Places to eat in Paris (lunch/teatime/dinner)

Instead of talking about far away places out of my comfort zone, I am going to talk to you about my hometown: Beautiful Paris. So ok, I left Paris when I was 18 but 4 years on I still love it. I am now back in the city of romance and I thought I would share some of my favorite places.

There is one thing I really missed from France and it is the restaurants, the café sitting outside on a nice terrace. It’s cliché, I’ll give you that. But it’s a  fact. Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE a good pub lunch. Be sure to find me on a Sunday curl up next to the fireplace of some nice public house somewhere in London. 

However I think I enjoy even more a French restaurant dinner, then walking through the streets of Paris at night, it’s got something magical.

 Enough with the cheap poetry and let’s get down to business.

Fillet d’entrecote avec sa fameuse sauce, pommes alumettes et sa salade aux noix / Rib eye with its famous sauce, French fries and walnut salad – Le Relais de l’Entrecote
20, rue Saint-Benoît, 6^th Arrondissement Métro: St Germain des Prés (They have several locations but this is without a doubt my favorite.)

The first thing I eat every time I go back to Paris is a good Entrecote-frites (rib eye with French fries) and it had to be very very rare.
And if you want a French brasserie feeling, with a classic French dish, well, this is the place to do it. It is generally busy so try to drop by early. Try it with a good red wine, may be a Medoc Bordeaux. And enjoy stereotypical French culture.  And if you are still a bit peckish , L’entrecote proposes a large choice of desserts. Give the profiteroles a go. Real profiteroles, not Tesco ones with the weird white horrible cream in it.

Le macaron aux frambroises fraîches/ Fresh raspberry macaroon – Hotel Costes
239, rue Saint Honoré, 1^er arrondissement  Métro : Opera /Palais Royal/Pyramides

Right for this place I must say, you need to put the flipflops away. Angelina Jolie is a regular and so is Kate Moss. Very hefty priced I hear you say. Well yes. Very much so. But you not only paying for your food (the pink crunchy and sticky shell, the soft-melting in your mouth cream, the fresh bursting with flavor raspberries) , you are paying for the beautiful restaurant with a charming courtyard, the impeccable service and the lovely feeling of treating yourself every now and then. And you know what, I eat a LOT of macaroons, and this one is definitely in my top two (the other one being a pistachio macaroons from Laduree as pistachio is my favorite flavor.). Also try their down to a notch mojito.  So ok you will drop 30 euros for a mojito and a dessert but you’ll enjoy every sip and every bite. But don’t lick the plate, it’s not quite the place.

Burritos, Fajitas, Nachos del Pollo – Mexi  & Co
10, Rue Dante, 5th arrondissement Métro: Maubert-Mutualite / St Michel

I love mexican food. I love it. Well, when I say Mexican food, I do mean mainstream Mexican food (because I know that people while come up to me and say “when I was in Mexico , actually it was…” Blah blah blah, I haven’t been there yet, so in the meantime, I will gorge myself on the Californian version).
Mexi & Co is a tiny, colorful restaurant in the heart of St Michel near the Quartier Latin. You’ll find a very nice selection of Mexican beers and the restaurant doubles as a grocery shop where you can load up in guacamole for your next fiesta.
Nothing to do with the Hotel Costes, here, you eat on the same table that your neighbors and help yourself for drinks in the fridge.  It’s a very simple menu and you can get a filling meal for 7euros.
Try their awesome pitchers of Margarita.
It is a perfect place to spice up your visit in Paris with a bunch of friends, before moving on to the many bars in the Quartier Latin.

This could be one of my favorite food day. Lunch at Le relais de l’entrecote, goûter (that’s how we call our afternoon snack. 'goo-té') at L’Hotel costes, then meeting friends at Mexi & Co. Not really diet kind of day, but you only live once. Go for a run along the Seine (the river in Paris "FYI") or in the Jardin des Tuileries  the next morning to burn it off.