I don't have a bucket list anymore, because this profession has given me everything - says Lajos Bíró, who was the first person to receive the Bocuse d'Or Academy's Lifetime Achievement Award, founded this year. He is someone who not only cultivates gastronomy, but also shapes it. His career has been decisive in its development, showing the way for generations. Chef, chef, chef de cuisine, but also innovator. Sometimes with a snappy manner, but always honest about how he sees things, even if he is scowled at. But what he has brought to the table is indisputable!
What is it that can earn someone many awards? Restaurateur of the Year (2008), Member of the American Chef Academy (2009), Hungarian Republic Gold Cross of Merit (2009), President of the Hungarian Bocuse d'Or Academy (2011), Gundel Károly Award (2015)[19], Dining Guide Lifetime Achievement Award (2019), and now Bocuse d'Or Academy Lifetime Achievement Award (2021). For those who didn't understand it before, now you can, Lajos Bíró told us himself.
It's too much to list how much is attached to your name. What have been the highlights of your career?
Since I started working, I have always been working on something that was in some way ahead of the general trends of the time. The Red Dragon restaurant was the first. We created the first Far Eastern restaurant, when Chinese cuisine was still unknown. Needless to say, we were a huge success! Then the Museum Café, which was also a novelty. I've been abroad a lot and I've seen a lot of raw material, we introduced new kitchen technology. Such was the sous vide technology which we introduced with Chef János Kiss and which has fundamentally changed the work of chefs. And what has become a new trend in the mentality and way of thinking of the catering industry is Bistro “genre”, as we were the first to name our restaurant this way!
You have worked with a lot of raw materials and have many recipes to your name. These have been copied many times, but you could also say that they have been adopted. Is it important for you to bring innovative cuisines?
I couldn't work any other way. An important part of a restaurant or kitchen is to always offer something surprising and interesting. To do that, I've been constantly researching new ingredients. When I worked at the American embassy, I had the opportunity to find new with raw materials to create dishes that were hardly heard of at the time. As a chef, I'm always thinking of new recipes. Being copied all the time is sometimes frustrating, but sometimes exhilarating, because it has allowed me to „spread and disseminate” a lot of new things in the catering industry.
You have helped many restaurants succeed and many more catering establishments. Your life is hospitality, how long will you be in the business?
Volga Hotel, Olimpia Hotel, American Embassy, Red Dragon Chinese Restaurant, Museum Café, Bock Bistro, Little Judge, Buja Pigs. Yes, there are quite a few, and we have made a success of the restaurant in each of them. Thanks of course to the continuous innovation. In addition to these, after a while, I had a lot of people asking for my advice, whether it was in setting up a restaurant, in the kitchen or in cooking. I have always been very happy to help, but of course there are some recipes that I don't give away, because some I have worked on for a year. How much longer will I be working? It's a bit like actors... I'll only stop when I'm no longer alive!
What do you consider the greatest achievement of your career?
I could list many things, but my greatest achievement is my son! Daniel Bíró! I am so proud of him like nothing else. I worked hard to give him a profession, my profession, which is heartwarming in itself. After a while he started to cultivate it to such a level that he even teaches me now! Of course, the trends are different now and the paths are different, but he has stood his ground and it is a great thing to be able to pass on the baton. It's uplifting that he has taken over the kitchen of the Little Judge from me and is creating something that perhaps even I couldn't do. Well, is the old man good in the kitchen ?
With a life like that behind you, do you think it's possible to go from a restaurant to a millionaire?
The kind of millionaire to which the question refers, I can say a definite no. Of course, we can talk about Jamie Oliver or Gordon Ramsay, if we just say the ones everyone knows, but not in Hungary. I would add, however, that there are also a lot of failed businesses with their names attached to them, where we are talking about millions and millions of euros. If you are asking about the classic and the reality, a good chef who gets to the point where he has his own restaurant is about supporting a family on a good bourgeois level. What I always say to young people is, I don't have a bucket list anymore! I, Lajos Bíró, have got everything from this profession. I have travelled the world, had and still have good cars and good bikes. I had a horse, a motorboat and a sailboat, and the only expensive things I missed out on were hunting and golf, and that only because I was never excited by them. I can afford to have quality clothes, shoes, and I had 8-10 Breguet (breguet) chef's coats even when you could only see one on someone every now and then. I was able to afford all of this from this profession and this job, but it must be added and understood: you have to work hard for it! If someone thinks they are tired because they have worked a lot, I was only halfway through the day. However, because I love what I do, it was never hard, at most I was really tired. My wish for everyone is that what you do makes you happy and that you get everything out of it!
You became the first Bocuse d'Or Academy Lifetime Achievement Award winner. How did it feel to receive the award?
It was the first prize I hadn't suspected at all. They managed to conceal it to such an extent that I never heard about it until I was there. I talk and work on a daily basis with the people who have now handed it to me, they know me and yet I still managed. That in itself is impressive! What I felt there and then is hard to describe! I have a few awards for my work and I am proud of them, but this is what I have received from my colleagues, from my peers. From people and organisations who really know my career. I'm not a sentimental person, although I do get emotional as time goes by, but this was one of the best moments of my life.
Why did you feel it was the most beautiful?
I have been saying for a long time in the industry that we should create some kind of platform for older for cooks. For those who, although no longer the main players in the profession, would not be here without them. It would be important to younger age groups teach them to appreciate and value what we have given them. This has long worked abroad, for example in Bocuse d'Or competition, where prizes are not awarded as a result of a competition, but in recognition of a course, an achievement. Then the whole profession gives a standing ovation! This is exactly what I experienced, this is exactly what I got, because when this „secret” prize, which I did not know, was put in my hand, I was challenged, all my colleagues, young and old, gave me a standing ovation. I admit I had a lump in my throat. #
by Tamás Budafoki / Airchef
Photo by Lajos Bíró
Read more on the topic:
Who will definitely be at the 2022 Bocuse d'Or final
„I see the potential for development in racing”
„My fiancée and I prepared two dishes that we sent and we made it to the final...”
