Great Paris restaurants?

My wife and I are going to be staying three nights on Ile St. Louis at the end of March, and I am looking for some restaurant recommendations, including at least one high end one.

Any recommendations?

can’t get much higher than Jules Verne, two stars and outstanding last October. Warm, friendly, can’t beat the view. A real highlight. High up on the Tour Eiffel.

Hard to give recommendations in the abstract, because Paris has enough quality and variety to check every box.

At the high end, Arpege may be my favorite restaurant on earth. But it’s not for everyone.

This site has some solid recs: http://parisbymouth.com/our-guide-to-paris-restaurants/

I agree with the others that it is a very broad question. This would be my short list with one of everything.

High End - L’Astrance, my favorite of the Michelin *** Make reservations far in advance

Lunch or Dinner - Septime Equally as good as most Michelin *** food but more casual

Lunch - Clown Bar or Bistro Paul Bert 6

Sunday Lunch or Dinner - Clamato (run by the Septime team)

Adding to the above:

Semilla - Same restaurant group as Fish, but I like it much better
Address: 54 Rue de Seine, 75006 Paris, France
Phone:+33 1 43 54 34 50

Le Comptoir du Relais - The perfect bistro. Go for lunch and get in line around 11:30/45. You’ll get in for the 12 PM seating.
Address: 6 Carrefour de l’Odéon, 75006 Paris, France
Phone:+33 1 44 27 07 97

In October, we ate dinner at the following restaurants, many of which we’ve been to before, each starred according to my preference:

La Regalade Ste-Honoré*
Yam’tcha**
Frenchie**
Goust**+
Passage 53***
Saturne**+
Dessance*+
Le Mary Celeste*+
Les Papilles* (we didn’t like it as much as earlier visits)
Terroir Parisien- avoid
Semilla**-
L’Ami Jean (x3)++ (my wife’s favorite restaurant and we’ve become friendly with Chef Jego over the years; so we go three times for dinner each month we are in Paris)
L’Arpège
*
David Toutain**+
Philou*+
Vivant**+
Bones**
Clown Bar**
Le 6 Paul Bert**
Le Chateaubriand**+
Le Servan**
L’Ecailler du Bistro**
Les DĂ©serteurs**
Septime***
Yard**
Le Baratin**

Too many to provide a narrative about each meal, but I’m happy to answer any questions about specific restaurants. I only listed those from our October '14 stay, as it is relatively recent.

great list, Mark!

serious question; what do people order at Paul Bert? I’ve only had one meal there and found it a little touristy and the food very average. It was fun however. Again, only once. had a steak and fries and probably a bojo.

edit- noticed it’s le 6 and not bistro, but i suppose the question still stands…

Yaacov,
Le 6 Paul Bert is a small, modern bistro. Nothing like Bistrot Paul Bert (which serves good steak frites, but is traditional/touristy).

1 Like

Tough on the high end, so many. A budget would help. I really enjoyed L’altelier de Joel Rubuchon and Guy Savoy on the high end. L’Arpege I would have love to have gone but could not get in. Goust was also very good. Le Comptoir du Relais on the lower end was excellent also as was Les Climats which is somewhere in the middle. Had an awful meal at Fish La Boissonnerie.

George

Nice list I agree with almost all of your ratings. Factoring in value I would vive Le 6 Paul Bert *** for lunch and Yam’ Tcha easily three stars, Chef trained at L’Astrance and the tea pairings are amazing (not sure if they are still closed).

Thanks for all the recommendations. Looks like septime for one of the nights. Has anyone been to epicure in the Bristol? It is #1 on trip advisor. As to budget, I am not wealthy, but food is a passion so I want to take advantage of being in Paris. Thus at least one ** or *** place is a must.

Trip Advisor is normally a terrible place for restaurant reviews. Look at www.parisbymouth.com

George

Seconded. And if the Bone Marrow with Lardo Foam is still on the menu order it.
You can skip the cheese plate though.

L’Arpege served some of the most memorable dishes of my life (not all were at the same level - but still can’t complain).

Seems hard to go wrong with Mark’s list.

