Racines
The picturesque Passage des Panoramas is home to this cozy Italian-accented spot with a short, simple menu and natural wine list.
Contraste
Two chefs - one captivated by the sea, the other by land - unite at this contemporary, creative restaurant in the ritzy 8th arrondissement.
Adar
Adar offers Mediterranean-inspired fare from chef Tamir Nahmias in the picturesque Passage des Panoramas.
Augustin Marchand d’Vins
Announcing the name of this calm, intimate Left Bank natural wine spot is a glaring red neon sign, of the sort one sees in speakeasies and sex shops. In reality, Augustin Marchand d’Vins – like Left Bank predecessors La Crêmerie & La Quincave - is a bare-bones cave-à-manger, a wine shop in which one can dine, slightly.
Pastore
With its thick wine list and selection of note-perfect pastas and subtle insalati, Pastore is everything contemporary Italian cuisine should be.
Le Colvert
This pretty new bistro is a fine option for tourists in Saint-Germain, but not worth crossing town for.
Carbón
Forget Carbón's wood-fired concept and enjoy it for what it is: ambitious small plates.
Ten Belles – Rive Gauche
Ten Belles' new Left Bank outposts offers some of the charm and all of the flavor of the original.
Le Maquis
Montmartre’s Restaurant Le Maquis – better known simply as Le Maquis – is among the latest haute-bistrot offshoots from the lineage of Inaki Aizpitarte’s influential, innovative institution Le Châteaubriand.
À La Vierge de la Réunion
The overarching honesty and generosity of La Vierge’s concept places the restaurant alongside overachieving peers like Belleville’s Le Cadoret at the vanguard of a new generation of Paris bistrot that recognizes the value of virtue.
Empire Celeste
The best way to understand the underground appeal of Empire Celeste is by comparing it to another well-known Parisian Chinese restaurant, Davé. Offering run-of-the-mill Chinese cuisine in a cramped, kitchy red interior, Davé is notoriously popular with the fashion set. Its walls are festooned with images of the proprietor arm-in-arm with Yves Saint-Laurent, Mick Jagger, and Kim Kardashian. Empire Celeste, run by three generations of the Wang family since the restaurant’s founding in 1953, is the Davé of another peculiar subculture: the natural wine crowd.
Le Cadoret
Nestled on a drab Belleville backstreet beneath the Parc des Buttes Chaumont, Le Cadoret’s blue awning shines out like a beacon. So does chef Léa Fleuriot’s delicate, thoughtful approach to country-bistrot classics. A sleeper hit since Fleuriot and her brother Louis opened it in 2017, Le Cadoret is a bistrot and café where an ostensibly straightforward offering - traditional recipes, inexpensive natural wines, craft beers - achieves the sublime thanks to rare combination of sincere and efficient service, serious value, and an ironclad commitment to ingredient quality.
Cheval d’Or
Disregard what is written on the window of Cheval d’Or’s elegantly-preserved red façade, for what restaurateur Florent Ciccoli (of Jones and Café du Coin, among other endeavors) and chef Taku Sekine (of Dersou) have created on a quiet side street near the Parc des Buttes Chaumont is not a Chinese restaurant. Cheval d’Or is, rather, a tasteful and welcoming luxury small-plates restaurant offering a delicate synthesis of pan-Asian and Parisian cuisines, more middle ground than Middle Kingdom.
