dhoffman14

There are thousands of places to eat in Paris so I was going to put this out to Fodorites. My wife doesn't eat red meat but is OK with chicken and seafood. So if you had a favorite place or two to eat in Paris what would that be? I have reviewed La Petite Chaise and I see there is new place called Hugo and Company on re Monge. Of course there are many 'ethnic' dining choices. I also have found a website that allows you to dine with a local 'chef' that prepares a dinner or lunch for 10 to 12 people in their homes.
I appreciate your taking the time to review this post and thank you ahead of time for any response.

Underhill

Mine would be Au Petit Marguery, in the 13th. It's a fine old establishment with excellent food and service. If the sautéed mushrooms with garlic are on the menu, go for it!

StuDudley

Where will you be staying in Paris. It would not make any sence to recommend someplace that is 2+ metro trips from your hotel/Apt.


We're heading out tomorrow and staying in the 7th near the Eiffel tower for 3 weeks. Below is the restaurants we have reservations of. We have dinners at restaurants - not lunches. We like to mix Michelin 1 star restaurants with local spots & historic old brasseries. A few restaurants are in the 16th or 17th or 7th - where we can get to on one bus ride. The days that have no names are days when we cook our our meals at the Apt we've rented.



15 Sat XX Divellec* Confirmed 7:30 seafood
16 Sun
17 Mon Pottoka confirmed 7:30
18 Tues
19 Wed XX Garance* Confirmed 8:00
20 Th
21 Fri XXX Le Pergolese* menu similar to Simonin Confirmed 7:30
22 Sat Prunier seafood Confirmed 7:30
23 Sun
24 Mon Zimmer confirmed 7:30
26 Wed XXX Antoine* Seafood Confirmed 7:30
27 Thurs
28 Fri Philippe Excoffier confirmed 7:00
29 Sat XX Comis* Confirmed online 7:30 re-confirm via e-mail 24-36 hrs in advance
30 Sun

1 Mon Arnaud Nicolas Confirmed 7:30
2. Tues
3 Wed XX Frederic Simonin* menu similar to Pergolese Reserved by phone 8:00
4 Thurs
5 Fri Bouillon Racine Confirmed 7:30
6 Sat X Pertinence* confirmed 7:30
7 Sun Flight home


Stu Dudley

AJPeabody

My trip report from Paris a year ago has a list of the restaurants I researched prior to the trip, with reviews of those we used. Feel free to plagiarize. Their menus are usually on line, so you can find out those that will suit your tastes. We stayed in the 5th, so most are in that vicinity.

The Peabody Papers: Paris 2017

StuDudley

Here is something I posted after our 2015 two-week trip to Paris.


We were in Paris for 2 weeks in October 2015, and decided to dine at several "Historic" brasseries. We used the book "Brasseries of Paris" as our guide to finding these places.
We've dined at several of them in the past couple of years also. In addition, we dined "locally" at some "old favorite" non-brasseries (we stayed in the western 7th at the corner of Rue St Dominique and Ave de la Bourdonnais) plus a few restaurants that looked interesting based on descriptions in the Michelin Red Guide and in France Today magazine. Most of these places are within walking distance of our apt, or a short bus ride away for dinner (we don't use the metro). We dined at 3 brasseries that required multiple buses to get there - so we had lunch at the brasserie instead. I think this visit was about our 16th & 17th week in Paris. We visit France for about 2 months almost every year.

Below is how we "judged" them - based on food choice and quality (according to "our" tastes), and atmosphere. Ratings are on a scale of 1 to 20. HB designates that the restaurant is an Historic Brasserie. * indicates that it is a Michelin 1 star restaurant.

Restaurant Food Atmosphere
Bistro Balhara ...................................10..........9
le Violon d'Ingres* (many visits).......14........13
Fables de la Fontaine* (many visits)..12........11
Brasserie Gallopin HB........................14.......14
Les Climates* ....................................16........17
Mollard HB (2 visits)..........................11.......17
Grande Cafe HB.................................10.......15
Montparnasse 1900 HB.......................7........14
Julien HB (2 visits).............................10.......16
Citrus Etoile........................................12.. .....14
Fermette Marbeuf HB (2 visits).........14.......16

From last year
Le Dome HB (2 visits)........................15.......14
Train Bleu HB (many visits)...............14.......20

We had lunches at Brasserie Gallopin, Julien, and Grande Cafe.


Stu Dudley

kerouac

I agree that there is absolutely no reason to cross the city to find a place to eat without red meat. Even the steakhouse chains like Hippopotamus or Buffalo Grill have plenty of options without red meat (just as the seafood chains like Léon de Bruxelles offer steak and chicken). I know that StuDudley is trying to be helpful, but often his lists of places make my head spin. I don't consider it to be a vacation if one has to do so much research.

The question is -- are you "foodies" or not? I you do not require gastronomic meals, there is absolutely nothing more to do than to follow your nose (and eyes) in the streets of Paris. That's what I still do, and I have lived here for 45 years. There is not a single restaurant that I would qualify as "my favourite restaurant in Paris." At most, there are a few Chinese or Indian places to which I return regularly.

