Open every day, from twelve to 15pm
and from 18.30pm to 1am. On week-ends and public holidays, open all
day from twelve to 1am. In 1864, l’Alsace set up its first beer pump
in Paris. Frédéric Bofinger established a small restaurant at 5, rue
de la Bastille, which rapidly gained a reputation for the quality of
its sauerkraut. And he served beer on tap – unheard of in Paris. As
was the glass dome ceiling illuminating the main dining room, a
masterpiece by Néret and Royer. It was installed by Albert Bruneau,
Bofinger's son in law who succeeded him in 1906, in association with
Louis Barraud. The revolving door, the bar, the vast winding
staircase, the padded black leather bench seats, the bronze wall
lights, the copper, the ceramics, the mirrors, everything dates from
this period and epitomises the style of an Alsatian brasserie. In
the 1930s, it became the meeting place of the political world, and
more than one government fell to the power of its sauerkraut.
Forsaken for some time, the Bastille quarter has now become
fashionable again and the rush to dine under Bofinger's domed
ceiling continues.
5-7, rue de la Bastille, Paris, 75004
Phone: 33 (0)1 42 72 87 82 Fax: 33 (0)1 42 72 97 68 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for all inclusive Gourmet Menu
FLO BRASSERIES
Métro : Vavin Open every day from
twelve to 1am and on Fridays and Saturdays until 1.30am Breakfast
from 8.30am to 10.30am It may be tucked under a porchway hidden away
in a paved courtyard, but once you have found the Brasserie Flo, you
will never forget it. It was the first brasserie to captivate Jean
Paul Bucher and even today, it still retains the flavour of Alsace,
where the beer always has a good head and the foie gras melts in
your mouth.
102, bd du Montparnasse, Paris, 75014
Phone: 33 (0)1 43 20 14 20 Fax: 33 (0)1 43 35 46 14 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for all inclusive Gourmet Menu
FLO PRINTEMPS
Métro : Havre-Caumartin The restaurant
follows the store's opening hours from 9.35am to 7pm. On Thursdays
until 10pm Tea-room from 3.30pm to 7pm The choice is up to you. You
are right at the top of the Printemps department store. If you
prefer the café, you will be able to marvel at the huge multi-coloured
domed glass ceiling. If you opt for the Brasserie, it is just next
door. Elegance and lightness are the order of the day for this
brasserie which rubs shoulders with the top names in fashion on the
other floors. The domed glass ceiling of the Café Flo is 16 meters
high and comprises 3 185 multi-coloured glass panels. It was
designed in 1923 by the master glassmaker, Brière. The building is
today an official listed building.
64, boulevard Haussmann - Niveau 6 Printemps de la Mode, Paris,
75009
Phone: 33 (0)1 42 82 58 81 Fax: 33 (0)1 45 26 31 24 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for all inclusive Gourmet Menu
JULIEN
Métro : Strasbourg Saint-Denis Open
every day from twelve to 3pm, and from 7pm to 1am Doorman in the
evening When you step through the threshold of Julien, you enter
another world, a bygone age, when women wore hats with veils and men
folding top hats. They still adorn the hat stand. Ravishing beauties
adorn the walls and the waiters, in their black and white apparel,
dodge between the tables. Legend has it that the floral glass roof
in the back dining room at Julien was the work of the father of
Bernard Buffet. Nonsense! Georges Viaud, the Flo Group's heritage
manager is categorical: it is the work of the Guenne Establishment
(Paris) and was created between 1925 and 1930.
16, rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis, Paris, 75010
Phone: 33 (0)1 47 70 12 06 Fax: 33 (0)1 42 47 00 65 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for all inclusive Gourmet Experience
LA COUPOLE
Métro : Vavin Open every day from
twelve to 1am and on Fridays and Saturdays until 1.30am Breakfast
from 8.30am to 10.30am
102 Bd du Montparnasse, Paris, 75014
Phone: 33 (0)1 43 20 14 20 Fax: 33 (0)1 43 35 46 14 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for an all inclusive Gourmet experience
LE BOEUF SUR LE TOIT
Métro : Saint-Philippe du Roule ou
Franklin-D.Roosevelt Open every day from twelve to 3pm, and from 7pm
to 1am. Doorman in the evening Even with their eyes closed, the
regulars could find their way to this restaurant with its famous
black metal sign. Elegance and discretion have always been the
watchwords of the most distinguished of the major brasseries. At the
"Boeuf" people meet for a quick lunch at the bar or to take time out
to savor a seafood platter amongst friends on the mezzanine.
