Basque chef Arzak wins Lifetime Achievement Award

Juan Mari Arzak, dubbed by The Independent as the ''father of new Basque cuisine'' was announced the 2011 winner of S.Pellegrino''s Lifetime Achievement Award on Monday.

The award, says the paper, "puts Arzak in the company of a small exclusive club of chefs" for their pioneering approach to their art.

Arzak''s restaurant&' || 'nbsp; came no.9 in the S.Pellegrino World''s 50 Best Restaurants awards list in 2010, behind the likes of Catalonia''s Ferran Adrià and US chef Grant Achatz.

It was, however, Arzak who paved the way for the kind of gastronomic innovation which typifies modern cooking: "constantly reinventing through experimentation and free of culinary expression".

As far back as 1966, when he took over Arzak, Juan Mari was "playing with fire - and liquid nitrogen - putting Spanish chefs on a bold new trajectory"; what he calls "investigation".

Third generation in a long line of chefs, Arzak''s daughter Elena - carrying on the family tradition - was also shortlisted in the newly-created World''s Best Female Chef category, losing out to France''s Anne-Sophie Pic.