Make people smile with delicious food! Mr. Takayama, who is trying to make his restaurant loved by the locals, has participated as a representative of Japan in “Bocuse d’Or”, which is titled the Culinary Olympics. This is a documentary of a man challenges the world with the theme of creating relationships with others.

Make a restaurant which binds the locals through using local foodstuffs!

A house-like restaurant “Maison de Taka Ashiya” is located on Ashiya River. At the restaurant, you can enjoy typical French dishes made using local foodstuffs. Hideki Takayama, the chef of the restaurant, learned the basics of cooking for eight years at “Chez Ino”, which is managed by Akira Inoue, and went over to France in 2004. He had experienced to work at starred restaurants including the three-star restaurant “Régis et Jacques Marcon”. After returned to Japan, he engaged with opening and became the chef at “Maison de Gill Ashiya”, a sister restaurant of French two-star restaurant “Gill”. As he won the 5th prize (fish dishes category special award) in “2015 Bocuse d’Or”, the restaurant was renewed as “Maison de Taka Ashiya” in the following year.

Local foodstuffs, such as vegetables of Mukonoso, Amagasaki and fishes of Awaji Island, are purchased from reliable producers. He believes that “Food makes people happy”, and is working for contribution to the local community, for example through studying and serving easy-to-eat dishes at nursing homes for elderly people suffered from dysphagia.

He decided to participate once moe in “Bocuse d’Or”. “Big chance of developing myself. May be the last year to pursue my dreams.”

“Bocuse d’Or” is a world chef championship, which is known as the Culinary Olympics or the Gastronomy World Cup. It was founded in 1987 by Paul Bocuse, who is called the father of French cuisine and died on January 20, 2018, at the age of 91. The competition is held every two years in Lyon, France, where chefs who won through the qualifiers in each country compete for their cooking skills. Mr. Takayama won the 5th place as a representative of Japan in 2015 and decided to make another attempt. As the chefs in the competition are required to fight hard over seven hours without any rest, he decided to make this time the last challenge when he turned 40 years old.

Both in the Japan Championship in 2017 and the Asia Pacific Championship in 2018 (Guangzhou, China), he won with a big lead over the 2nd place. As a result, he again got the ticket to the World Championship in 2019 (January 29, 30). How is his dish with might and main that is magically beautiful and makes good use of the foodstuffs? We had covered closely Mr. Takayama, who challenged himself to be the top of the world with the theme of creating relationships with people he met and the staffs supported him.