Alain Ducasse is, there is no other way to put it: deeply relaxed. The 66-year-old is perhaps the most famous, but definitely the most successful living chef. At times he ran no fewer than 30 restaurants, three of which had three Michelin stars at the same time: Le Plaza Athénée in Paris, Alain Ducasse at the Essex House in New York and Le Louis XV in the Principality of Monaco. But this Wednesday morning he is in Munich to open his own chocolate shop at the Viktualienmarkt. He follows the photographer’s instructions with an ironic smile, orders an ice cream for the camera from the integrated gelateria and examines the window displays. Casual, with one hand in your trouser pocket: the sovereign boss.
“Monsieur Ducasse, in your famous ‘Grand Livre de Cuisine’ from 2005 there is not a single recipe with chocolate on more than 1000 pages – and now you have your own chocolate shop?” Ducasse smiles mildly and then says very dryly: “1056 pages”, which, by the way, also applies exactly to the German edition, “and 750 recipes!” Incidentally, he wrote his own book about chocolate in 2013, and he brought the English edition with him: “The Language of Chocolate – From Bean to Bonbon” is the title and it was published in the same year that he opened his first chocolate shop in Paris.
In the meantime, his sweet empire has grown quite a bit. There are now 35 shops of various sizes with the name “Le Chocolat Alain Ducasse”, 30 of them in France alone, one in Tokyo, one in Luxembourg, two in London and now also one in Munich. But the one here at Rosental 7 is something special. “A prototype,” says Ducasse, “with a small factory and a gelateria for ice cream.” Something like that still exists in London and Tokyo, but not elsewhere. “Munich seems to us to be the best place to start in Germany,” says Ducasse.
So far, the combination with a gelateria has only existed in Tokyo and London.
(Photo: Stephan Rumpf)
Which certainly has something to do with the visible wealth of this city. You also need a well-stocked wallet when you shop here: the 110-gram bar with whole nuts costs 13 euros, the mixed box with 363 grams costs 59 euros, and you pay 6 for two scoops of ice cream, 50 Euros. However, the quality is also unique. You can choose between chocolate from 15 different countries of origin from Colombia to Madagascar to Vietnam, there are twelve different types of ice cream and sorbet. “Everything with little fat and little sugar, just the pure taste,” says Matteo Casone, the head gelato at Ducasse, who has traveled from Paris.
Bars of chocolate lined up like bars of gold
The shop, which until recently was a simple café with mostly vegetarian snacks and bowls and before that a generic mobile phone shop, has been renovated at great expense. The massive shelves once belonged to a bank. Bundles of money were said to have been stacked there, and the association “gold bars” comes to mind when you see the bars of chocolate, lined up like in a jeweller’s shop, and the pralines in glass showcases. Some of Ducasse’s Easter lambs or chocolate chickens look as if they were created in Picasso’s Cubist phase. Most of the products – one might almost call them “exhibits” – come directly from the manufactory in Paris. However, part of the final production also takes place in the clearly visible show kitchen next to the shop.
For delicacies from this chocolaterie you need a well-filled wallet.
(Photo: Stephan Rumpf)
During the pandemic, Ducasse’s chocolate boutiques and ice cream parlors have proved to be a lifeline, after all they were grocery stores for, well, everyday needs, while the restaurants were all in lockdown for many months. In the meantime, Ducasse says frankly, he makes more sales with the shops than with his restaurants. And Munich will be able to contribute a little to that in the future.