More than just a prestigious name, Anne-Sophie Pic is an exceptional woman, a passionate cook, an ambassador for delicate flavours... and a very happy mother.

Whilst her first name may conjure up an image of gentleness and delicacy, her last is a reminder that character is a combination of emotions, choices, and the right words. This cook from a prestigious line of chefs learned at a very young age that modern times demanded that she enhance her education with the qualities required of a business leader.

As a child, of course, coming home from school had a very special flavour for Anne-Sophie, who could be tempted by a cream puff offered to her by the restaurant’s pastry chef. She was incapable of resisting the crayfish simmering in the great copper pots.

Her tastes were formed almost without her realising it, in her intimate relationship with her parents, the kitchen and the rest of the team. Nonetheless, her thirst for adventure sent her down another path for a time.

When she joined the Higher Institute of Management, Anne-Sophie left the comfort of the family home to explore both the wider world and the world of business, travelling from Paris to the United States via Japan, where she would discover a whole new range of flavoursome culinary experiences. She was also to meet her future husband, David Sinapian, there.

In June 1992, aged 23, she returned to Valence and told her father she wanted to devote herself to her true passion. Jacques Pic therefore put his daughter in the kitchen and imagined she would learn her craft at a catering college. Destiny had other plans for her, however, and the death of her father in September turned everything on its head.

Anne-Sophie was to have a hand in all the jobs associated with the proper running of the Pic family business. But she knew that her future lay elsewhere, in the kitchen, like her father. David, her husband, would help her to “make her way into the kitchen” and one September morning in 1997, with the support of her mother Suzanne and to general astonishment, Anne-Sophie pushed open the door and began her apprenticeship.

In 2007, aged 37, Anne-Sophie Pic was awarded her third Michelin star. She was also elected “Chef of the Year” by the 8,000 chefs listed in the Michelin Guide. Today, surrounded by a team of like-minded staff, Anne-Sophie is a “cuisinière” – the title she claims for herself – who creates, invents and innovates.