In a city full of amazing food, narrowing down a to-eat list can be quite difficult. Septime, however, should be at the top of your Paris list. If you’re planning a trip to Paris, make your reservations in advance. Run by Passard- trained chef Bertrand Grebaut, this one Michelin Star restaurant was by far the most memorable meal we had in the city and is rumored to be JAY Z and Beyonce’s favorite restaurant in Paris. Bertrand describes his cooking style as “naïve, spontaneous and balanced” focusing on simple seasonal ingredients and French cooking techniques.
The menu changes every day with dishes that live for no more than a week. Septime’s menus are date stamped and broken down into three choices of starters, three main courses, a cheese plate and two desserts. Each dish consists of no more than three main ingredients. You can either order a la carte or opt for Carte Blanche where dishes will be selected for you by chef Bertrand and his trained chefs which I highly recommend.
In addition to Septime, Bertrand has added two more restaurants to his empire – Clamato and Septime La Cave. Clamato is a seafood restaurant with a new take on seafood dishes. Like its sister restaurant, the menu also changes every day. Septime La Cave is more of a wine bar than restaurant serving small simple sharing plates and wine. Order the lardo di colonnata or full fat ham with a glass of wine.
While we waited for our table, we went HAM on full fat ham, lardo di colonnata. SO GOOD.
Our first dish consisted of sweet creamy sea urchin, pickled white asparagus, a frothy watercress sauvignon and roasted macadamia nuts. This was one of my favorites and I savored each and every bite.
Next, toasted brioche with lardo, clams and Swiss chard. The clams were sweet and tender gently cooked with crunchy Swiss chard. The toasted brioche was light and crispy soaking up the natural juices of the clams.
My least favorite dish was the St Pierre, a white fish served with thin slices of turnip, wilted spinach, bits of grapefruit, parsley puree, olive oil and a blood orange reduction. The fish was a slightly tough, but the vegetables were perfectly cooked and saved this dish.
The Galicia Spanish steak was served with smoked Belgium endives and a spring onion, garlic, and nettles puree. The steak was slightly on the chewy side but had a ton of flavor. The endives were perfectly cooked, tender and super buttery.
Our cheese plate consisted of different types of goat’s cheese.
The pear, rosemary and olive oil sorbet was sweet, delicious, and refreshing. I wanted more!
The meal ended with an amazing caramelized smoked orange with pepper ice cream and olive oil cake sprinkled with orange zest. The olive oil cake was incredibly moist with a nice citrus kick from the smoked orange and orange zest. The ice cream was amazing with subtle hints of pepper.
Septime
80 Rue de Charonne
75011 Paris
France
p: +33 1 43 67 38 29