It has been 10 years since the town of Puy-en-Velay no longer had a Michelin-starred restaurant. Since the departure of chef François Gagnaire to Paris. But this month of March 2024 changed the situation... Just one year after their installation in the old Ponote town, at the restaurant Le Charmalenc, the young chef Yoan Delorme won the precious sesame, his first star in the Michelin Guide.
" Everything happened really fast. Even today, we are in a dream. We're slowly going back down..." Yoan Delorme still seems to have difficulty believing it, and yet... Just one year after taking over the restaurant Le Chamarlenc, rue Raphaël, and a first distinction at Gaut&Millau, it was already a consecration: a first star in the Michelin Guide. “A success for the team, for the restaurant and for the city. »
The fruit of talent obviously, “but also the price of work and sacrifice… 18-hour days, 6 days a week,” he lists. But today the result is there. “The very evening of the star, we received 7 reservations and more than 150 text messages. » So much so that the restaurant is already full, until the end of June. “We have almost 300 months of waiting. »
Why Haute-Loire and Le Puy-en-Velay?
What luck for Puy-en-Velay and Haute-Loire! Because at the start, nothing predicted the installation of the prodigy chef in the department. “It is first of all the fruit of a major questioning at the end of Covid. I worked to Avignon alongside the starred chef Florent Pietravalle in La Mirande. In the team, there was a guy from Haute-Loire (who is none other than the chef of La Ferme du Bien-Être in Saint-Julien-Chapteuil, Quentin Allirand, also distinguished Young Talent at Gault & Millau 2023, editor's note). It was he who told us: ''I know a restaurant for sale in Puy-en-Velay, you should go and visit it''. I am originally from Saint-Etienne, but I did not know the city. After a first visit, we found it magnificent! » From now on, “we can say that Haute-Loire and its inhabitants have adopted us! »
As for Chamarlenc… it was our favorite! This charismatic old building simply caught the eye of him and his partner. Cellia Baudelier, who works at reception and room service. “She has the merit of having learned everything on the job,” Yoan emphasizes, not without pride. " It's crazy ! » Célia, a graduate in management and accounting, is also a great help in the management of the Ponot establishment. “The hardest thing now is going to be to keep up and keep this star. »
More than just a meal, a real experience
Fortunately, the young couple has not said their last word... They have ideas and the Chamarlenc of the future. “It’s a fairly innovative concept. No one else offers it in Haute-Loire and no one has done it before. Indeed, Le Chamarlenc is the promise of a beautiful and good meal, but also and above all, “the promise of an experience”. “People don’t come to us every day, so we want to make this meal a special moment. Come sit down and let yourself do it, we’ll take care of everything,” summarizes Yoan Delorme.
Because to eat at Chamarlenc, you have to like surprises. “You don’t know what you’re going to eat. » Apart from fresh and seasonal products, mainly purchased locally. Two menus are offered: “Discovery” in 6 steps and “Experience” in 8 stages, developed and served in a logical tasting sequence. It's up to you to make a choice. “As for us, we try to adapt to all profiles,” assures Yoan Delorme.
Two “surprise” menus which change approximately every 2 months. “There are a few changes over the weeks depending on arrivals or the inspiration of the moment. We sometimes refine the recipe a little as we go along…” specifies the chef. In the kitchen, reflection is constant for Yoan Delorme and his team. Their cuisine is in constant motion. On the front of the restaurant and on their website, it is also described as “utopian” : in other words “the search for an impossible ideal. »
At Chamarlenc, on your plates, expect a share of imagination and innovation, a hint of surprise, all in a local cuisine, with 60 to 70% Altiligarian and gastronomic products, which perfectly combines the Loire origins of Yoan, Provençale of Célia and Altiligerian origins of the products they enhance. In short, a 3 or 30 hour culinary journey which should appeal to the most skeptical, as well as the most greedy.
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