There’s so much to love about Paris: the history, the architecture and, of course, the cuisine. The 13 Wine Spectator Restaurant Award winners below enhance the magic of French dining with stellar wine programs that match the grandeur of the city. Whether you’re attending the 2024 Summer Olympics or planning to finally see the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre in person, you’ll find that these establishments—from a family-owned bistro to high-end hotel eateries—shine bright in the City of Light.
To discover more wine-and-food destinations around the world, see Wine Spectator’s more than 3,500 Restaurant Award–winning picks, including 26 award winners in France and the more than 90 Grand Award recipients worldwide that hold our highest honor.
Do you have a favorite you’d like to see on this list? Send your recommendations to restaurantawards@mshanken.com. We want to hear from you!
Epicure
Le Bristol Paris, 112 Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré
Telephone (33) 1-53-43-43-40
Website oetkercollection.com/hotels/le-bristol-paris/restaurants-bar/epicure
Grand Award
One of Paris’ best-known restaurants, Epicure sits inside the famed Le Bristol hotel neighboring the Élysée Palace, the official home of French presidents since 1848. The hotel and restaurant are also a couple blocks away from the city’s premier shopping avenue, the Champs-Élysées, where you’ll find storefronts for Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Prada and other luxury labels.
What’s on the Menu
Epicure's culinary team puts a modern spin on dishes firmly grounded in French cuisine—think macaroni stuffed with black truffles, artichokes and foie gras, or lemon-thyme langoustines served with an onion-mango condiment. As of spring 2024, Arnaud Faye leads as executive chef for Le Bristol, including Epicure, taking over from previous chef Éric Fréchon.
Wine List Highlights
Head sommelier Benjamin Formé manages the wine list, which is largely French save for a few pages of international labels. Burgundy is the strongest focus, with nearly 200 grand cru reds alone. Additional highlights include choice bottlings from Bordeaux, Champagne and the Rhône Valley. Collectively, there are some 5,000 selections representing 110,000 bottles in the cellar. Notably, each of the hotel’s restaurants has its own cellar to avoid disturbing the wines with excess movement.
Le Taillevent
15 Rue Lamennais
Telephone (33) 1-44-95-15-01
Website letaillevent.com
Grand Award
Named after Guillaume Tirel (better known by his nickname Taillevent), the 14th-century chef largely credited with writing the first French cookbook, Le Taillevent carries on a long tradition of French fine dining. André Vrinat opened the restaurant in 1946, and his family owned Le Taillevent until 2011, when it was purchased by the Gardinier family. Nearly 80 years since its opening, Le Taillevent remains at the top of its game, having held a Restaurant Award since 1984—longer than any other winner in Paris.
What's on the Menu
Chef Giuliano Sperandio serves seasonal French dishes with distinctive touches, such as lobster flambéed tableside with peated whisky, John Dory cooked directly over the coals and seasoned with sea herbs, and lamb navarin (a traditional stew) with seasonal vegetables. Several tasting menus (from $123 to $368) are also available, each served to the entire table. Be sure to save room for the crêpes suzette, which are flambéed tableside and accented with pistachios and orange blossoms.
Wine List Highlights
Wine director Paul Robineau oversees the primarily French cellar, which comprises more than 300,000 bottles. The Bordeaux and Burgundy sections are particularly notable, with vintages of Château Latour dating to 1918 and more than four dozen from Domaine de la Romanée-Conti. Le Taillevent also excels with picks from Alsace, Champagne, the Loire Valley, the Rhône Valley and other French regions, with extensive selections from Jean-Louis Chave, Didier Dagueneau and Domaine Tempier.
