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Gerald Passedat

La Petit Nice

Gerald Passedat is one of the most respected French chefs, history and legend, owner of the restaurant Le Petit Nice in Marseille.

The main part of Gérald Passedat’s cuisine comes from what he sees before him every morning, the place where he draws his strength and vitality: the Mediterranean.

Life By the Sea

For more than 30 years, Gérald Passedat’s cuisine has not stopped exploring the land and banks of Provence and the Mediterranean. Having been immersed in the culture of the Mediterranean diet and cuisine, he concentrated the precision and quintessential of his work on Mediterranean fish. And that’s whether it’s applied to his day to day work with artisan fisherman, intensive work to promote the biodiversity of species as well as in the palette of the most ancestral to contemporary techniques used to enhance them.

Fishermen bring the wealth of fish directly to the restaurant, with sixty-five species filing into Le Petit Nice: dentex, sea bream, Atlantic bonito, whiting, red porgy, moray eel, always incredibly fresh and encased in shaved ice. Some fish had been forgotten; others are little known: the work of Gérald Passedat is centred around finding the way to prepare them that will enhance them to preserve the depth of their taste. Dive into his unique marine universe.

At Le Petit Nice they have always worked with the fishermen, ever since Germain Passedat, his grandfather, founded the establishment, and Gérald Passedat has refined his collaboration with local fishermen by drawing up a set of specifications respecting sizes and seasons, and laying claim to traditional fishing techniques. The fish are therefore caught using the longline technique (a selective technique used from the 17th century in Marseille, imported by the Catalans that settling in the city), through potting, creeling or simply by hand, particular for certain shellfish or sea anemones.

A Sustainable Undertaking

Between economy and ecology, sustainable traditional fishing is a difficult balance, and the relationship between gastronomy and environmental responsibility is sometimes strained: it can be complicated, and Gérald Passedat believes in common sense being applied every day more than anything.

Customers must understand and allow themselves to be guided… because here, the Mediterranean reigns supreme, and everything varies depending on what it gives.