The top 10 Best restaurants in Paris

Paris is home to some of the greatest restaurants in the world. The greatest of the best are chosen by food writer Alexander Lobrano, who places a galaxy of Michelin stars between them. Best restaurants in Paris

1. Le Meurice

The opulent dining room at the Hotel Meurice in the center of the city is the best place to go for a grand-slam taste of French culinary splendor. The magnificent space is animated by old-school but friendly service that’s as precise as a minuette, even though Philippe Starck redecorated it several years ago, but its good French bones survived intact – mosaic floor, crystal chandeliers, heavy damask curtains at the windows overlooking the Tuileries Gardens across the street. In 2007, Chef Yannick Alléno was awarded a third Michelin star. His incredibly creative cooking is grounded in a profound understanding of classic Escoffier antique culinary techniques. Along with more recent innovations like spit-roasted red wine-marinated pigeon with red cabbage and apple juice, crispy green ravioli with a fricassee of snails and wild garlic, and a starter. Best restaurants in Paris

2. L’Astrance

A meal at one of these nec plus ultra tables is an investment that just cannot fail, and securing a sought-after table at chef Pascal Barbot’s three-star restaurant on a cobblestone side street in the 16th arrondissement is well worth persistence, even with the dizzyingly high prices of Paris haute cuisine. This high-ceilinged dining room, featuring mirrored walls, widely spaced tables, and pleasant service, offers a very 21st-century perspective on French haute cuisine. Formerly the chef to the admiral of the French Pacific fleet, Barbot trained under Alain Passard and has a deep love for fresh herbs, vegetables, and fruit. His signature dishes, like his turbot with baby spinach and sea urchins or his galette of finely sliced button mushrooms and verjus marinated foie gras dressed with hazelnut oil, are examples of his inventive and brilliantly witty cooking style. Best restaurants in Paris

3 Huitrerie Regis

Nestled in the center of Saint Germain des Pres, this little, white-façaded shopfront table is the greatest spot in town for perfectly fresh oysters, delivered straight from the Atlantic coast of France’s Marennes-Oléron area. Your plateau de fruits de mer, served with bread and butter, can also include prawns, clams, and sea urchins, depending on what’s in season. The bivalve-focused cuisine is complemented by a good range of predominantly Loire valley white wines, and the lively conversation between the many local regulars and the joyful oyster shuckers creates a welcoming atmosphere. Best restaurants in Paris

4. Macéo

With oxblood walls, wedding cake mouldings, and parquet flooring, this elegant restaurant overlooks the Palais Royal in the center of Paris and is run by Englishman Mark Williamson, whose Willi’s Wine Bar is a favorite local bolthole for oenophiles in Paris. In addition to having a large selection of vegetarian meals, Chef Thierry Bourbonnais also offers tasting menus that are periodically rotated and center around a certain vegetable, such asparagus or tomatoes. His global approach is showcased in dishes like mange toute on a bed of cumin-scented bulghur and scallops marinated in sea weed oil on a bed of quinoa and wild sea bass with baby carrots. Outstanding selection of wines.

5. Spring

Chef Daniel Rose, who was born in Chicago, relocated to a refurbished 17th-century home in Les Halles in July 2010 from the 9th arrondissement. Since then, he has been entertaining crowded houses with his creative cuisine du marche menu. Parisians have been drooling over dishes like grilled New Caledonian prawns on a bed of shaved baby fennel and Basque country fish with avocado and coriander blossoms, as this skilled American demonstrates just how diverse the city’s culinary talent pool has grown. If you want to sample Rose’s offerings without having to deal with making reservations for a table upstairs, a decent option is the wine bar Buvette, which is located in the basement and offers a variety of charcuterie, cheese, and plats du jour. Best restaurants in Paris

6. Les Tablettes

Chef Jean-Louis Nomicos’s new table in the posh 16th arrondissement signals a return to the serious, dressed-up restaurant in Paris, which had lost out to the bistro as a platform for young chefs striking out on their own. The dramatic modern basket-weave interior designed by French interior designer Anne-Cécile Comar includes an apricot velvet-upholstered dog’s leg banquette. Nomicos is originally from Marseille and trained under Alain Ducasse. His excellent contemporary French cooking has a Provencal accent, as evidenced by dishes like squid and artichokes barigoule (cooked with white wine, lemon, and herbs) and veal sweetbreads with a confetti of lemon pulp, which are excellent examples of his style. Most recently, Nomicos cooked at the venerable society restaurant Lasserre.

7. Le Stella

To enjoy a fine meal of well-prepared French classics like onion soup, escargots, sole meunière, steak tartare, roast lamb, and other Gallic standards, head to one of the few independent brasseries in Paris, located in a quiet corner of the silk-stocking 16th arrondissement. The majority of the city’s storied brasseries are now owned by corporate chains and serve wiltingly mediocre food. The people-watching here could be named “the discreet charm of the bourgeoisie”; the venue has true character, or du gueule, as the French term it, and the service is competent.

8. Thoumieux

Chef Jean-Francois Piège, who was previously head chef at the opulent Les Ambassadeurs at the Hotel de Crillon, struck out on his own two years ago when he reopened Thoumieux, a venerable Left Bank bistro renowned for its cassoulet and enormous resident cat. Though much hype was generated by the new menu and sleek Manhattan supper club décor at this address, the true brilliance of this gastronomically astute young chef was not evident until last autumn, when he opened an intimate first-floor restaurant at the same address, decorated in a Las Vegas-style rat-pack style by Parisian interior designer India Mahdavi. Having worked in many Alain Ducasse kitchens, Piège was astute enough to see that the typical French restaurant experience needed to be adjusted. After all, these days, patrons go out to have fun rather than adhere to structured formality, still receive a starter course, a cheese course, and a dessert.

9. Yam’Tcha

One of the few female chefs in Paris, Adeline Grattard, is a young Burgundian who trained under chef Pascal Barbot at the three-star L’Astrance. She spent some time in Hong Kong where she fell in love with Asian ingredients and cooking methods and met her husband, Chiwah, a tea steward (you can order a different tea with each course of your meal here instead of wine). Located close to Les Halles, their quaint little eatery boasts old stone walls and a beamed ceiling. Grattard’s tasting menus are constantly changing based on what she has to buy every day, but highlights like her grilled scallops served over bean sprouts with a vibrant green wild garlic sauce and her amazing dessert of homemade ginger ice cream paired with avocado slices and passion fruit showcase her refined culinary skills and inventiveness, which earned her a Michelin star.

10. Ze Kitchen Galerie

Styled like the surrounding art galleries on this side street in Saint Germain des Pres, this white, loft-like room with parquet flooring is filled with modern art and steel tables and chairs. The well-liked eatery of chef William Ledeuil provides a fascinating taste of modern French cuisine. Trained by Guy Savoy, Ledeuil is fascinated by Asia and creates inventive dishes such as grilled monkfish with an aubergine marmelade and Thai-seasoned sauce vierge, or Sardinian malloreddus pasta.