The best rated restaurants from the Gault & Millau
The Gault & Millau guide is a very influential French guide for restaurants and hotels in France. It is published every year since the past 40 years and results from Henri Gault and Christian Millau’s wish to promote the “Nouvelle Cuisine”, a concept that intends to go to back to the basics and the essential taste of food. Here are some of their five Toques restaurants, in other words, the best rated ones throughout France.
Named after the favourite symbol of Napoleon, Gault & Millau rates their dishes as “Haute Couture”. It is located near the Pont de l’Alma and its chef, Philipe Labbe offers a creative cuisine with sea spider, pork belly or turbot not to mention the wonderful desserts of the pastry chef François Perret so as to complete the offer of the Shangri-La Hotel, where the restaurant is. The room is said to be very common, a bit like a hotel lobby but fits nevertheless the top-notch performance the chef offers.
- L’Amphytrion, Lorient, Brittany
The place looks like a canteen giving its furniture and decoration but don’t turn your back on it because should this place be one, it would be very high-end! Surprisingly enough, the price tag is actually affordable for a gastronomic restaurant but it all comes down to the chef’s philosophy to get as much people as possible acquainted with the wonders he cooks. Equally, the location which seems odd at first glance (a retail park!) really makes sense. In Brittany, the fish is king consequently the menu puts a great emphasis on it but there is still room available for meat. Try the squab or the veal filet mignon.
- Auberge du Vieux Puits, Fontjoncouse, Languedoc-Roussillon
The restaurant is part of the brand Logis, a network gathering 2600 independent hotel and restaurant owners throughout Europe. It guarantees a certain standard which is easily spotted in the chef’s cuisine Gilles Goujon. To the Gault & Millau reviewer, the latter alone represents the local economy for he works with everybody involved in the catering area from raisers to wine-growers, from the maitre d’ to the oyster farmer and sommelier. Not only he works with them, but he also manages to reveal their own talents quite successfully, making the products the stars of his dishes.
- L’Atelier de Jean-Luc Rabanel, Arles, Provence Cote d’Azur
Jean-Luc Rabanel offers a vegetated cuisine, he loves vegetable and roots and a quick look at his menu will make you love vegetable as well. Everything is mouth-watering and like every good chef in France, he regularly changes his menu in accordance with the seasons (poetically entitled The Emotions of the Moment). The entire world influences his cuisine and he is not afraid to stir together the cultures and countries to make a unique dish like Italy and Thailand with his Tartine which consists of polenta and raw marinated fresh tuna with crunchy vegetable (of course!) and a wild greens soup.
- Les Prés d’Eugénie – Michel Guérard, Eugénie les Bains, Aquitaine
At the heart of a stunning location, the chef offers dishes to die for with inviting titles, each one sounding like a masterpiece. Michel Guérard (one of the most senior chef with three Michelin stars) has been cooking in Eugénie-les-Bains health resort for almost 40 years; in this exceptional French property, he was the first to develop the concept of tasty “healthy cuisine” and is considered one of the founding members of the “Nouvelle Cuisine”. You cannot think about a more perfect place to unwind and forget about everything, it is a peace haven in Gascony and tasting his unique dishes will emphasize the feeling.
- Régis et Jacques Marcon, Saint Bonnet le Froid, Auvergne
This restaurant has been established since 1948, when the chef’s parents decided to settle in Saint Bonnet le Froid. Throughout the years, the chef, Régis Marcon has developed his cuisine by highlighting the different and numerous types of mushrooms the region offers which enables him to propose a different menu depending on the season. Not only the menu changes but also the decoration, the dishes and the linen! By doing so, the chef intends to bring you to his very own world where it is all about the nature and what it has to offer.
- Flocons de sel, Megève, French-Alps
Emmanuel Renaut, who was awarded Best Worker of France and has three Michelin stars, has opened Les Flocons de Sel after a long but rewarding training with some of the best chefs in France and a period at Claridge’s. He came back to Megève to honour his hometown and support the local economy; this added to his cooking leads him to introduce you to a particular savoir-faire, local traditions and a certain art of living: the alpine one. So sit back and indulge with some lightly steamed char or green tea sabayon with glazed apples.
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