Following many years of coasting on the right bank of the Champs
Elysée with its founder, Louis Moysés at the helm, the Bœuf sur le
Toit finally weighed anchor at 34 rue du Colisée. In the wake of
Cocteau, the entire avant garde arts scene embraced this art-deco
style liner which owes its name to a Brazilian song, "O boi no
telhado". It sports oak wood paneling, engraved mirrors, paintings,
sculptures, photos, an immense mahogany bar, and the marble-covered
entrance houses a vast bank of seafood piled onto crushed ice. For
the 2002 season, the "Bœuf" has given itself a new look: new floral
decor in stoneware pots, immaculate white tablecloths, Limoges
porcelain crockery and silver cutlery. A mere stone's throw from the
most beautiful avenue in the world, its five dining rooms are host
the top names in the world of finance, the arts, politics, fashion
and the media. It is the epitome of the brasserie spirit…. right
bank style!
34 rue du Colisée, Paris, 75008
Phone: 33 (0)1 53 93 65 55 Fax: 33 (0)1 53 96 02 32 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for an all inclusive Gourmet experience
LES GRANDES MARCHES
Métro : Bastille Open every day from
twelve to 1 am. Pressed artichokes and celeries, hazelnut
vinaigrette, crispy crayfish parcels, tartar sauce, supreme of
pike-perch with almonds, New Zealand spinach salad, not forgetting
traditional vol-au-vent, thickly sliced calf's liver with gratin
dauphinois or rum baba with Chantilly cream, the menu at the Grandes
Marches is resolutely modern, whilst retaining a note of tradition.
The bar is situated at the top of the Grandes Marches at the end of
the dining room. A few low tables surrounded by red leather
armchairs, the vast bar from where the incessant activity around the
Bastille, column is the ideal spot to meet and enjoy a glass of
champagne before or after the opera.
6, place de la Bastille, Paris, 75012
Phone: 33 (0)1 43 42 90 32 Fax: 33 (0)1 43 44 80 02 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for an all inclusive Gourmet experience
LE VAUDEVILLE
Métro : Bourse Open every day from
twelve to 3pm, and from 7pm and 1am. Breakfast from 7am to twelve
Lunchtime at the Vaudeville echoes to discussion of news and
business over the dish of the day - the stock exchange and Agence
France Presse are close by. In the evening, the conversation turns
to the theatre and entertainment, accompanied by a seafood platter.
The theatres may have closed for the night but the last curtain to
go down is at the Vaudeville. On the corner of the rue Vivienne and
the rue de la Bourse, the Vaudeville was originally the bar of the
theatre of the same name which in 1852 saw the triumph of the Dame
aux Camélias by the younger Dumas. The construction of the rue du
Quatre Septembre was fatal to the stage but the bar survived and
became the meeting place for brokers from the stock exchange over
the road, for coachmen and cabmen, then for taxi drivers. The
Vaudeville is one of the few remaining great Parisian brasseries
decorated in the 1930s by the Solvet brothers, the others being the
Coupole and the Closerie des Lilas. The year is 1926: the Art deco
style reigns: wood incrusted, warm-toned marble covering the walls,
engraved glass, flamboyant lights, the domed ceiling, the intricate
ironwork, the moldings and furniture – Art Deco is all around.
Except on the terrace, which when the sun shines, brings a little
Vaudeville to the stock exchange. The actress Réjane, who played at
the Vaudeville theatre at the beginning of the 20th century, used to
park her cab on the Stock exchange square. It was drawn by two mules
that had been given to her by Manuel II, the last king of Portugal.
29 rue de Vivienne, Paris, 75002
Phone: 33 (0)1 40 20 04 62 Fax: 33 (0)1 49 27 08 78 *Special Offer:
Voucher availlable for an all inclusive Gourmet experience
TERMINUS NORD
Métro : Gare du Nord Open every day
from 11am to 1 am. Breakfast from 8am to 11am «Happy birthday to
you…» - the light is suddenly dimmed and the waiters gather around
the cake, complete with birthday candles, to sing the customary
refrain to the guest of honor on his birthday. This is a commonplace
scene at the Terminus where the patrons and the staff have always
joined forces to play out the part. "Paris Gare du Nord, terminus !"
Travelers from London, Brussels, Amsterdam have only to cross the
road to partake of some refreshment. With its mahogany bar, the
copper and the mirrors, its seafood and its bouillabaisse, ladies
and gentlemen, the Terminus Nord invites you to enter Paris via the
gourmet gate, the brasserie gate. And to think that it never closes,
the incessant service never seems to stop. A mixture of art nouveau
and art deco, this great café, once the property of the Northern
Railway Company, has always lived according to the rhythm of the
railway and the arrival of the Eurostar has only served to heighten
this link. Businessmen on the way to the London, European parliament
members returning from Brussels, families arriving from the country
or from abroad, all paths meet at the Terminus Nord, the most lively
of all the great brasseries. At the end of the main dining room, up
a few steps and you are out of the buzz and into the Belle Epoque
salon, a little gem from the 1900s, with its frescoes, its mirrors
and its glass panels. It can be reserved for a party of up to 15.
