🇫🇷 France · French cuisine · b. 1949
The self-taught Frenchman behind Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons — the longest-running two-Michelin-star restaurant in the UK.
Raymond Blanc is a French chef and restaurateur who has built his entire career in England and is widely credited, alongside the Roux brothers, with raising the standard of restaurant cooking in Britain in the 1980s. Born in Besançon in the Franche-Comté region of eastern France, he is famously self-taught — having been refused entry to the chef's apprenticeship system after failing his entrance exams.
He moved to England in 1972 and worked his way up through restaurant kitchens in Oxford before opening his own restaurant Les Quat'Saisons in Summertown, Oxford in 1977 with his then-wife Jenny. The restaurant earned its first Michelin star within a year, a second in 1982 — making him the first self-taught chef to be awarded two stars by Michelin — and he relocated the operation to a 15th-century manor house in the village of Great Milton, Oxfordshire in 1984, renaming it Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons. Le Manoir has now held two Michelin stars continuously for more than 40 years, the longest unbroken run at that level of any restaurant in the United Kingdom.
Beyond Le Manoir, Blanc co-founded the Brasserie Blanc chain of casual French restaurants, runs the influential Raymond Blanc Cookery School at Le Manoir (where Heston Blumenthal, Marco Pierre White and a generation of British chefs have spent time), and serves as president of the Sustainable Restaurant Association. His advocacy for kitchen gardens, organic produce and seasonal cooking pre-dates the British farm-to-table movement by two decades. He has been awarded an honorary OBE and is a Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur.
Cuisine du terroir et du jardin — cooking of the land and of the garden. Blanc insists that great French cooking begins in the soil. Le Manoir grows over 90 varieties of vegetables and 70 varieties of herbs in its two-acre organic kitchen garden and uses them daily on the menu. He argues that seasonality is not a marketing slogan but the structural basis of all French regional cooking.
Two Michelin stars continuously since 1984; 32-bedroom country-house hotel with a celebrated organic kitchen garden.
Casual French brasserie chain co-founded in 1996; around 15 UK branches.
Cookery school within Le Manoir; runs day and residential courses for amateurs and professionals.
These recipes from our database reflect the french cooking tradition that Raymond works in. They are not direct reproductions of Raymond's copyrighted recipes, but traditional dishes inspired by the same culinary heritage.
“A garden is the chef's pantry.”
— Kitchen Secrets (BBC, 2011)
“I did not become a chef. I was born one.”
— Interview, The Guardian
Moves from Besançon, France to England aged 22 and starts as a waiter at the Rose Revived pub in Oxfordshire.
Opens Les Quat'Saisons in Summertown, Oxford with his wife Jenny.
Earns first Michelin star at Les Quat'Saisons within a year of opening.
Earns second Michelin star — becomes the first self-taught chef to hold two stars.
Buys and converts a 15th-century manor house in Great Milton, Oxfordshire; opens Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons.
Opens the Raymond Blanc Cookery School at Le Manoir.
Co-founds the Brasserie Blanc chain of casual French restaurants.
Awarded an honorary OBE for services to British cuisine.
Made a Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur by the French government.
Publishes Simply Raymond and presents the BBC series of the same name.
Le Manoir aux Quat'Saisons is in the village of Great Milton, about 10 miles south-east of Oxford in Oxfordshire, England. It is a 32-bedroom country-house hotel with a two-Michelin-starred restaurant and a celebrated two-acre organic kitchen garden.
Continuously since 1984 — the longest unbroken two-star run of any restaurant in the United Kingdom. The original Les Quat'Saisons in Oxford had also held two stars from 1982 before Blanc relocated the operation to Great Milton.
Yes. Blanc was refused entry to the French chef apprenticeship system as a teenager after failing his entrance exams, and learned to cook by working his way up from waiter through pot wash and commis chef in English kitchens in the early 1970s. He was the first self-taught chef ever to hold two Michelin stars.
Blumenthal spent only a brief stage at Le Manoir before opening The Fat Duck, but he has repeatedly cited Blanc as a major influence on his thinking about flavour and on his decision to pursue cooking as a career. Many other British chefs — including John Burton-Race and Michael Caines — did serve full apprenticeships at Le Manoir.
Brasserie Blanc is the casual French brasserie chain Raymond Blanc co-founded in 1996. It operates around 15 sites across the UK, mostly in London and southern England, and serves a more accessible, bistro-style menu distinct from the fine-dining tasting menus at Le Manoir.
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