New Michelin-starred menus on departure from Paris for Air France customers
This autumn, on departure from Paris, Air France will be unveiling exceptional new menus specially created for its customers, available in its airport lounges and on board its flights. Triple Michelin-starred chef Jérôme Banctel, and Josselin Marie, passionate about responsible cuisine, are the latest chefs to join the prestigious Air France team, alongside Nina Métayer, Glenn Viel, Philippe Rigollot, Frédéric Simonin, Michel Roth and Alain Ducasse and his teams.
To create these menus showcasing French fine dining, the chefs work together with Servair, the world leader in in-flight catering, using fresh, local produce that varies according to the season. In a responsible approach, the meat, poultry, milk products and eggs on each menu are of French origin, and the fish sourced from sustainable fisheries. Vegetarian menus are also systematically available in all airport lounges and on board all the airline’s flights.
Triple Michelin-starred chef Jérôme Banctel in the long-haul Business cabin
On departure from Paris, for the first time, Air France is entrusting chef Jérôme Banctel with the dishes on the menu available in the long-haul Business cabin. Awarded three Michelin stars in 2024, the chef draws inspiration from his native Brittany in creating dishes to be enjoyed all over the world. For Air France, he uses produce evocative of his childhood, enhanced by his own special culinary signature; delicious sauces, without butter or cream. Chicken, buttermilk sauce, buckwheat risotto and parsley oil, and haddock, lightly spiced carrot sauce, carrot variations with orange and ginger feature among his ten dishes to be enjoyed over the next eight months.
“I wanted to offer travellers a glimpse of my cuisine, a blend of gourmet delicacy and unexpected flavours”, stated Jérôme Banctel.
As for desserts, Nina Métayer will continue working with Air France as part of the partnership initiated in April 2024. Crowned World Pastry Chef 2023, she will be signing a selection of gourmet yet light pastries, including a crunchy hazelnut and caramel pleasure, and the mango coconut slice with a hint of lime.
Triple Michelin-starred chef Glenn Viel will continue to sign the entire menu in the La Première cabin. Ingeniously combining his Breton roots with Provençal cuisine, this lover of local produce has created a total of twelve exceptional dishes to be enjoyed until the end of November 2024. To bring an elegant and sweet touch to the cabin’s menus, Meilleur Ouvrier de France and world pastry champion Philippe Rigollot showcases French pastry-making expertise with his lightly-textured and innovative desserts. Strawberry gateau, Black Forest gateau, and an apricot tartlet and rosemary whipped cream are among the six desserts created by the chef for Air France.
In the Premium cabin, the one-starred chef Frédéric Simonin continues to delight Air France customers as part of an on-going partnership initiated with the company in 2023. A perfectionist at heart, he has created a new series of dishes prepared with the greatest respect for the products chosen.
Michel Roth and Josselin Marie, a new duo of high-flying chefs!
On its short and medium-haul network, Air France also offers a refined gourmet selection. In the Terminal 2F lounge at Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Michelin-starred chef Michel Roth, Bocuse d’Or and Meilleur Ouvrier de France, is now signing a range of delectable dishes. To create a rich and varied menu, he has teamed up with the talented Josselin Marie, a chef committed to responsible, gourmet vegetarian cuisine. An original duo of chefs illustrating Air France’s determination to take inspiration from the very roots of French haute cuisine and promote the promising young talent behind today’s inventive cuisine with a view to transferring and sharing know-how. With Michel Roth’s chicken in red wine sauce with lardons accompanied by gnocchi fried in butter, button mushroom and pearl onion medley, and Josselin Marie’s creamed celery with truffonade and celery pickles, the two chefs are presenting new hot dishes that change with the seasons and complement the offer available in the lounge.
Customers continue their gourmet experience on board the flight. On Air France’s short-haul network, Michel Roth has created a new range of “signature” sandwiches for Business customers, to accompany the in-flight service and adapted to short-haul flight times. With a choice of farmhouse bread with shredded beef and mustard, celery, apple and mild curry, or two types of bread, with creamy goat’s cheese, onion and walnut chutney, the offer changes every month. On the medium-haul network, customers travelling in Business class can enjoy the chef’s cold dish that accompanies the meal proposed during the trip. With a choice of lightly seared prawns, leek fondue and pot-au-feu style beef ragoût, the dishes are also renewed monthly to continue to surprise and delight the company’s frequent travellers.
