His parents are from the Bassin decazevillois. His mother from Noailhac and his father from Almont-les-Junies. Laura Pelou was however born in Toulouse, on March 3, 1992. A double three, and even a triple since that day, her mother gave birth to three children. Laura, therefore, and her two brothers Mathieu and Julien. Hence the birth in Toulouse because “in Decazeville, it was a bit risky”. The Pink City where the young chef recently opened the Gram’s restaurant in the city centre.

A passion for cooking

Laura Pelou is not a newcomer to the profession since she is already at the head of the Jardin des Causses, in Villeneuve-d’Aveyron. A village where she spent her childhood, educated at the municipal school before continuing at the Francis-Carco college in Villefranche-de-Rouergue then in Rodez at the Louis-Querbes private high school.

She then turned to studies in medico-social. “My father, who is a cook himself, didn’t want me to do this job,” she recalls.

She obtained her ST2S baccalaureate in 2010 and left for Toulouse where she took courses at the Limayrac Institute to specialize in dietetics. “I didn’t like it at all, she admits. It hasn’t been a great year for me.”

“Already, the only thing I wanted to do was cook”, insists the young chef who, very quickly, returns to Aveyron and registers with the CFA of the chamber of trade of Onet-le-Château to prepare a CAP of… cooking. She then works alternately in a brewery in Villefranche-de-Rouergue.

She is not yet a chef but only a kitchen clerk and joins the pro “turbo” training in Toulouse. “It allows you to pass the baccalaureate in just one year. It was unique in France at the time and therefore in great demand!, underlines the Villeneuvoise. I had to pass a very specialized interview. Out of 100 candidates, only 13 were selected.” Graduated with a gastronomic cuisine option in 2012, Laura Pelou still has a thirst for learning. “I was absolutely looking to work in a starred restaurant,” she says.

In the Lot then in England and with Quentin Bourdy

She then chose the apprenticeship path to prepare, for a year, a professional patent at L’Allée des Vignes (one star), in Cajarc in the Lot. “It really gave me confidence.”

She was then 22 years old and flew to Great Britain – “I wanted to know how I could manage on my own abroad” – where she was hired at Nottingham’s Hart’s, a renowned restaurant in this city in the center of the England. “A beautiful English bistronomy with a strong French influence, specifies the young chef. We served up to 180 covers.” “I loved my stay there! England, the English!”

But, in 2014, it’s time to return to Aveyron. She works in a new starred establishment: “A bad experience but very formative”, she specifies. And even makes a passage through Le Jardin des Causses, at her home, in Villeneuve-d’Aveyron.

“I wanted to go back to town. I could have gone to Paris, where chefs had made me some offers, but I was a little apprehensive, afraid of not acclimating to the capital. I didn’t feel ready. “, she admits.

She was then contacted by Quentin Bourdy, head of L’Univers in Villefranche-de-Rouergue, where she served as second for two and a half years.

And this is the turning point, in November 2018, when two friends offer him that the Jardin des Causses is for sale.

“I call my father: Dad, it’s for sale!” “It can do it,” he replies.

Ups and downs at the Jardin des Causses

Laura Pelou is going on vacation to Reunion in January 2019 and takes the opportunity to think about this project that excites her. She signs and collects the keys to the establishment in April of the same year and opens in June, after some work. The Villeneuvoise invests all her energy – “90 hours per week for a maximum of €1,600 per month” – but in March 2020, the (first) confinement, linked to the Covid pandemic, comes to a complete halt in her business. “It was out of the question for me to stop working, she insists. We closed on Saturday and from Monday, I stopped deliveries. Between 11 a.m. and 2:30 p.m., I delivered 150 meals (entrance , main course and dessert for €15) in the area of ​​Villeneuve, Villefranche, Capdenac and the surrounding villages.”

The experience lasts three months until the young chef throws in the towel, exhausted, she who ensures all alone preparation and delivery, with all the same a helping hand from her parents.

But two short weeks later, refreshed and when the end of confinement has sounded, she reopens Le Jardin du Causse. “I had hired some friends and we had a huge summer…”, she recalls. But the second confinement arises in October 2020 and the restaurant closes again. This time for six months until the reopening in May 2021, after the third confinement.

These repeated openings and closings and these beautiful summer seasons then push Laura Pelou to think about the future of her establishment. She then decides that the Jardin des Causses will only be open during the summer months, when the clientele – especially tourists – is more numerous and can enjoy the terrace.

The crush for a business in Toulouse

But the Aveyronnaise has not said its last word. She won the Young Talent Endowment which enabled her to obtain €25,000 in the form of products or equipment, a welcome aid which would enable her to start a new business. She visits a dozen restaurants for sale in Toulouse and throws her evolution on an establishment rue de la Colombette: “A crush!”, she says.

Forty covered plus the terrace, a decoration made of wood and bricks from Toulouse with a real old floor, a huge vaulted cellar in the basement… Laura Pelou opened Gram’s on October 4th. “I want to make people discover the good products of Aveyron, through simple and gourmet cuisine”, she says. Its suppliers – the Bousquet delicatessen in Luc-la-Primaube, the Maison Pouget in Pruines or the Brasserie d’Olt, among others, as for the Jardin des Causses, are from Aveyron.

A young team surrounds him

And she surrounds herself with a young team: Charlé and Gabriel in the kitchen – also from Aveyron – and Lucas – from Saint-Gaudens in Haute-Garonne – in the service. “They are tops!” rejoices the chef who has not, however, given up on his Villeneuvoise business which she wishes to manage from May to September. But “it’s difficult to find a team that only stays six months,” she says. The idea would be to find a manager to take care of Gram’s in Toulouse while she herself would take care of the Jardin des Causses in Aveyron during the season.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve been so happy,” discovered Laura Pelou. A well-deserved happiness after a lot of hardships but still deep down inside her this relentless desire to succeed in the restaurant business. “Cooking, that’s all I’ve been thinking about since I was two or three years old. And when I was 7 or 8, I prepared my first dish with my father!” If that isn’t passion…