By all appearances, Benoît Violier, at 44, was on top of his profession and on top of the world. And then he pulled the trigger.
NICE, France — Why kill yourself with a shotgun one month after you’re voted the best chef in the world?
That’s the mystery that’s taken hold around the famed Restaurant de l’Hôtel de Ville in the picturesque Swiss village of Cressier, where 44-year-old chef Benoît Violier apparently committed suicide at home on Sunday.
He loved hunting and published just last year a book on cooking “feathered game.” (The prestigious daily Le Monde waxed ecstatic over his snow partridge in a wine reduction with tiny Roscoff onions.) The gun that he appears to have used to kill himself reportedly was one of those he used for game.
Swiss police have opened an investigation into the case.
The chef was in the prime of his life. Handsome, charismatic, said to be calmer in temperament than most world-class cooks, he was married to a beautiful woman, Brigitte, who left her job in cosmetics to work at his side at their highly sought after, three-star restaurant near Lausanne that was normally booked up four months in advance. The couple had a 12-year-old son and an equally photogenic dog, Mac Queen.
So why did the French-born Violier, who achieved what most would consider the pinnacle of professional and personal success in this world, apparently take a gun and shoot himself on Sunday, blowing to bits a self-made universe that was the envy of all who knew him?
So far, no one has any idea. ”Late in the afternoon, police went to Cressier where they discovered at his home the body of Mr. Benoît Violier,” Swiss police said in a cryptic statement.
Violier, who obtained Swiss citizenship two years ago, had been expected in Paris on Monday for the unveiling of the latest Michelin guide where, as expected, his restaurant retained its three stars, or, as the French call them, its three macarons.
Even when he talked about his childhood, Violier gave no hint of unhappiness. In an interview with the Swiss website Illustre in September 2015, Violiet described his idyllic upbringing near the seaside city of La Rochelle in France, and how his mother encouraged her kids to stay away from the TV and enjoy nature. Violiet didn't even take his first train ride until he was 17..."
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