Tour d’Argent
15 quai de la Tournelle
Telephone (33) 1-43-54-23-31
Website tourdargent.com
Grand Award
On the banks of the Seine overlooking the Notre-Dame cathedral is one of France’s most famous restaurants: Tour d’Argent. Said to have inspired Pixar’s beloved film Ratatouille, the establishment is also home to a Grand Award–winning wine collection; it is, in fact, the largest restaurant wine program in Paris, with some 14,000 labels representing a cellar exceeding 320,000 bottles. With panoramic views of the city and distinctive Baron Haussmann interiors, the restaurant offers a quintessentially Parisian dining experience.
What’s on the Menu
Chef Yannick Franques has developed a classically French menu that has all the mainstays you’d expect, but it varies from season to season to keep things fresh and innovative. Starters include caviar, escargot and foie gras and main dishes feature langoustine, blue lobster and smoked chicken. Famed for its pressed duck (Tour d’Argent had served well over 1.1 million of them as of fall 2023), the restaurant currently showcases a few different preparations on its menu, including the traditional version, a second two-person option prepared two ways and a seasonal offering.
Wine List Highlights
In 2018, Victor González took over the wine program from David Ridgway, who had overseen the cellar for more than 40 years. González has since maintained the list’s dedication to collectible French wines, with jaw-dropping gems from Château Lafite Rothschild, Château Latour, Château Mouton-Rothschild and other leading estates.
Vantre
19 Rue de la Fontaine au Roi
Telephone (33) 014-8061-696
Website vantre.fr
Grand Award
The laid-back comfort of Vantre bridges the divide between Paris’ high-end and more casual restaurants. With an intimate dining room evoking a bistro and an expansive wine list, it lives up to its name—Vantre being a word used during the Middle Ages for a “place of enjoyment.”
What’s on the Menu
Chef Satria Vue’s compact menu is traditionally French and has previously featured such dishes as veal tartare with a bouquet of seasonal herbs, grilled red mullet with binchotan charcoal–cooked foie gras, marinated sardine tartlets with tomatoes and gnocchi in sage butter. The brief dessert menu has showcased such tasty concoctions as chocolate mousse with hay ice cream, poached pear with timut pepper ice cream and strawberry sorbet with a cardamom crumble.
Wine List Highlights
Overseen by owner and wine director Marco Pelletier, Vantre’s wine program highlights producers from leading French regions along with a few international selections. Bordeaux and Burgundy are the biggest strengths, followed by Champagne, the Loire Valley and the Rhône Valley. Among the 3,000 wines on the list, representing 45,000 bottles in the cellar, are high-end prestige bottlings as well as a range of wallet-friendly selections. Another draw at Vantre are the dessert wines, including picks from leading wineries like Hungary’s Disznókő.
Le Bon Georges
45 Rue Saint Georges
Telephone (33) 1-48-78-40-30
Website lebongeorges.paris
Best of Award of Excellence
Le Bon Georges is the passion project of chef and owner Benoit Duval Arnould, who has created a Parisian paradise with his fusion of bistro comfort, chef-counter innovation and a Best of Award of Excellence–winning wine cellar. Found in the heart of Paris’ theater district, the 9th arrondissement, Le Bon Georges can be both a pre-show stop and the whole show in and of itself.
What’s on the Menu
Arnould has developed both a bistro à la carte menu, ideal for casual diners at the front of the restaurant, as well as a chef’s counter menu, perfect for guests looking to engage with the kitchen and taste a more experimental selection of up to 10 courses. The bistro and chef’s counter menus are ever-changing, with Arnould and his team preferring to keep the day’s dishes market-driven, but Polmard beef selections are Le Bon Georges staples.
Wine List Highlights
Arnould works with head sommelier Frédéric Sénéchal to maintain the restaurant’s 2,000-label wine list. While the majority of its picks are French, the list shows international variety with bottles from Germany, Italy, Spain, the United States and beyond. The program shows particularly impressive depth in Burgundy and Loire Valley selections, with verticals from Bonneau du Martray and other well-known domaines.
