2020. He is also owner of the more casual Left Bank Basseries and LB Steak restaurants. Passot was named one of "the eight wonders of Bay Area dining" by San Francisco Chronicle lead critic Michael Bauer.[2]

Early life and career

Passot was born in 1955 in Villefranche-sur-Saône, in France's Rhône-Alpes.[3] He is a classically trained French chef, having attended cooking school in Lyon while beginning as an assistant, at age fourteen, in the city's Léon de Lyon restaurant under Chef Paul Lacombe, and then Pierre Orsi Restaurant.[4] After Passot rose to the rank of assistant sous-chef at Léon de Lyon, Jean Banchet (who Passot considers his most important influence)[5] recruited him in 1979 to work at Le Francais in Wheeling, Illinois (near Chicago, Illinois | Chicago), then sent him in 1981 to open the French Room at the Adolphus Hotel in Dallas, Texas[6] (He was fired from the French Room after getting into a shouting match with its maitre d').[7] In between, he opened Le Castel in San Francisco.[8][9]

Restaurants

Passot opened La Folie on Polk Street in 1988, with his wife Jamie and brother Georges. A small brasserie in the Polk Gulch section of the Russian Hill neighborhood of San Francisco, it opened at a cost of $45,000 with no outside investors.[5] His wife conceived the name, which means "craziness" or "folly" in French, referring to the difficulty of opening a new establishment in San Francisco's competitive restaurant scene.[9] The restaurant remained a family business, with his wife serving as general manager and his brother as sommelier.[9] La Folie steadily gained in reputation until, by 2000, it was one of only several restaurants in the San Francisco Bay Area, California, to earn a "four star" review from the San Francisco Chronicle.[10] Avoiding "fusion" influences, the establishment was a contemporary French restaurant, with classic French use of stocks and sauces, but lighter than traditional French and with attention to local ingredients.[9] After 32 years in business, La Folie closed in 2020. “It’s bittersweet for me to let it go, but it’s time,” said Passot of the closing. “I’m turning 65 this year. It’s time to let the next generation do their thing.”[11]

Passot joined forces to open Left Bank[9] in 1994, with partner Ed Levine in Larkspur, California.[10][12] The second Left Bank opened in Menlo Park, California in 1998,[12] and then San Jose in 2003. The restaurants serve French home-style cooking Passot calls "Cuisine Grand-mere".[13] In 2009, the Left Bank restaurant group opened LB Steak, a modern American Steakhouse, in San Jose's Santana Row.[14]

Influence and awards

In style, Passot favors contemporary French cuisine, avoiding fusion, molecular gastronomy, and new devices or techniques such as sous vide.[7] Passot has a reputation for hiring and mentoring young academy-trained chefs.[9] A number of successful restaurant chefs credit Passot as a mentor, or as inspiration, including Richard Reddington, the Michelin starred Chef of REDD in Yountville, CA. Jeffrey Russell, Executive Chef at The Grand America Hotel in Salt Lake City,[15] Trey Foshee of George's at the Cove in La Jolla, California,[16] and Michael Kramer, formerly of McCrady's Restaurant in Charleston, South Carolina and (as of 2008) of Voice Restaurant in Houston, Texas[17]

In 1991 Passot was inducted into the Maitres Cuisiniers de France.[4][18] His restaurant won the Zagat Survey awards for "Best Food" and "Best Nouvelle French restaurant" in 1998, and "Best French restaurant" in San Francisco, in 2002. He also earned a James Beard Award as "best rising star chef" of 1980,[3] and other "best" designations and awards from USA Today, Food & Wine Magazine, Gourmet magazine, Gault Millau, and SF Weekly.[13] In 2001 the French Government awarded him the "Chevalier dans l’Ordre du Mèrite Agricole".[13]

A local caviar producer, Tsar Nicoulai, has named a product after him.[19]

Personal life

Passot met his wife, Jamie, when she was working at the Four Seasons Resort in Irving, Texas.[20] They have two kids, Charlotte and Jean Paul. Known for being gregarious and social, Passot is a frequent participant in cooking shows and demonstrations, charity events, and television appearances.[6] After gaining weight from the stress of managing his restaurants, he lost 60 pounds by eliminating alcohol, sugar, and starches from his diet.[21]

References

  1. ↑ "42 North America Lodgings and Restaurants Achieve the Coveted 2001 Mobil Travel Guide Five-Star Rating". ExxonMobil Travel Publications. 2001.
  2. ↑ Michael Bauer (2008-08-06). "The eight wonders of Bay Area dining". San Francisco Chronicle.
  3. 1 2 "In the Spotlight: Roland Passot, La Folie". Challenge Dairy. Archived from the original on 2006-10-15.
  4. 1 2 "Chef Roland Passot". Food and Beverage World. Spring 2002. Archived from the original on 2008-09-21.
  5. 1 2 Susan Dyer Reynolds. "Roland Passot:Pots, Peppers and a Passion for Fashion". The Food Paper. Archived from the original on 2006-12-11.
  6. 1 2 "Infuse your meal with tea". ABC 7 News. 2008-04-08.
  7. 1 2 Sophie Brickman (September 19, 2010). "Huge contrast between Coi, La Folie kitchens". San Francisco Chronicle.
  8. ↑ Julie Ratner (1995-03-29). "Haute cuisine for a higher cause". Palo Alto Online.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Alan Liddle (1998-05-18). "La Folie". Nation's Restaurant News.
  10. 1 2 Michael Bauer (2000-11-26). "The Creme De la Creme:Four-star restaurants in the Bay Area are more casual but still first-rate". San Francisco Chronicle.
  11. ↑ Janelle Bitker (February 4, 2020). "San Francisco French restaurant La Folie to close after 32 years". San Francisco Chronicle.
  12. 1 2 Laura Reiley (1998-09-04). "Restaurant Review: rant in Menlo Park". Palo Alto Online.
  13. 1 2 3 "Roland Passot Chef Profile". Cooks Eat Share.
  14. ↑ Susan Steade (June 9, 2009). "A La Carte, 9 June 2009". San Jose Mercury News.
  15. ↑ "Utah's Great Chef Migration". Visit Salt Lake. 2007-01-06. Archived from the original on 2007-10-09.
  16. ↑ "In the Spotlight: Trey Foshee, Executive Chef/Partner at George's at the Cove, La Jolla, California". Challenge Dairy. Archived from the original on 2006-10-15.
  17. ↑ "Houston's Hotel ICON Debut's VOICE Restaurant". Hotel Interactive. 2008-03-04.
  18. ↑ "Roland Passot". Maitres Cuisiniers de France. Archived from the original on 2008-08-20.
  19. ↑ Melissa Feldman (2007-11-04). "Now Flavoring:Roe v. Wasabi". New York Times.
  20. ↑ Alan Liddle (1994-04-25). "Passot, Levine join forces to open Left Bank venture". Nation's Restaurant News.
  21. ↑ Kim Severson (2002-01-02). "Balancing act:Chefs and restaurateurs share secrets for battling the bulge". San Francisco Chronicle.
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