Ed Alcock for The New York Times
Clockwise from top left: eating at Le Pantruche; Argentine beef entrecôte at Pulperia; inside Septime; ceviche of bream at Semilla.
Paris is, of course, a walker's city. But which direction to take? And to what destinations? With previously unknown (to me, at least) restaurants as my end points, I started at Notre Dame (essentially the center of town; all time allotments below are from there) and headed in different directions for different lengths of time.
After a few attempts, I found myself drawn toward the Marais and the 11th Arrondissement, where I was eating best. When I walked west, I was disappointed. With one exception, I had to walk north (and usually east) in order to find food that thrilled me.
Here, then, are the four winners.
Septime (35 minutes from Notre Dame)
Especially in daylight, Septime may be the most pleasant Parisian restaurant I know. There are big north-facing front windows; a bright, open kitchen; and simple, beautiful filament bulbs and lamps over tables of rough-hewed wood. The result is an overall glow that quickly becomes internal.
This is among the most successful of a current generation of restaurants that is sometimes called neo-bistro. The cooking is subtle, the food is served leisurely and informally. Lunch is relatively (one needs the qualifier, here in Paris more than most places) inexpensive: 28 euros ($35.60 at $1.28 to the euro) for three courses (for 55 euros you get what is essentially the day's dinner menu of two starters, two main courses and a dessert).
The small lunch and dinner menus change daily. I tried an exciting white asparagus with an anchovy dressing; a fine "salad" of leeks, smoked duck breast and ricotta; and cuttlefish with creamy potatoes and pancetta. These were followed by a nicely done piece of sautéed lieu jaune (pollock) with chard and greens, and the most professionally cooked pieces of chicken — crisp skin, supermoist, well seasoned — that I ate all week. (There were three others.)
Portions were beyond generous; it was only because it was included that my companion and I ordered dessert. That was lucky: a perfect piece of Cantal cheese was served next to a decent Camembert-style chèvre (I am not a fan of goat cheese in general, so it may have been better than that), and a bowl of wonderfully slow-cooked apple with thin raw apple slices and ice cream made from woodruff, a subtle herb, was polished off quickly.
Unsurprisingly, reservations are hard to obtain, which is why we wound up at lunch, and you may well also. Nothing wrong with that.
Septime, 80, rue de Charonne; (33-1) 43-67-38-29; septime-charonne.fr.
Le Pantruche (45 minutes)
Le Pantruche serves bolder, heartier and more traditional food than Septime, and the menu is bigger. Still, the chef has the "right" pedigree (he worked for the famed Parisian chef Christian Constant), and the place is more destination than neighborhood joint. It's in a great neighborhood, too: the Ninth Arrondissement, just down the hill from Montmartre — I think you could literally roll if you were so inclined.
At lunch, Le Pantruche is downright cheap: 18 euros for the day's special, and either a starter or dessert; at dinner it's 34 euros for pretty much any combo of three things on the menu. (There are supplements for some.) Blanquette de veau was a special when I was there (again, for lunch), and since it's a dish I have trouble turning down for purely sentimental reasons, I ordered it. It's not easy to prepare, and they nailed it: tender, creamy, well seasoned, with loads of carrots.
Really, I could have ordered half the menu: there was braised veal breast, another favorite, and lamb shoulder (just writing the words makes me hungry). We settled on coucou de Rennes (a type of chicken), served with vegetable ravioli that outshined the meat by a long shot. (If the dish had been sold as ravioli with a side of chicken, I'd have had no complaints.) For starters, I sampled lobster bisque with a fair amount of nearly raw lobster in it, and that special crab-gut flavor, nicely done, and an ultra-creamy soup of Jerusalem artichokes.
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