I visited Le Bon Georges for the first time in May 2022, and to be honest, I wasn’t super impressed. While I love the mission behind this bistro just steps from Montmartre, which walks the walk of local, top-notch sourcing and has exactly décor one hopes for for restaurants of the genre down to the most adorable plates depicting farm animals, I was put off by the overly Anglo dining room and the exorbitant prices, and I found the food to be disappointing, especially given the aforementioned. But following a recent visit with a friend, I find myself eating my (expensive) words. Sort of.
Let’s start with that first visit, which revealed that some characteristics of this bistro are far from one-offs. Located on a picturesque street corner steps from Place Saint-Georges, le Bon Georges fulfills many of the tropes one associates with a bistro.
Each of the three dining rooms is jam-packed with quaint décor in the form of posters and placards evoking some of France’s best-love products, particularly apéritifs and liqueurs. Tables are jammed quite close together, and as is the case in many bistros, you’ll often find yourself with a stranger’s elbow a bit close to your wine glass.
The chalkboard menu can be found on multiple smaller boards as well as on a massive board lining a wall of each of the dining rooms. It skews fairly meat-heavy, with beef sourced from celebrity butcher Alexandre Polmard. Nearly every dish on the menu is expensive by Parisian standards, but this is where the prices become truly exorbitant. If a lowly pleb wants to try one of Polmard’s dishes, they have to opt for the 28-euro tartare, as I did in 2022.
Friends, don’t.
The steak tartare here, my server explained to me, is a departure from the norm. Polmard’s beef is presented unseasoned, ostensibly so that you can reap the fullest flavor of his “hibernated” beef. But while the quality of this beef was clear, in tartare form, I frankly found it bland, and the sad salad alongside didn’t inspire much confidence either.
The accompanying fries I found fine, but again, nothing terribly exceptional.
Fast forward to my return visit in February 2024. I expected to find much of the same, and in some ways, I did.
The award-winning wine list is just as massive.
The dining room is still bustling – and still filled with mainly English-speaking tables arranged so close together that perusal of the aforementioned wine list proves difficult if not impossible.
And the dishes are just as – if not more – exorbitantly expensive, with no main except for that still-same tartare priced any lower than 38 euros and none of Polmard’s steaks available in any size smaller than a whopping 900 grams.
That said, this time I ordered better, and I could start to see just how le Bon Georges has remained so successful all this time.
We started with a 20-euro lentil salad seasoned with a beautiful walnut oil vinaigrette and loads of fairly lean slices of smoky bacon. A pile of thinly shaved endive lent welcome bitterness to the dish, while marinated red cabbage added a pop of color and some subtle sweetness. It was served just this side of warm, the perfect temperature for fully experiencing all of the textural components of the dish. All in all, it was the ideal way to whet the palate.
I did, however, have my first run-in with the unfortunate service here in this moment, when a basket of grain-studded bread arrived. I inquired as to the grains, and our server was fairly ill-informed and dismissive in his response, which he delivered as he quickly fled our table. He proceeded to ignore us fairly admirably for most of the evening. While I get that a buckwheat allergy is a bit of an oddity, in a restaurant ostensibly so wedded to the origins of its products, I found it strange that there was no one on staff who might be aware of what, exactly, was in the bread.
I soldiered on.
Seeing as we weren’t to encounter any of Polmard’s steaks, we were both tempted by another beefy offering: a 38-euro oxtail parmentier seasoned with Baume de Bouteville, a balsamic vinegar aged in Cognac barrels. It did indeed add some lovely balanced acidity and fruitiness to this dish, which nevertheless felt a bit potato-heavy and meat-poor. To add insult to injury, it was slightly underseasoned, something we quickly rectified to find we enjoyed it even more.
The winner of the night was undoubtedly this wild boar tenderloin, which was served alongside a crépinette filled with boar offal. A base of a silky parsnip purée and a topping of crispy parsnip chips lent a lovely sweet earthiness, while wild boar jus and a lingonberry topping offered the ideal contrasting marriage of richness and acidity.
The boar was perfectly cooked, perfectly seasoned, and honestly was a testament to what great bistro cooking should be. It cost 45 euros and was worth every penny.
We were far too full for cheese, but I couldn’t help snapping a pic of this selection from the Fromagerie Boujon in Thonon-les-Bains, known especially for their selections from Savoie.
I was equally too full for dessert, but I decided to order one anyway. (The sacrifices I make for you folks…)
The behemoth of a chocolate mousse served in a massive cast iron pot was beyond our stomach capacities, so at our waiter’s suggestion, we instead opted for the ile flottante. This bistro classic is typically far from my favorite dessert, pairing airy meringue with rich crème anglaise. Here, it was revisited with a hazelnut custard and a base of Buddha’s hand jam. Crunchy roasted hazelnuts and citrus zest were sprinkled over the top. It transformed what is typically a homey dessert into something refined and worthy of the 14-euro price tag.
If you’re a long-time reader of this website, you know I’m not typically one to harp on and on about prices the way I have thus far. But it feels important, given the bistro genre to which le Bon Georges claims to belong. It ticks some bistro boxes, like the close quarters and aloof service (with the exception of the sommelière, who was lovely). And when the food is good, it’s really very, very good.
So would I recommend it? I think so… but with a few caveats. If you’re looking to celebrate a special occasion, and especially if you’re dining with a large group that likes to share big bottles of wine, big cuts of beef, and gargantuan chocolate mousses, I’d say it’s definitely worth a stop. But if you’re looking for a corner bistro where you’ll be treated just as well if you’re on a budget as if you’re a big (read: American) spender, maybe give it a miss.
Le Bon Georges – 45, rue Saint-Georges, 75009