[2023 Picks] Best Lunch in Paris | Where to Eat

The best lunch in Paris depends mainly on the experience you are looking to get. A range of bistros and restaurants in Paris cater to every taste, budget, vibe, and experience. Whether you are in the mood for authentic French cuisine, fine dining, or casual dining, the selections of quality restaurants are plenty.

Traditional French lunches are light meals, often served with salads containing meat, fish, cheese, and salad served in restaurants between 12 – 02:00 pm.

It’s important to note that restaurants in Paris offer fixed menus for lunch, or “formule.” These fixed menu items include a couple of items on the à la carte, which is generally cheaper than if you order the items individually. The formule, or fixed menu, is essentially a combination of an appetizer + a main dish or a main dish + a dessert.

We list some of our favorite lunch spots in Paris below, plus other restaurants depending on your vibe and taste.

1. Le Bistrot Flaubert

Address: 10 Rue Gustave Flaubert, 75017 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

Initially founded by Michel Rostang in the 80s, this cozy bistro with flea market furnishings was acquired by renowned chef Nicolas Baumann. Its Asian twist on French bistro cooking has become a popular lunch restaurant in Paris. Our favorite item on the menu is the Korean beef tartar with avocado whipped sauce and puffed rice, and pasta with snails served with rabbit confit, red curry, and kimchi.

2. L’Arpège

Address: 84 Rue de Varenne, 75007 Paris, France | map

Vegetarian meals cooked by three Michelin-star chef Antoine Passard are rare in Paris. It’s a lovely lunch spot in Paris whether you are a vegetarian or not (although there is fish on the menu). The chef sources ingredients from his organic vegetable farm, and everything on the menu depends on available supplies. Passard is a talented chef with a bounty of gardening dishes, including ravioli with ratatouille sauce infusions of purple basil topped with puff pastry with baby peas, turnips, and snow peas in the center.

3. La scène

Address: 32 Av. Matignon, 75008 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

Chef Stéphanie Le Quellec’s glamorous subterranean kitchen feels like a luxurious railroad car. The chef works on the front end with an open theatre-like kitchen, which adds to the unique experience and qualifies this restaurant as one of the best restaurants in Saint Germain de Prés. Quellec’s inventive and innovative take on French gourmet cuisine features an extensive menu that includes poached langoustine that comes in a bag containing buckwheat and white meat. Other items include veal sweets that are topped with roast cauliflower and harissa.

4. Chez Aline

Address: 85 Rue de la Roquette, 75011 Paris, France | map

One of the best restaurants for lunch in Paris if you are looking for something quick. Chez Aline is famous for its crunchy fresh French bread, super tasty seasonal ingredients, and daily changing specials. The sandwiches are prepared to order in front of you, and you get to pick exactly what goes in them. The ingredients range from the traditional (yet exceptional) “prince de Paris” ham, or comté, to more original “pickled veal tongue” or marinated haddock. Whether you dine or take away, their sandwich offer is enriched by snacks like oeufs mimosa (mayonnaise eggs) or salads.

5. L’As du Fallafel

Address: 34 Rue des Rosiers, 75004 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

If you want good falafel, come here. The portions, the ingredients, and, most importantly, the falafel are delectable. The lines will be long, indicating that this is the best joint in Paris. You won’t be disappointed, and it’s worth the wait (and weight).

All of the ingredients were so fresh and tasty. The spicy sauce they gave you the option of topping the falafel off with was a nice touch to cap all of the other ingredients perfectly. I’d never eaten eggplant with any falafel I’d eaten before, but I found it to be excellently mixed in.

6. Massale

Address: 5 Rue Guillaume Bertrand, 75011 Paris, France
Restaurant Menu

Massale is a modern seasonal restaurant in the fashionable 11th arrondissement, offering incredibly reasonable meal options. For its lunch menu, €22 allows you to choose between three appetizers, three main courses, and two dessert courses daily. A light and spacious dining room is ideal for these modern dishes.

7. Freddy’s

Address: 54 Rue de Seine, 75006 Paris, France | map

The nearly walking rue de Seine contains several restaurants but none more welcome to lunch than Fréddy. The wine bar offers lunchtime prix fixe all week long and features a wide variety of good small plates changing seasonally. Choose from a delicious selection of wines for a meal.

8. Le Nemrod

Address: 51 Rue du Cherche-Midi, 75006 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

Le Nemrod is a traditional French café with a huge patio and top croquet spot in Paris. Instead of traditional croque-monsieur—a sandwich of ham, cheese, and béchamel served on sandwich bread— choose a Croque-poilain, a sandwich of open-face on artisanally made country bread.