La Cagouille
10 Place Constantin Brancusi
Telephone (33) 1-43-22-09-01
Website la-cagouille.com
Best of Award of Excellence
Open since 1981, La Cagouille is one of Paris’ leading seafood restaurants. Situated in the 14th arrondissement, home to many artists and where the streets are lined with trees and cafés, La Cagouille has a bright and airy terrace with cozy chairs, while inside there’s a dark and sleek dining room with black-and-white photos lining the walls.
What's on the Menu
Alongside a regularly rotating seafood selection, including a fresh catch special that’s handwritten on a board for all to see, La Cagouille offers mainstays such as buttery live-poached langoustines, slow-roasted red mullet and grilled John Dory fillets. For raw fruits de mer, the restaurant serves a salmon salad with roe and a burrata sauce as well as oysters from farmer David Hervé.
Wine List Highlights
Wine director Kang Du manages the seafood-friendly wine program, which shows strength in Burgundy, Champagne and the Loire Valley. Highlights include Domaine Leroy Mersault and Chapoutier’s Ermitage White de l'Orée. There are also plenty of picks for fans of red wine with fish, including Burgundies from Louis Jadot, Left Bank Bordeaux from Château Cos-d’Estournel and Châteauneuf-du-Pape Château Rayas.
Chez Fernand
9 Rue Christine
Telephone (33) 613-339-505
Website restaurantchezfernand.fr
Best of Award of Excellence
In the heart of the historic Saint-Germain-des-Prés quarter, Chez Fernand is a true Parisian bistro, with food described by its team as “traditional France, revisited.” The three vaulted dining rooms feature exposed beams, red gingham tablecloths and sconce lighting. The restaurant is a 10-minute walk from such Parisian attractions as the Shakespeare and Company bookstore, the lush Luxembourg Gardens and the Sainte-Chapelle.
What's on the Menu
Chez Fernand’s menu boasts comforting French classics such as onion soup with Emmental cheese, escargot bathed in garlic butter, beef bourguignon with steamed potatoes and a green bean salad with a mustard vinaigrette. Also on offer are gastronomic gems such as razor clams flambéed with pastis, veal kidneys with a creamed mustard sauce and mushroom ravioli in a thick foie gras sauce. It’s worth mentioning that the menu comes in French and English and that all of Chez Fernand’s servers are bilingual.
Wine List Highlights
With 1,400 labels in the cave, Chez Fernand features big names from across France, in particular Bordeaux, Burgundy and the Rhône Valley. This includes verticals from the likes of Armand Rousseau, Laurent Combier and Château Latour. Wine director Pierre Guignard highlights other French regions on the list too, including Languedoc, the Loire Valley and Provence.
Le Cinq
Four Seasons Hotel George V, 31 Ave. George V
Telephone (33) 1-49-52-71-54
Website fourseasons.com/paris/dining/restaurants/le_cinq
Best of Award of Excellence
Set in the prestigious Four Seasons Hotel George V, Le Cinq is a modern French haute cuisine restaurant that’s refined at the highest level. With an opulent dining room featuring large columns, lavish moldings and crystal chandeliers, the establishment is known for combining classic French cuisine with modern gastronomic techniques for mouthwatering results.
What’s on the Menu
Across his 10-course “Epicurean Escape” tasting menu and à la carte offerings, chef Christian Le Squer spotlights French produce, much of it sourced from his native region of Brittany. Standout dishes include line-caught sea bass with caviar, poached foie gras in an iodized broth, coffee-and-passion fruit–scented black pudding and Dublin Bay prawns with warm mayonnaise and (in true Breton fashion) buckwheat pancakes.
Wine List Highlights
Wine director Eric Beaumard oversees the 2,800-wine program, which encompasses some 44,000 bottles. The primary focus is on Burgundy, but there are also choice wines from Alsace, Bordeaux and Champagne in France, as well as gems from Germany, Portugal, Spain and Italy’s Tuscany and Piedmont regions. For those looking for a particularly special find, the oldest bottle in the cellar is a 1792 Madeira.
