Originally from Brittany, Richard Bertinet trained as a baker from the age of fourteen. Having moved to the United Kingdom in the 1980s, he is now very much an Anglophile.
With twenty years’ experience in the kitchen, baking, consulting, and teaching, Richard moved to Bath in 2005 to open the Bertinet Kitchen cookery school. The school attracts people from all over the world to participate in Richard’s classes and has been highly praised, including recognition by Ruth Reichl in her television series, Adventures with Ruth, in which it was featured as one of the best cookery schools in the world.
As well as instilling passion through his teaching, Richard works as a consultant for major manufacturers developing specialty products throughout the industry.
The Bertinet Bakery started life as a weekly pop-up shop above the cookery school in 2007 but has grown to a much larger affair producing breads and pastries for restaurants, hotels, and food stores in southwestern England, and supplying the bakery’s own shops in Bath, with more to come further afield. The bakery’s signature sourdough loaf was the winner of the Soil Association’s award for Baked Goods in 2010 and 2011.
Richard’s first book, Dough, received a host of accolades, including the Guild of Food Writers’ Jeremy Round Award for Best First Book, the International Association of Culinary Professionals’ Cookbook of the Year Award and Julia Child First Book Award, and the James Beard Foundation Award for Baking and Desserts. His second book, Crust, was also published to critical acclaim and received a Gourmand World Cookbook Award. His third book, Cook, focused on many of the dishes taught at the cookery school. Richard was named the BBC Food Champion of the Year 2010 at the BBC Food and Farming Awards.
