On March 31, 2025, Le Coquillage at Château Richeux became one of only two new French three-star restaurants in the 2025 Michelin Guide. Hugo Roellinger — son of Olivier Roellinger, who also held three stars — had spent eleven years building a cuisine entirely without meat, rooted in seaweed and the spice heritage of his family's Brittany, with the Bay of Mont-Saint-Michel visible from the dining room windows. He received 600 reservations the day of the announcement.

The Food & The Setting


Au gré du vent et de la lune. 12 courses. No meat. The moon in the title says everything.


The single menu served at Le Coquillage is called Au gré du vent et de la lune — By the Whims of the Wind and the Moon. The title is not metaphorical: the 12-course menu changes according to the seasons, the weather, the daily catch, and what the kitchen's gardens and foraging yields. The moon matters — Brittany's tides, among the largest in the world, determine when fish can be caught and what coastal plants can be harvested. The wind shapes the sea's temperature and what the fishermen can bring in. The menu's name is literally accurate.


The tableware underlines the philosophy: plates made of clay extracted from the beach; the crumber, a razor clam shell; bread crumbs collected in an oyster shell. The sea is present in the room without a trace of kitsch. Michelin's inspector described the entire meal as something that can be eaten with tongs — disorienting on paper, extraordinary in practice. The dishes carry dreamlike names, the service is young and passionate without ceremony, and the Château Richeux manor — a 1920s building in an expanse of moorland above the sea, the Bay of Mont-Saint-Michel visible through the bow windows — provides a setting that the inspector chose to photograph before doing anything else on arrival.


Running a restaurant is a collective work and a militant act. Le Coquillage will continue to express the love of Brittany with sincerity, simplicity, and authenticity, never abandoning our freedom to cook.

HUGO ROELLINGER, ON RECEIVING THREE MICHELIN STARS, MARCH 2025
The Chef & The Family


Olivier Roellinger. Three stars. Then Hugo walks in and removes all the meat.


Olivier Roellinger — born and raised in Cancale, a privateer dreamer, one of the great chefs of his generation — earned three Michelin stars for his Bricourt restaurant in the 1980s, held them until health problems forced him to return his stars in 2008, and spent the following years building the Les Maisons de Bricourt estate around his childhood house and the spice workshop that produces the family's celebrated blends. His son Hugo, born in 1988, grew up between the kitchen and the open sea: a former merchant navy student who turned to cooking in 2014 and trained with Michel Bras, Pierre Gagnaire, Michel Guérard, and the Troisgros family before taking over Le Coquillage at Château Richeux.


The transition from his father's style was immediate and decisive. In 2017, Hugo removed all meat from the menu — a radical decision for a French restaurant at any level, made more radical at a restaurant aiming for the top of the Michelin hierarchy. The argument was ecological and culinary simultaneously: the sea, the coast, and the land of northern Brittany offered everything the kitchen needed. Seaweed became the backbone of his cooking, providing umami depth through broths and garum-style preparations that replaced the animal stock foundations of classical cuisine. Spices — the Roellinger family's inheritance from centuries of Breton privateering and trade with India — wove through the dishes as atmospheric elements rather than heat providers.


Two Michelin stars arrived in 2019. A Michelin Green Star in 2020 recognised the kitchen's ecological commitment: no pesticides on the gardens, natural wine list, seasonal calendar strictly followed, zero food waste policy. For three years, guests and critics waited for the third star. It came on March 31, 2025, at the ceremony in Metz, alongside Christopher Coutanceau's La Rochelle return. Hugo Roellinger had done it differently from how it has ever been done at this level.

What Defines Le Coquillage


No meat. Seaweed. Spices. The moon and the tide. A new chapter in French gastronomy.


Seaweed Broths — The New Foundation


Roellinger replaced the animal stock foundations of classical French cuisine with seaweed broths: kombu, dulse, sea lettuce, and others harvested from the Cancale bay, simmered to extract the deep umami depth that classical cooking derives from bones and carcasses. The broths at Le Coquillage are not substitutions for meat-based stocks but an original contribution to French sauce-making — a marine terroir translated into the liquid foundations of the kitchen's cooking.


