Priyam Chatterjee conferred “Chevalier de l’Ordre du Mérite Agricole”

Dear Priyam Chatterjee,

It is a great delight for me to host this ceremony to celebrate your appointment as Knight in the Order of Agricultural Merit this evening.

This national order was established in 1883 - a time when 20 million French men made their living from agriculture, and was second in importance only to the Legion of Honour in the French order of precedence. Also called “the leek”, in reference to the colour scheme of the insignia, this order rewards people who have rendered exceptional services to agriculture, be it in the practice itself, in research and of course in gastronomy!

This is actually the first time that we are celebrating the talent of a young chef at this embassy by conferring this distinction. And it had to be you.

This honour, dear Priyam, recognizes your talent and your commitment to promoting French cuisine.

The first time that I tasted your cuisine, I was astonished that I had not met you earlier. This was at QLA restaurant in March 2018 and you had agreed to promote the Goût de France event, which aims at making French gastronomy better known in the world. It was quite an amazing occasion. I remember that I had originally planned to stay for half an hour for a cross-interview with you; instead, I stayed on for two hours to sample the dishes you had prepared.

Priyam, you like to introduce yourself as the ambassador of French cuisine in Delhi. You most certainly are so, and tonight we applaud your most promising career.

You were born 31 years ago in Kolkata – a city I love – to a Bengali father and a Bangladeshi mother. Quite early in your life, cooking fascinated you – as did the army. But, as you have said yourself, fate decided for you, and you set course for cuisine, a cuisine that you execute in a very artistic and precise manner.

This is, moreover, what characterizes you: precision. It’s there in your dishes as well as in your paintings – because you paint – and in music – because you are a very good rock drummer. And, often, your plating is reminiscent of artworks. One gets a glimpse of your whole personality even before tasting your dishes. Apart from its taste, what is striking in your cuisine is quality and creativity – two qualities that Master Chef Paul Bocuse has always highlighted, and are at the core of French and Indian cuisines.

Your encounter with French cuisine happened quite by chance, but it was the beginning of a love that still animates you today. French cuisine entered quite early in your career, in 2011. You were twenty-two years of age when you underwent rigorous training under Chef Jean-Claude Fugier, who would go on to be your mentor. Very soon, by dint of your talent and long hours of hard work, you progressed and were spotted as a promising chef. And that enabled you to enrich your experience internationally, first in the UAE and then in the Sultanate of Oman, where you contributed to opening the Fauchon Paris café.

Bolstered by this experience, you returned to Delhi to become the head chef first at QLA – which is where we met – and more recently at Rooh.

I will not reveal your forthcoming ambitions, but I think that they are linked to France.

Dear Priyam, French gastronomy in India has found its reference in you, one of its ambassadors, and I hope that you will continue to bear aloft the colours of our country, which suits you very well. You have, in fact, been selected for this year’s batch of the India-France Young Leaders Club, a proof that we have faith in your career. Alongside your Young Leader batch mates – space engineers, architects, businesswomen, to mention but a few – you will spend a week in Paris in November. I’m sure you’ll return with some delicious ideas.

This is the first time that we are awarding an honour to an Indian chef – and about time, too! Because both the French and the Indians share two unique traits: we can talk about food, food and nothing but food over a meal, without getting bored for even a second – and there isn’t a single French or Indian film that doesn’t have a scene featuring a meal.

It is indeed with great pleasure that I will now proceed to confer the insignia of this honour – in French, as required by protocol:

Monsieur Priyam CHATTERJEE, au nom du Ministre de l’Agriculture, nous vous faisons Chevalier de l’Ordre du Mérite Agricole.