9. Restaurant Omar Dhiab

Address: 23 Rue Hérold, 75001 Paris, France | map

This earth-tone restaurant close to Place des Victoires at Les Halles is elegant but relaxed, with a parquet floor and walls topped with oak and roses. Chef Omar DABI welcomes visitors to “Kakarkadé,” a popular Egyptian hot hibiscus drink. He uses chickpeas, lentil water, and orange blossom to create suave French cooking. The menu includes cooked lamb with Jerusalem artichoke miso, grilled zucchini with shrimp, pistachio pesto, and beef fried in tomato sauce with green pepper and sardines.

10. L’Assiette

Address: 181 Rue du Château, 75014 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

Paris remains one of the finest culinary destinations for discerning people like David Rathgeber. He has taken up the famed local restaurant that had previously been managed by flamboyant Chef Lulu and charmed former President François Mitterrand and other celebrity chefs. A lighter selection of dishes is also available, including seabream tartare with green tomatoes, coriander jus, cuttlefish carbonara, etc. For dessert, the crème caramels are epic.

11. Mosuke

Address: 11 Rue Raymond Losserand, 75014 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

After years of detention, young chef Mory Sacko became one of the best chefs in 2020 for the innovative and fascinating African French Japanese cuisine. He was born into an Italian family in France and spent his childhood eating a variety of African cuisines from his mother. At a job in a central hotel in Paris, Sacko found himself fascinated by cooking and worked for two Michelin-starred chefs Pierre Marx, a Japanese-based chef who taught him the importance of Japan.

12. Joséphine Chez Dumonet

Address: 117 Rue du Cherche-Midi, 75006 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

This bistro has an impressive collection of woven lace curtains with stained glass partitioning walls and bent wooden chairs. Boeuf bourguignon is the most famous city dish ever. The food is a testament to the gallic genius and calls for slow-simmering meat to make the sauce taste incredibly tasty. You must make reservations ahead, and remember a Grand Marnier dessert too!

13. Juvenile

Address: 47 Rue de Richelieu, 75001 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

This friendly wine bar and bistro are the best places to buy French comfort foods and an exceptional wine bottle without wasting time by booking three months in advance. The pub is now occupied by the wife of Margaux Roudeau’s French husband, Romain Roudeau.

Roudeau is in the kitchen while Johnston is in the dining room directing the team to a gallic gastro-food experience.

14. La Bourse et La Vie

Address: 12 Rue Vivienne, 75002 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

Chef Daniel Rose’s second Paris restaurant has grown into a vital bistro. He presents excellent versions of rock-of-ages French meals people crave. His exquisite foie gras de canard sits in a fresh Artichoke heart with a sprinkle of shallot vinaigrette, an exquisite detail. Do not miss this collier agneau provençal (braised lamb neck style provençal).

15. L’Huîtrerie Régis

Address: 3 Rue de Montfaucon, 75006 Paris, France | map

A minuscule, white-painted raw bar in Saint-Germain is one of the pearls serving the finest bivalves. The owners receive the shipment daily from pedigreed producers from Frances Maritime – Normandy. Start with smoked scallops, then eat a dozen oyster shells before finishing with a runny chocolate tart.

16. Menkicchi

Address: 41 Rue Sainte-Anne, 75001 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

The restaurant is located in the heart of the city, halfway between Opera Garnier et Museum du Louvre. Visit the very popular Menkicchi to enjoy gyoza and some great ramen. Regulars love LeSpece ramen, with stuffed noodles with rich pork bouillon and topped with fried eggs with a piece of pork beef and seaweed.

17. Le Maquis

Address: 53 Rue des Cloys, 75018 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

This laidback neighborhood bistro draws a discerning crowd of locals and word-of-mouth consumers from other parts of Paris. Many dishes at this restaurant have Southern French / Italy accents including excellent homemade pasta dishes and ceviche topped up with poutargue sliced into strips.

18. Prunier

Address: 16 avenue Victor Hugo, 75116 Paris France | map

Founded in 1872 by Albert Prunier, the restaurant near the Arc de Triomphe has always reflected French sophistication and Paris’ avid love of the finest seafood. The new owners hired Chef Yannick Alleno to revamp the restaurant’s menu after his career at Ledoyen.

19. Restaurant David Toutain

Address: 29 Rue Surcouf, 75007 Paris, France | map
Restaurant Menu

David Toutain first impressed Paris at Agapé Substances, Saint-Germain. The restaurant is also the place for the best-tasting menu of Paris – which vary daily from 70 to 250 euro. Try grilled foie gras in mashed potatoes bouillon with black truffles.