5 great chef's bistros to discover

At the dawn of the first spring asparagus, many chefs are not only busy reopening their gourmet establishments. They're also pulling out all the stops to relaunch more accessible offerings served in a bistro or brasserie setting. In Noirmoutier, Alexandre and Céline Couillon's Table d'Elise reopened on February 16. In Montreuil-sur-Mer, Alexandre Gautier has relaunched the stoves of the Anecdote restaurant, as has Dimitri Droisneau, in Cassis, at the Brasserie du Corton.

In Valence, Anne-Sophie Pic has chosen to open the bistro Chez André all year round. "When my husband David Sinapian and I returned to Valence in 1992, there was no bistro. First we had to get the gourmet restaurant back on its feet. There's no denying the economic dimension of such a project. So, in December 1966, we opened the Auberge du Pin to serve Provençal cuisine," recounts the four-toque chef. We werealso aware of the need to diversify our culinary offerings. It's important to remember the context: at the time, gourmet restaurants weren't as popular as they are today, not least because of their prices. Bistronomy was more in vogue".

Here's a look at some of the bistros in France where you can discover a different side of the great chefs.

L'Embarcadère, Georges Blanc

"Eating fried food on the banks of the Saône". That's how chef Georges Blanc sums up the project he had in mind in the late 90s. Half an hour's drive from Vonnas, his gastronomic stronghold, the Meilleur Ouvrier de France visited a no-frills establishment in 2010, which had one undeniable advantage in the eyes of the great chef: it was right on the water. It was a no-brainer: Georges Blanc chose L'Embarcadère to invite his customers to enjoy a convivial meal of local cuisine, including Bresse chicken with cream sauce and Dombes-style sautéed frogs' legs. You can come on foot, or moor your boat all year round. The restaurant is even open every day in fine weather, from June to the end of September.

• 15 avenue de la Plage, 01480 Jassans Riottier
• Read Gault&Millau's review of L'Embarcadère

Corinne Bertrand

La Coulemelle, Régis and Jacques Marcon

To dine at La Coulemelle is to return to the past, where Régis Marcon and his son Jacques won over the critics before the gourmet restaurant was moved further up the hill. Some restaurants have a soul, and not just for what happens on the plate. Here's a sample with this bistro, which assumes its role as such, offering an affordable menu, starting at 32 euros for the main course, cheese or dessert. Open seasonally, the address is popular, as if to better relax its guests, who are welcomed in a family atmosphere. The restaurant's name says it all, and its customers are sheltered under the large hat of this umbrella-like mushroom. A nod, of course, to Régis Marcon's passion for mushroom picking.

• Place de l'Eglise, 43290 Saint Bonnet le Froid
• Read Gault&Millau's review of La Coulemelle

Laurence Barruel, ©Philippe Barret

André, Anne-Sophie Pic

BecauseAnne-Sophie Pic never forgets where she comes from, since 2016 the Valence chef has dedicated a gourmet tribute to the generation of cooks and chefs who preceded her in her Valence bistro. There's Sophie, her great-grandmother, and her snow eggs with pink pralines. There's André Pic, her grandfather, whose legacy is kept alive by a tasty crayfish tail gratin that his son Jacques Pic reinterpreted himself before his grandfather's death.His son Jacques Pic reinterpreted the recipe, before his daughter Anne-Sophie took it over and taught her how to make a Nantua sauce. In this bistro, Chez André, you open a storybook like a family album teeming with legendary recipes. But this table has had several lives. "Every ten years since it opened in 1996, we've renewed the bistro's culinary concept. We've looked for ourselves. At the beginning, I was in the middle of building my own gastronomic cuisine. I was trying to emancipate myself from my history, culinarily speaking. So I couldn't draw on the past to create the bistro's menu", says the chef.

• 285 avenue Victor Hugo, 26000 Valence
• Read Gault&Millau's review of André

Serge Chapuis, ©GroupePic

Le bistrot du 11, Jean-Baptiste Lavergne-Morazzani

11 for his gourmet restaurant. 11 for its wine cellar. And 11 as in his bistro. Jean-Baptiste Lavergne-Morazzani honors his lucky number in all forms of catering, including those that offer a taste of his talent at a lower cost. Three years after inaugurating his haute-cuisine table, the twenty-something toque completed his hendécagone galaxy in 2017 to satiate customers who weren't quick enough to grab a reservation, if not those who don't have the resources to afford a gourmet dinner. In his bistro, where the two-sequence menu costs 34 euros on weekdays, Jean-Baptiste Lavergne-Morazzani spins the story of his culinary identity, always summarizing his dishes by three ingredients that act as strong markers on the plate. Jean-Baptiste Lavergne-Morazzani will also have to find the right balance between the cost of raw materials and his promise to respect his chef's DNA, when he signs the menu of La Flottille, the historic restaurant in the park of the Château de Versailles, next April.

• 10 rue de Satory, 78000 Versailles
• Read Gault&Milau's review of Le Bistrot du 11

La table d'Élise, Alexandre Couillon

Savor the kind of cuisine you concoct without frills when you return from the market... In December 2007, chef Alexandre Couillon and his wife Céline decided to split their successful gastronomic restaurant in two, to offer their guests from as far away asto the island of Noirmoutier a more accessible experience built around local produce, without missing out on the marine ingredients so distinctive to the chef's cuisine. On the menu monkfish from Noirmoutier, hake from the L'Herbaudière fish market, rillettes of pollack... Deliberately presented as a bistro, Elise's table is a tribute to the island of Noirmoutier.Elise is in fact a tribute to Céline Couillon's maternal grandmother, who cooked behind the stoves of a working-class restaurant in Loire-Atlantique.

• 5 rue Marie Lemonnier, 85330 Noirmoutier en l'Île, France
• Read Gault&Millau's review of La Table d'Élise