Marc Veyrat, a celebrity chef from France, is suing the Michelin Guide, claiming that one of his restaurants was unfairly docked a star by them for inaccurate reasons. Specifically, Veyrat said he is suing the publication in order to clarify that he did not use cheddar cheese in a soufflé.

Veyrat alleges that a Michelin inspector accused him of using English Cheddar in a French soufflé, rather than a traditional French cheese option. The chef has since fired back by saying that the chef had an “unsophisticated palate” and mistook the cheese’s yellow color (it was made with saffron) for cheddar during a visit to Veyrat’s La Maison des Bois eatery in the French Alps. Veyrat added that the incident reported caused his restaurant to lose a Michelin star.

“I’ve been dishonored. I saw my team in tears, to have them call you one evening without warning, without anything written down, without anything, to say ‘That’s it, it’s over,’” Veyrat said. “I put saffron in it, and the gentleman who came thought it was cheddar because it was yellow. That’s what you call knowledge of a place? It’s just crazy.”

He went on to describe losing a Michelin star as “worse than a wound,” as well as “profoundly offensive.”

“It gave me depression,” he claimed.

Emmanuel Ravanas, the lawyer representing Veyrat, said his client is more upset about the alleged false allegation by the Michelin instructor than he is about anything else.

“For decades, Marc Veyrat has been used to having his cooking graded, evaluated and compared, and he knows quite well that you don’t own a star for life,”  Ravanas said. “He accepts it all, as long as the criticism is accurate.”

Michelin has responded in a statement of their own, saying that they understand “the disappointment for Mr. Veyrat, whose talent no one contests, even if we regret his unreasonable persistence with his accusations. Our first duty is to tell consumers why we have changed our recommendation.”

“We will carefully study his demands and respond calmly,” Michelin concluded.