François Payard (born July 16, 1966) is a former

pastry chef A pastry chef or pâtissier (; the French female version of the word is pâtissière ), is a station chef in a professional kitchen, skilled in the making of pastries, desserts, breads and other baked goods. They are employed in large hotels, bi ...

at some of the world's finest restaurants, including

Le Bernardin Le Bernardin is a French seafood restaurant in Midtown Manhattan in New York City. Gilbert Le Coze and his sister Maguy Le Coze started the restaurant in Paris in 1972, where it was called Les Moines de St. Bernardin. They restarted the resta ...

and Daniel in New York City. He was the owner of Payard Patisserie & Bistro, FP Patisserie, and FP bakery in New York City; he resigned as chief executive in 2016, and they closed after about a decade of existence in January 2018.

Biography

Born in

Nice Nice ( , ; Niçard: , classical norm, or , nonstandard, ; it, Nizza ; lij, Nissa; grc, Νίκαια; la, Nicaea) is the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes department in France. The Nice agglomeration extends far beyond the administrative c ...

, Payard grew up spending much of his time in his grandfather's pastry shop, Au Nid des Friandises, on the Riviera. After moving to

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

in 1990 from traveling around Paris honing his skills in three-star Michelin rated pastry kitchens, chef François Payard began his New York City career at

and Restaurant Daniel where he earned recognition in the kitchen as the 1995 recipient of the James Beard Association "Pastry Chef of the Year" award, honoring him for his unique pastry designs and high attention to flavor. In 1997, Payard opened his first Pâtisserie and Bistro with Payard Pâtisserie and Bistro on

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

’s Upper East Side. Currently, Payard has locations in Korea, Brazil, Japan, and Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas. Payard wrote several cookbooks, "Bite Size: Elegant Recipes for Entertaining," "Simply Sensational Desserts" and his most recent "Chocolate Epiphany: Exceptional Cookies, Cakes, and Confections for Everyone." Payard's creations include Soy Chocolate Mousse and upgrades to the classic Payard Holiday Yule logs.

References

Sources

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External links

Payard
1966 births Living people French male chefs Pastry chefs James Beard Foundation Award winners {{Chef-bio-stub