Retour des Indes — The Roellinger Spice Heritage


The Roellinger family spice workshop — housed in Olivier's childhood home, the Maison du Voyageur — produces blends that connect Brittany's privateer history to the spice trade routes of the Indian Ocean. Hugo uses these blends throughout the menu as atmospheric accents: the spice appears in specific dishes as a note that recalls the long sea voyages that brought these ingredients back to Cancale. The family's spice heritage is the thread that connects father and son most directly.


Clay Plates from the Beach


The tableware was created using clay extracted directly from the beach below the restaurant — the Michelin inspector's first observation on being seated. The plates, the crumber (a razor clam shell), and the bread dish (an oyster shell) make the beach physically present at the table without any decorative gesture. The sea is the source of the clay that holds the food that came from the sea. A completely coherent material logic that is entirely Hugo Roellinger's invention.


The View of Mont-Saint-Michel


From the Château Richeux dining room, the Bay of Mont-Saint-Michel is visible through the bow windows — the island abbey visible on clear days as a silhouette against the horizon. The bay has the largest tidal range in Europe; at low tide, vast mudflats extend for kilometres; at high tide, the sea covers them entirely. The daily rhythm of the tides is the same rhythm that determines what the kitchen can cook. Requesting a window seat is not optional; it is essential.


Au gré du vent et de la lune — 12 Courses


The single tasting menu — 12 courses, no meat, no fixed menu from day to day — is the only format at Le Coquillage. Roellinger does not offer a shorter alternative or an à la carte option. The 12 courses represent the full argument: this is what the sea, the coast, and this specific day's catch can produce when cooked by someone who has spent eleven years building a vocabulary for it. The inspector described it as an experience from which you wish it would never end.


600 Reservations in One Day


When the third star was announced on March 31, 2025, the Château Richeux team received 600 reservation requests in a single day — a volume that would fill the restaurant for months. Hugo Roellinger described it as abasourdi: astonishing. The scale of the response confirms what the cooking had suggested for years: that this remote Breton manor, with its no-meat menu and its seaweed broths, was one of the most original and significant restaurants in France. It was simply waiting for the recognition.

Before You Go


Everything practical, plainly told


  • Address: Château Richeux, Saint-Méloir-des-Ondes, 35350 Cancale, Ille-et-Vilaine, Brittany, France


  • Phone: +33 2 99 89 64 76


  • Website: maisons-de-bricourt.com/en/page/le-coquillage


  • Getting There: Saint-Méloir-des-Ondes is approximately 5km south of Cancale on the northern Brittany coast. The nearest TGV station is Rennes (2h30 from Paris-Montparnasse), 60km to the south. Saint-Malo — the fortified port city, 30 minutes away — has ferry connections to the Channel Islands and England. A hire car from Rennes or Saint-Malo is the practical approach to reaching the restaurant.


  • Bookings: Via maisons-de-bricourt.com. Following the three-star announcement in March 2025 and the 600 reservations received on the first day, demand is extremely high. Book as far in advance as the system allows — at least 2–3 months for any available date. The Château Richeux hotel (5-star Relais & Châteaux) provides rooms that can be booked alongside the restaurant; staying overnight is strongly recommended given the distance from the nearest city.


  • Price: The 12-course tasting menu is approximately €180–€220 per person for food. Beverage pairing (wine or non-alcoholic — the kitchen offers the same creativity in its juice and broth pairings as in its food) additional. Total with pairing approximately €280–€350. The Château Richeux hotel rooms range from standard to suite pricing at Relais & Châteaux five-star rates. Verify current pricing at the time of booking.



  • No Meat: Le Coquillage has served no meat since 2017. The menu is based entirely on seafood, shellfish, coastal plants, vegetables, seaweed, and dairy. Guests who cannot eat fish or shellfish should contact the restaurant before booking to discuss accommodation. Guests who can: this is one of the most original expressions of coastal cuisine available anywhere in France.

Le Coquillage isn’t a meal—it’s a tidepool of memories. A place where Hugo Roellinger stirs the Atlantic’s soul into every dish, where spices whisper tales of distant ports, and where Brittany’s coastline becomes a plate. For those who hear the sea’s call, this Château Richeux jewel is where maritime tradition and global wanderlust anchor in harmony.