Menus signed by talented chefs in all Air France’s Paris airport lounges
Air France also cultivates its art of fine dining for customers in all its long-haul lounges. In the La Première lounge at Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Alain Ducasse, the world’s most starred chef, and his teams, create exceptional dishes. The prestigious menu includes the chef’s famous coquillettes with ham and black truffle and his rum or Armagnac baba, just like in Monte Carlo. The Ducasse Paris teams have also developed new dishes to be enjoyed in the long-haul lounges in terminal 2E (halls K, L and M). Customers can notably enjoy the “Burgal” signed by Ducasse Paris, a fully veggie, healthy and locally-sourced alternative to the traditional hamburger made from locally produced French cereals and vegetables. And at Paris-Orly, in the international lounge located in terminal 3, customers can discover the refined cuisine of Jérôme Banctel, whose dishes are regularly renewed in line with the seasons.
About Jérôme Banctel
Jérôme Banctel is a true Bretton and Brittany is resolutely part of his identity. His career began with Michel Kerever, who worked at the Duc d’Enghien and whom he then followed to the Vreugt en Rust restaurant in the Netherlands. He arrived in Paris in 1993 and worked at the Jules Verne with Alain Reix before joining Les Ambassadeurs, the fine dining restaurant at the Hôtel de Crillon, under Christian Constant. In 1996, aged just 25, he joined l’Ambroisie, the prestigious three-star restaurant on the Place des Vosges, where he stayed for eight years as a sous-chef. There, he learnt from the great Bernard Pacaud about rigour in his work and respect for produce. His talent was spotted by Alain Senderens, who called on him in 2006 to become head chef at his restaurant on Place de la Madeleine. He adopted Alain Senderens’ unique approach, which consists of creating dishes according to the wines with which they are to be paired, while at the same time developing the chef’s own culinary vision. Then, in 2012, the chefs teamed up to write a recipe book and lead the series of Mama Shelter openings, with Jérôme as chef consultant, coached by Alain Senderens. Jérôme Banctel subsequently took up the new challenge offered to him by Michel Reybier, owner of La Réserve in Ramatuelle and Geneva, who was preparing to open a five-star hotel in Paris. He called on Jérôme Banctel to head up the kitchens of the gastronomic restaurant in his Parisian Réserve. Jérôme Banctel gradually became more daring and let his travel inspiration express itself, between his native Brittany and Japan, which had a profound effect on him, via Turkey where he discovered a technique that he has now mastered and made his own; cooking with lime. His cuisine has a style all of its own.
About Josselin Marie
Brought up in the clean fresh air of Brittany, chef Josselin Marie discovered his passion for cooking early on with his grandmother. After training at the Lycée hotelier, he gained experience in prestigious establishments across France (La Bastide Saint Antoine with Jacques Chibois, L’Espérance with Marc Meneau, etc.) before moving to Paris, where he dedicated the next part of his career working at the Ritz with Michel Roth and the Plaza Athénée with Alain Ducasse. In 2012, he took over as head chef at the Hôtel de Vendôme. Seven years of loyal service proved decisive in forming his future identity and culinary ambition with a team of like-minded chefs. This experience also fostered his eco-responsible approach to cuisine, rooted in plant and marine inspirations, composting and low-carbon impact; his exciting culinary creations continue to flourish with the changing seasons. Josselin Marie opened his zero-carbon gourmet restaurant, La Table de Colette, last October. Josselin Marie pays detailed attention to the environmental impact of the activity of a gourmet restaurant, considering such aspects as respecting the seasons of course, as well as the carbon footprint of products, waste management and energy consumption. Today, he is going even further in his ambition to offset his carbon impact by inviting customers to financially contribute to ecological projects. For the first time in a restaurant, it is possible to participate in the ecological transition via a donation at the payment terminal.
