Africa's culinary heritage

I was born in 1991 in Congo-Brazzaville and grew up in a family where food played a central role. I spent much of my childhood with my grandmother, who owned a restaurant near a highway. As a teenager, I moved to Warstein in Germany to live with my older sister. I discovered my passion for cooking shortly after arriving: I missed the food from my home country and began cooking Congolese dishes to reconnect with my roots.

I searched for ingredients in Afro shops and experimented on my own. At 17, I started my professional training as a chef in Münster. After that, I worked in various top restaurants, such as La Vie in Osnabrück, Aqua in Wolfsburg, and alongside the German chef Nelson Müller in Essen.

“In France, the focus is on taste, refinement, and innovation. In Germany, I not only learned how to cook, but also how to run a business”

I began early on to develop a fusion style, combining African ingredients with German recipes—for example, homemade sauerkraut with African spices that aren’t available in Germany. I experimented with fermentation and created new flavors and taste profiles by blending ingredients and techniques from different culinary traditions. Eventually, my interest led me to France, whose cuisine fascinated me. I see it as the foundation of many classical cooking techniques and wanted to learn directly at the source.

For a while, I commuted between France and Germany. A pivotal moment was my participation in “Top Chef,” the international TV cooking competition. After the show, I stayed in France to continue learning and advancing my career. There are some differences between culinary training there and in Germany. In France, the emphasis is on taste, refinement, and innovation. In Germany, I not only learned how to cook, but also how to run a business.