Josep Espuga’s mother still runs the family’s braseria grill restaurant in their home town in the Catalan Pyrenees. “I grew up helping my grandmother and then my mother in the kitchen, learning how to cook,” he says. “We worked only with produce from local farmers and fed only local people.”

If there is a tinge of guilt in his voice, it’s because his mother retires this year and is closing the restaurant. In a parallel universe, Josep would take the reins. But he went travelling instead, working at Spain’s celebrated Mugaritz restaurant with Andoni Aduriz, and La Broche with Sergi Arola.