My most recent trip the highlights were:

Le Cinq Mars
Les Papilles
Mon Viel Ami


If you want some very rustic and traditional french food and sausages (i.e. real traditional Andouille, etc) and some of the best Frites we had in Paris- Go to Les Pipos. Tourists are less common there too.

Robert,
Yam’tcha was a little uneven the night we went; some dishes very good, some underwhelmed. It was our first dinner in Paris after a week in New York and a glutinous few days in London, so it might have been us more than them, but my expectations were very high, maybe too high…? I’m interest in returning to see what she can do in a real kitchen. Wine and tea service were excellent. We went back to Le Chateaubriand largely because of your enthusiastic posts about it. We’d been a couple of times in the past and had a truly lousy meal in 2012, vowing not to return. Our meal in Oct was very good and we’ll go back.

…
In retrospect, I think I underrated Frenchie a little and it should be **+. We’ve gone once or twice a year since it opened and largely went back in Oct because our son joined us for a week and we thought he would like it there. Chef cooked some special dishes for my wife (she doesn’t eat raw) and our dinner was probably the best we’ve eaten there. Considerably better than our dinner in 2013. Much more energetic.

Worth mentioning: Frenchie, Passage 53, Septime, Saturne, David Toutain, Goust and one or two others serve a daily menu decouverte that usually has a course or two of uncooked meat and fish. I love both, but my wife eats neither. Rather than doing a half-assed job with searing or otherwise cooking the raw dishes, each of those restaurants graciously substituted dishes for her that had completely different ingredients, often not on that night’s menu. It didn’t always used to be that way…

Although we didn’t go last October, Akrame is on our list for our trip in the fall. We’ve been several times and like it a lot. A couple of friends went recently on our recommendation and were enthusiastic.

Passage 53 doesn’t get the recognition that it deserves. Consistently our favorite restaurant following L’Arpege. I think the cooking there is more refined than Yam’tcha. Great wine list, too. Shinichi Sato cooked at Astrance and manager/co-owner Guillaume Guedj is a member (I think by his marriage) of the Desnoyer family of butchers/purveyors, which is considered to be the best in Paris. The ingredients at Passage 53 are impeccable. Located in the Passage des Panoramas, which along with the other passages, are cool to explore.

I left Sola off the list because we didn’t get there this year. Great Japanese/French cooking; I think it overperforms for the price. We’ll go back in the fall for sure.

Mon Vieil Ami has the benefit of being open on Sundays and is on Ile St. Louis, which would be convenient as Bill is staying there. The original Berthillon is on Ile St. Louis, too.

I’m not much of a big lunch eater, as we have a substantial dinner out almost every night we are in Paris. But I’ll occasionally eat a very late lunch at Le Comptoir (right at the end of lunch service, because you can generally sit and stay as late as you want) or, much more frequently, at their wine bar next door, L’Avant Comptoir, which is excellent and very fun. Much roomier since they expanded it last year. We live nearby, so I eat there more than any place in the city. My other main lunch go-tos are oysters at any number of places, pho when it gets cold and rainy (lots of great pho in Paris), and Pain des Amis with Bordier demi-sel butter at our apartment. Pain des Amis is baked by Du Pain et Des Idées, located in the 10th by the canal St. Martin and near Republique. My favorite bread in the world and served at many of the restaurants on the list I posted above. Worth the trek.

What an excellent post. If I had the money and time, I’d visit Paris several times a year.

Wouldn’t we all. [cheers.gif]

George

Totally get what you’re saying here. *** is a serious splurge. If that’s the case, go with your best chance to have a mindblowing meal…L’Arpege
.

I second the reco for Astrance. Not too stiff and with inventive and seriously delicious food. Also had a lovely meal at Carre des Feuillants (**) last year, where the Coche is very well priced.
If you are up to a substantial lunch the starred addresses are much better value then.

I have to say that in my next life (and I think my life is pretty darn good), I would like to come back as Mark Kaplan, Robert Dentice, or Jeremy Holmes. You guys do it right. Thanks for posting your insights. They are always a pleasure to read.