StuDudley

>>are you "foodies" or not?<<


How about you, kerouac?? I'm certainly a foodie!!! And I think many others plan their dinners in France in advance also (perhaps the majority??) I think that's what the OP is doing with this post.



I certainly would not "wander around" and try to find a place to dine that night. I've seen too many "complet" signs on the door when we walked into a restaurant that we had reserved days or weeks before.



Stu Dudley

kerouac

Oh, I feel realty sorry for obsessive foodies. My restaurant dinners are around 19:00-19:30, so I rarely have to worry about reservations. Actually, I never have to worry about such things personally, because I can eat anything and can change at the last minute from an Italian restaurant to a Chinese deli without any problem. I do understand that this is traumatic experience for a lot of people, but it's not my problem. With certain friends, reservations are indeed made, but guess what -- for some reason these are almost never the best meals. In fact on Sunday I had dinner with friends from South Africa who reserved a place, and the food was totally mediocre. Luckily, they absolutely loved it, and I didn't care...

AJPeabody

The imperatives of life: Breath. Drink. Eat. Reproduce.

Three out of four can be pathological. But foodie is better than obesity.

RJD

What suggest is tihat you goggle john talbott and specifically his 7th arronmisment reviews.
They are current apt and worth the time.

AJPeabody

John Talbott's Paris

dhoffman14

We will be staying in the Latin Quarter - Hotel des 3 Colleges on Rue Cujas next to the Sorbonne. Interesting point about not more than 2 metro stops.

timeforver

You can also dinning in the restuarant in the Eifeltower

thibaut

'How about you, kerouac?? I'm certainly a foodie!!! And I think many others plan their dinners in France in advance also (perhaps the majority??) I think that's what the OP is doing with this post. '

so called Foodie are interesting people. However I looked up the list you mentioned and have been only to 2 of those (Marbeuf and train bleu) and would rate them about 10 max.
I consider a quality price ratio actually and maybe 10 is even too much for those. So I guess I don't belong to the majority of people planning their meals in Paris nor anywhere else. When I'm on holiday, food is not an obsession, I have 'better' things to do with my time. However living in France I can plan excellent meals close to home and not cram one during (expensive) travel.

On top of it European tastes differ from US ones (you yourself wrote that you never had meat that was as good as in the US - a comment that I find ridiculous and make it impossible for me to call you a 'foodie'), so I'd recommend to just look at TripAdvisor, go for restaurants where a lot of english comments have been added and that is it.

(Actually I have also read here when saying Bouillon racine was great for tourists but no local actually enjoys it somebody asnwered that it was thus perfect...so why bother giving a recommendation).

And have a great coffe at a Starbucks ;-)

kerouac

Oh, I will never quarrel with people who like those places. It is just unlikely that I will ever run into them at mealtime, even though I have eaten at four of the places on the list (this is assuming that when Stu writes 'Grande Café' he actually means 'Grand Café.'). However, all of that Parisian charm costs a fortune to keep up the décor, and the only solution for that is to jack up the prices as much as possible. That's fine if people want to pay for it.

However, the real Parisian foodies that I have known have absolutely never taken me to such establishments -- their real finds are restaurants that don't look like much but which make absolutely spectacular meals for reasonable prices. When I've been to places like the Train Bleu, the company was always paying, which is the case of most of the French customers in places like that. ("Oh, we didn't hear anybody speaking English -- all of the customers were French." -- that is certainly something that I have often read in these threads as though it were a gauge of quality.) I think a lot of people forget that there are hundreds of thousands of French tourists and business people in Paris, too, and they are just as clueless as to where to have dinner as foreign visitors -- so they follow the guidebooks and the forums, too. So be it.

StuDudley

thibaut


The OP asked for restaurant recommendations. I provided a list of restaurants we plan to visit in the next 3 weeks, and also those we visited 3 years ago - with both a food and ambience rating (same as Michelin & Gault Millau). You did not provide any restaurant recommendations - but proceeded to criticize some of mine and perhaps also the approach I use when selecting restaurants.



Which of us provided the OP with the most useful information about specific restaurants??


Stu Dudley

kerouac

I think that I am. What use is a list of restaurants from 3 years ago and another list of places you have not yet visited on this trip? As a regular visitor, I am sure you know how quickly things can change. But everybody here also knows how you love to copy and paste lists whenever possible. We will all make use of them as we see fit. Perhaps you can invite the OP to join you for certain meals.

TDudette

Following a recco from Nikki and AGM, I ate twice at La Cerisae. Wonderful. You need a reservation:

https://www.restaurantlacerisaie.com/

Please report back!

StuDudley

I don't think the restaurants from 3 years ago have changed chefs - and least the non-historic brasserie ones. So I assume they are still the same. All the non-brasserie ones are still listed in the Michelin guide - except for Citrus Etoile (one of my lower rated ones, however). I am sure Christian Constant is still at le Violon d'Ingres.


Neither Underhill nor TDudette specified when they last dined there, and PJs were a year ago. Only 4 of us provided any first hand recommendations & only 2 of us "dated" these recommendations. Too bad there are not more first-hand recommendations.



Stu Dudley

kerouac

Oh Stu, are you texting from a restaurant? (It is 19:45 in Paris.) That's bad form!