23 Rue de Dunkerque, Paris, 75010
Phone: 33 (0)1 42 85 05 15 Fax: 33 (0)1 40 16 13 98 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for an all inclusive Gourmet experience
BRASSERIE BALZAR
Métro : Odéon Open every day from 8am
to midnight. The Balzar has always been a place where you eat,
debate and set the world to rights. It still is a place for
professors, students, writers and publishers, intellectuals and
artists to meet to enjoy the immutable decor and unaltered fare. The
establishment owes its origins to the fun-loving, red-bearded Amédée
Balzar, who left his native Picardy in 1890 to serve beer on tap to
the students in the rue des Ecoles, the university area of Paris.
University professors and students have always been united at the
dinner table! On the left as you leave the Sorbonne, the tavern
became a brasserie in 1931 under the direction of the reputed Cazes
family Balzar who ran Chez Lipp on the boulevard Saint-Germain.
Marcelin Cazes wanted the Balzar to be a second Lipp and
commissioned the same architect, M. Madeline to design the interior.
The sober wood panelling, the vast mirrors on each wall, the
moleskin banquettes, the bistro chairs, the green and white tiling,
ceramic vases and clock - no, the art deco atmosphere has not
changed and calves' liver and Fontainebleau cheese are still to be
found on the engraved marble menu. Paris, 1947. Western Europe
threatened by a soviet invasion. Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre
are lunching at the Balzar. - What will you do if the soviets
attack? asks Sartre. - I'll join the resistance. Like Malraux. What
about you? - I will not shoot against the proletariat replied
Sartre. History has not recorded what they were eating..
49, Rue des Ecoles, Paris, 75005
Phone: 33 (0)1 43 54 13 67 Fax: 33 (0)1 44 07 14 91 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for an all inclusive Gourmet experience
LES BEAUX ARTS
Métro : Esquirol Open every day from
twelve to 14.30pm, and from 7pm to 1am. In Toulouse, the famous
"rose-coloured city", where the atmosphere is always young and
lively, restaurants abound, but the Beaux-Arts is a unique place
where all generations and all types of professions mingle and share
a joie de vivre and a love of culinary delights. Gone are the days
when carriages and coaches crossed the Pont-Neuf, but the reputed
Café Bellevue on the banks of the river Garonne has never completely
disappeared. For many years the main meeting place for students of
the nearby School of Fine Arts, the café had the pleasure of the
company of Ingres and Matisse. It was saved from abandon by the Flo
group in 1987, and, in an entirely restored Belle Epoque decor, it
was re-baptised the Brasserie des Beaux-Arts. When the sun sets over
the river and people out for a stroll take a break in this brasserie
which is home to rugbymen, university students and aeronautical
employees, it is like a little breath of Paris in Toulouse. It took
seven years of seeking out the top quality products and advice from
the best sources before Jean-Paul Bucher put cassoulet, the local
delicacy, on the menu of the Beaux-Arts. Today's cassoulet is in
every way equal to its competitors. It contains haricot beans from
Tarbes, preserved duck, lamb, pork rind and real Toulouse sausages,
cooked "au gratin" in the oven.
1, Quai de la Daurade, Toulouse, 31000
Phone: 33 (0)5 61 21 12 12 Fax: 33 (0)5 61 21 14 80 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for an all inclusive Gourmet experience
L'EXELSIOR
Open every day from 8am to 00.30am and
on Sundays from 8am to 11pm. Breakfast from 8am to 11.30am,
afternoon tea from 3pm to 6.30pm Excelsior stands for excellence.
Excellence was in the minds of brewers from Vézelise who founded the
Excelsior in 1911, calling upon the greatest talents of the Nancy
school. The Flo group, now at the helm, remains true to this
heritage. Mme Janine Grise, a native of Vesoul was living peacefully
in retirement at Fréjus, in the company of her Majorelle piano. But
she wanted her piano to be seen in an appropriate period setting, so
she put pen to paper, proposing the piano to various institutions in
Nancy, including the Excelsior. Roger Mallarmé, the Manager at the
time, was the first to reply. Today, Janine Grise's piano is at home
in the Excelsior's Majorelle salon.
50, rue Henri-Poincaré, Nancy, 54000
Phone: 33 (0)3 83 35 24 57 Fax: 33 (0)3 83 35 18 48 *Special Offer:
Voucher available for an all inclusive Gourmet experience
