Le Bistrot Paul Bert © Karl Blackwell
50 best restaurants in Paris
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By Rosa Jackson, editor of the 'Time Out Guide to Eating & Drinking in Paris'
Updated: Tue Mar 24 2009 -
The Euro exchange rate might have taken some of the lustre off a gastronomic jaunt across the Channel, but that hasn't affected the spectacular food in the French capital. Here's our guide to the best restaurants, bistros, brasseries and cafés in Paris
Latin Quarter | The Marais and eastern Paris | St Germain and Montparnasse Tuilleries and Opéra | Pigalle and Montmartre | Champs-Elysées
Latin Quarter, the Islands and 13th
Atelier Maître Albert
This classy Guy Savoy offshoot with an outsized fireplace specialises in spit-roasted meats. Start with one of the soups for which the chef is famous, perhaps artichoke with spiced bread and wild mushrooms. Lunch is a relative bargain.
Atelier Maître Albert, 1 rue Maître Albert, 5th (+33 1 56 81 30 01/www.ateliermaitrealbert.com). Métro Maubert Mutualité. Meal for two with wine and service: around €140.
L’Avant Goût
CLASSIC BISTRO
Christophe Beaufront’s cheerful red-and-yellow bistro provides the perfect excuse to see the villagey Butte-aux-Cailles neighbourhood (or vice versa). A classic dish is the updated pot-au-feu de cochon – various cuts of pork served with sweet potatoes, fennel and a glass of spiced broth. At lunch, you can have a soup, plat du jour, glass of wine and coffee for €14.
L’Avant Goût, 26 rue Bobillot, 13th (+33 1 53 80 24 00/www.lavantgout.com) Métro Place d’Italie. Meal for two with wine and service: around €80.
Le Buisson Ardent
The painted glass panels dating from 1925 would be reason enough to visit this bistro, but the kitchen also makes a big effort with inventive dishes such as scallops from Erquy with a lime-coriander emulsion and roasted sweet potatoes, and mango tarte tatin with lemon froth.
Le Buisson Ardent, 25 rue Jussieu, 5th (+33 1 43 54 93 02/wwww.lebuissonardent.fr). Métro Jussieu. Meal for two with wine and service: around €85. Feature continuesAdvertisementMon Vieil Ami
Renowned Alsatian chef Antoine Westermann gives vegetables star status at his Ile St-Louis bistro. Under his protégé Frédéric Crochet, the kitchen turns out sophisticated bistro fare that borrows from French regions and abroad, as in Tarbais beans with preserved lemon and fresh coriander with crisp shoulder of lamb.
Mon Vieil Ami, 69 rue St-Louis en l’Ile, 4th (+33 1 40 46 01 35/www.mon-vieil-ami.com). Métro Pont Marie. Meal for two with wine and service: around €110.
Les Papilles Les Papilles
It looks like a long, narrow wine shop with some tables and a bar, but Les Papilles is home to a chef with haute cuisine credentials. Go for the four-course menu, which brings sophisticated bistro cooking served family style in cast-iron and copper pots, and choose your wine straight off the shelves for a €7 corkage charge.
Les Papilles, 30 rue Gay Lussac, 5th (+33 1 43 25 20 79/www.lespapillesparis.fr). Métro Luxembourg. Meal for two with wine and service: around €80.
Le Pré Verre
It’s rare to find a French chef who successfully incorporates Asian spices into bistro classics. Philippe Delacourcelle sets the standard here with dishes such as his trademark suckling pig with spices, making the restaurant so popular with visiting Japanese that he also has a branch in Tokyo.
Le Pré Verre, 8 rue Thénard, 5th (+33 1 43 54 59 47/www.lepreverre.com). Métro Maubert-Mutualité. Meal for two with wine and service: around €80.
Ribouldingue
Owner Nadège Varigny has a fondness for offal, from pig’s snout to lamb’s testicles, which is shared by many of the regulars here. If fried slices of cow’s udder make you shudder, you’ll also find more conventional dishes on the very affordable menu.
Ribouldingue, 10 rue St-Julien le Pauvre, 5th (+33 1 46 33 98 80). Métro Saint-Michel. Meal for two with wine and service: around €75.
Find more restaurants in Paris
Latin Quarter | The Marais and eastern Paris | St Germain and Montparnasse Tuilleries and Opéra | Pigalle and Montmartre | Champs-Elysées
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11 comments
Stay away from Restaurant Du Palais Royal..The wife had a very nasty dose of food poisoning after eating the lobster rissoto with squid ink..
I had the most amazing meal at le Buisson Ardent last year. I actually went 2 nights in a row. I'm heading back to Paris in the morning and I will be making another reservation for this trip! I'm a complete foodie and I recommend them completely!
I have been to Rose's for breakfast and frankly, I think for someone who lives in London or the UK, it's a lot of hype. You can get equally lovely cakes and puddings in London. They are a hit in Paris because they seem exotic over there. The long ques and the attitude (at the Marais outlet) detracted from the experience greatly but having lived in Paris (and loving the city) I could have overlooked that. However, the menu was underwhelming.
Also adored Ambassade d'Auvergne but the BEST was lunch at Lasserre with the roof opened to a beautiful afternoon. Stupendous food, service was formal but not stuffy at all. A precious memory of Paris.
We took TimeOut's advice and recently dined at L'Ardoise. I have been to Paris a number of times and this goes down as the worst night ever in my favorite city. Thankfully the food was excellent. Our food was crammed down our throats by two waitresses who were working the whole room. They should have been flipping pancakes in a greasy American spoon. To top it off they were rude. I have had few experiences with service like this in Paris but have to say that it is these kinds of experiences that turn off tourists to France. $200 euros later we went the next night to a wonderful restaurant around the corner...MUCH MORE WORTH IT VIN CHAI MOI...TOP NOTCH FOOD, CLASSIC FRENCH, CLASSIC SURFACE. NO BUSH LEAGUE WAIT STAFF HERE
The service at Julien is absolutely terrible. We had a reservation for 10pm. It took till 1030pm to be seated, 1050pm to be given a menu, and 1130pm to be served our first course. The bill came 20 mins after requesting it. Food was ok, not spectacular.
my favourite eating experience in Paris, (my dining there ocurred mainly in the 1-6 aronds) was L'Ambasade D'Auvergne on Rue de Grenier St Lazare (close to Pompidou Centre). Been there twice now and superb ech time
C.Elder... you can't be serious. Food in London as good as in Paris. Impossible.
I have dined at several restaurants in Paris and have found that Chez Pierre Gagnaire, 6 Rue Balzac, is by far the BEST restaurant in Paris. If you are looking for true elegance, Pierre Gagnaire is your best option. Although the cheapest entree item on the menu is 160 Euro, ranging up to 420 Euro, it has been rated the 3rd best restaurant IN THE WORLD for several years.
This all seems ridiculously expensive.€60 for a salad at granterroirs!!!That's £55+ for a salad!!!!€130 for 3 course meal,that's £120!!!!The credit crunch will kill off these pretentious over priced places.
Otherwise,stay in London and get food just as good without these insane prices.
Hello and thank you for your review. Please note however that racines is spelled with an S like roots: racines.
Happy new year to everybody