Le Clarence
31 Ave. Franklin D. Roosevelt
Telephone (33) 01-82-82-10-10
Website le-clarence.paris
Best of Award of Excellence
From the family behind first-growth Bordeaux Château Haut-Brion and Clarence Dillon Wines, Best of Award of Excellence winner Le Clarence boasts a Bordeaux-led wine list of more than 1,300 selections. Owner Prince Robert de Luxembourg himself oversaw the decoration of the restaurant’s several opulent dining rooms, which all overlook tranquil estate gardens. Housed in an elegant 19th-century mansion, this historic dining destination is also a stone’s throw from La Galerie Dior and the Grand Palais (which will host some of the Olympic events) and central to many of Paris’ famous sites.
What's on the Menu
Chef Christophe Pelé has been the head of Le Clarence for almost a decade, defining the cuisine as creative and market-driven. Rather than setting a fixed menu, Pelé and his team regularly change the dishes based on what seasonal ingredients inspire them. Seafood often takes center stage, and past appetizers have included mini brioches with burrata and caviar and fried baby octopus with barley pearls cooked in cuttlefish ink. Among past entrées, Pelé has served mussels gratin with pistachio sauce and seared scallops with smoked tuna and a broccoli rabe emulsion.
Wine List Highlights
Along with Haut-Brion, the Clarence Dillon portfolio also includes Bordeaux’s Château La Mission Haut-Brion and Château Quintus—all of which are served at Le Clarence. The wine program is divided into two lists: The first is exclusively wines from Clarence Dillon, with selections direct from its estates, including a 26-bottle vertical of Haut-Brion. The other list focuses primarily on some of France’s most celebrated terroirs, including more Bordeaux wines as well as picks from Burgundy, Provence and the Rhône Valley.
Drouant
16-18 Rue Gaillon
Telephone (33) 1-42-65-15-16
Website drouant.com
Best of Award of Excellence
Owned by the Gardinier family, hoteliers originally from Champagne, Drouant is a library, art gallery and restaurant all rolled into one. Centuries-old first editions and manuscripts line the walls of the restaurant’s art deco dining rooms, along with frescoes and paintings from both Italian and French masters. Found in the trendy 2nd arrondissement, known for its vibrant street markets and historic cinemas and art houses, this Best of Award of Excellence winner caters to those thirsting for both wine and culture.
What’s on the Menu
Head chef Romain Van Thienen has designed brunch, lunch and dinner menus that fuse Parisian bistro standards with seasonal inspirations. Notable starters include candied lemon–topped smoked salmon on blinis with Isigny cream, crispy langoustines with a spicy cream sauce and escargot with herbed brioche toasts. For entrées, look to classics such as steak frites with béarnaise sauce as well as seafood options such as grilled cod with zucchini flowers. For dessert, special attention is paid to a shareable madeleine dish, complete with chocolate sauce, whipped cream and jam.
Wine List Highlights
Head sommelier Guillaume Sicsic runs the wine program, which features one of the largest collections of Rhône wines in Paris, with approximately 1,300 Rhône labels out of the restaurant's 2,000 overall selections. This includes unparalleled verticals from domaines in Châteauneuf-du-Pape, Côte-Rôtie, Côtes du Rhône, Gigondas and Hermitage. Bottles abound from the rest of France’s winegrowing regions as well, with Bordeaux and Champagne also strongly represented.
L’Ecrin
10 Place de la Concorde
Telephone (33) 1-44-71-15-17
Website rosewoodhotels.com/en/hotel-de-crillon/dining
Best of Award of Excellence
Next to the famed Place de la Concorde, L’Ecrin sits inside an 18th-century palace that operates today as Hôtel de Crillon; the hotel underwent an extensive four-year renovation before reopening to the public in 2017. L’Ecrin frequently hosts dinners with winemakers as well as “sensory dinners” designed to evoke all five senses. Bookable for private events, the restaurant’s La Cave space features a candlelit table surrounded by glass-enclosed racks of wine from L’Ecrin’s 38,000-bottle inventory.
