For JM:
I'm sorry I won't be much help on specific places to eat, b/c we generaly just wandered until we found a place that had whatever we were craving and I never really noted the names of places. But I can say this -- the location of the Madison cannot be beat. It is steps away from anything, we hardly needed to use the metro (we did only for Pere Lachaise and the Eiffel). If you walk across Saint Germain towards the Serine and deeper into the latin quarter, there are streets and alleys full of restaurants. And we arrived Easter Sunday (Monday is a holiday there, too) and did not have any problems finding places that were open.
So, sorry, no specific pointers, but I do indeed hope you enjoy your trip.

We are booked at the Madison for 3 nights the first of June. When I saw this thread, I emailed them and they immediately replied saying all the construction was completed in February and they are concerned about "rumors" that work is still on-going.
This is from Stephanie at the Madison.
Thanks!

HI--sorry to have to say this but Stephanie did not tell you the truth. We were staying at a hotel farther down Blvd St Germain in the middle of March and we went into the Madison to get some info about the hotel. They were very much in the middle of a project of some kind of construction--in the lobby area at least--and there were very strong paint type odors emanting as well. I bring this up only b/c I wonder why she was not being truthful about when the project was finished. Judging from the state where it was in mid March, it is hard to imagine it being done much before closer to April than February.

One of my Paris friends visited the Madison a few days back and reported that the renovations appeared to be completed and that everything looks very nice. He thought the hotel looked warm and welcoming and that the staff responded well to his questions. The guy is an architect, by the way, and so I trust his judgement about the renovations.

If you want a good meal at a good price, all you have to do is walk a few doors to the left from the Madison and into Vesuvius. It's a good every-day Italian place with great pasta and pizza, but they also do excellent "regular" French meals; the daily specials are usually a particularly good buy. It's a very relaxed kind of place, popular with university students.

Just down the street on your right is a Léon de Bruxelles, a good place to go for moules frites. Also close to the hotel--on the same side of the street--are a Thai and Chinese restaurant. Diagonally across the street is yet another restaurant; we've visited it only for the Berthillon ice cream and so can't report on the food, but it smelled wonderful.

Thank you, Underhill, for your tips. I'm now once again looking quite forward to our 3 day stay at the Madison in July.

Hi,

Just got back from Paris so am pretty jetlagged. I checked in on the Madison while I was there - the lobby area looked fine, very nice, and no signs of construction. They even showed me two rooms - both overlooking the boulevard on the 5th floor. One had a double bed and was very nice, the other had twin beds and was slightly larger. Both had tiled bathrooms (not huge but nice). They were very polite and also told me that construction work was finished. It is in a wonderful location and I would definitely stay there - just get a room overlooking the boulevard.

Tripadvisor.com has a new, positive recommendation for the Madison. Sounds as though things are looking up.