“We met nineteen years ago in high school and have been together ever since. We had both gone to this establishment in Picardy to follow a cinema option which was quite rare in high school. We were thinking of working in audiovisual – Sarah in production, me in editing. After the baccalaureate, a gap year as an “au pair” in families in England, to change air and learn English, and our audiovisual BTS in Saint-Quentin (Aisne) in our pocket, we were still unsure of what we wanted to do.
We took it into our heads to go far away, with a working holiday visa, which allows young people to expatriate by working on site if they wish. We decided to go to Vancouver, without really knowing why. It was awesome. This is where we discovered the idea of entrepreneurship.
“Vancouver had opened our eyes to entrepreneurship, Melbourne whispered in our ear the sector in which we wanted to get started. »
While our families in France, far from this universe, pushed us to seek the security of a salary, in Vancouver, 20-year-olds threw themselves into entrepreneurial projects without asking questions. Sometimes with bits of string, but with conviction and great freedom. It was totally alien and inspiring to us.
After two and a half years in Vancouver, I wanted to return to France, and Sarah wanted to continue traveling: she went to Australia, with a new working holiday visa. During this time, I was going around in circles trying to find my place in France. I thought everything had changed, but in fact it was I who had changed… A few months later, I joined Sarah in Melbourne, she had found work in a café, and that was a revelation.
We had already discovered specialty coffees in Canada, but in Melbourne, we landed in the midst of a coffee boom with high-quality savory cuisine. We went from one great place to another, with super appetizing menus, and we worked in a legendary restaurant, Duchess of Spotswood, where we learned everything about the trade – at the bar, in the dining room, in the kitchen. And soon we realized that was what we really wanted to do. Vancouver had opened our eyes to entrepreneurship, Melbourne whispered in our ear the sector in which we wanted to get started.
Back in France in 2012, we knew we wanted to create a place open from morning, with seasonal cuisine, good coffee and a warm welcome. This description was our mantra, it summed up our idea and allowed us to face our entourage (who tried to dissuade us from it) and all the banks which sent us to hell. Nobody understood that a good salty breakfast could be a thing of the future. We held on, we ended up finding the funding, and we opened Holybelly (“sacred belly”) in 2013.
One of the very first dishes on the menu was the hashbrowns, a kind of very Anglo-Saxon grated and grilled potato pancakes, which we reworked a little to lighten and Frenchify them. This remains one of our key dishes on the menu, which goes just as well with eggs as with meat or a salad. It’s super simple, and it’s as good in the morning as it is at noon or in the evening. »