What’s on the Menu
Executive chef Boris Campanella calls on local and seasonal produce for his Italian- and French-influenced cuisine. There are no set menus, but rather five- and seven-course customized culinary experiences (starting at $230) where guests choose a wine and that selection ultimately influences what food they’ll receive. So while the final dishes will be a surprise, the restaurant works with ingredients such as foie gras, blue lobster, Madagascar chocolate and snails from Touraine, France.
Wine List Highlights
Wine director Xavier Thuizat’s program focuses primarily on France, excelling in Burgundy and the Rhône Valley, with nearly 200 Champagnes and an incredible collection of Bordeaux. There are 2,300 selections available, including by-the-glass offerings from Burgundy’s Michel Redde and Lucien Le Moine. Guests can also expect half-bottles from leading Bordeaux estates and dozens of large-format selections.
Le Gabriel
La Réserve Paris Hotel and Spa, 42 Ave. Gabriel
Telephone (33) 1-58-36-60-66
Website lareserve-paris.com
Best of Award of Excellence
Le Gabriel is found inside the opulent 19th-century La Réserve Hotel and Spa, which is just off the bustling Champs-Elysées and within equal strolling distance of both the Arc de Triomphe and the Jardin des Tuileries. The hotel’s owner, Michel Reybier, is also the proprietor of Bordeaux second-growth Château Cos-d'Estournel and Hungarian producer Hetszolo.
What’s on the Menu
Chef Jérôme Banctel infuses Thai and Japanese flavors into his French menu. The results have included dishes such as salmon in miso with celery, pigeon from Louvigné (in France’s Brittany region) with fermented turnips and squid tagliatelle with duck juice. Le Gabriel serves three menus: the “Stopover” lunch menu, the seven-course “Trip” menu and the “Journey” menu (more than nine course).
Wine List Highlights
Leading with selections from Reybier’s estates, wine director Gaëtan Lacoste’s list is strongest in French picks, with standout bottlings from Bordeaux, Burgundy, Champagne and the Rhône Valley. The roughly 1,200-wine program, representing a cellar of more than 14,000 bottles, also champions producers from Germany, Spain and Switzerland.
Origines Restaurant
6 Rue de Ponthieu
Telephone (33) 9-86-41-63-04
Website origines-restaurant.com
Best of Award of Excellence
With a dining room washed in midnight blue and velvet touches, Best of Award of Excellence winner Origines Restaurant is a wine sanctuary in the 8th arrondissement, close to art galleries and picturesque parks. Open since 2019, Origines is the first restaurant from acclaimed chef Julien Boscus and it has risen to prominence as one of the city’s hidden fine dining gems.
What's on the Menu
Hailing from Aveyron in the south of France, chef Boscus made a name for himself while working at famed Burgundy-focused, Parisian restaurant Les Climats (a former Grand Award winner, now moving to a new location in 2024) after years of training in restaurants across Paris and Seoul, South Korea. The Origines menu combines rustic flavors with refined ingredients for dishes such as grilled pigeon served with cereal-crusted foie gras, bluefin tuna cut in strips and seasoned with sweet-and-sour beet juice and barbecued Loire Valley white asparagus garnished with trout roe.
Wine List Highlights
Wine director Thibault Souchon has created an expansive wine list that touches every corner of France, with sparkling wines from Alsace and Jura, plush reds from Provence, sweet wines from the Loire Valley and southwest France and much more. Forming the core of the list are hundreds of bottles from Burgundy and the Rhône Valley, with picks from leaders such as Leflaive and Famille Perrin.
Edited by Chris Cardoso, Collin Dreizen, Julia Larson, Olivia Nolan and Megan Tkacy
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