Céline PAVARD

No doubt Céline and Alain Pavard see themselves reflected in “La Bohème,” Charles Aznavour’s hit song in which he sings, “We were young, we were crazy .” Thirty-five years after opening their restaurant in Seine-et-Marne, that’s certainly the only explanation the manager of the Auberge de la Brie can offer when she recalls the early days of this adventure. “I wasn’t even 21 yet, and Alain was barely 25. There was nothing there—just this farmhouse converted into a barn that had caught our eye, and the water troughs were still inside. It wasn’t even a matter of trying to plan for the future, as we say today. You’d have to be completely reckless to imagine opening a restaurant there.”

The mayor didn’t believe in the restaurant’s future

At the time, the village mayor didn’t bet a single cent on their project and even predicted they’d close within six months. He also required them to build a parking lot—an unexpected extra cost for the young restaurateurs, which has since become a valuable asset for the establishment.

“We hung in there, even though I had no experience in the business ,” recalls Céline Pavard. A former pharmacy student, she was funding her studies at the time by leading tours of Champagne cellars. It was during one of these tours that she met the man who would become her husband. Alain, a trained pastry chef, was working at the time at Marc Meneau in Saint-Père-sous-Vézelay.

It was love at first sight. The two young people quickly decided to move in together and set their sights on this Brie-style farmhouse in Couilly-Pont-aux-Dames. They renovated it and opened the Auberge de la Brie there in 1991.

The first three years were quiet. Then an article by Gilles Pudlowski drew attention to this new establishment, and in 1994,Gault&Millau dedicated a double-page spread to it, spotlighting this inn, which was still relatively unknown at the time. “ Overnight, thanks to that article, we entered a whole new level. That magnificent feature—just as our daughter had been born—changed our lives .”

An inn that has become an institution in Seine-et-Marne

Thirty-five years later, the Auberge de la Brie is still run by Céline and Alain Pavard. The couple has chosen to keep capacity deliberately limited—to a maximum of about twenty guests per seating—in order to maintain the quality of their hospitality despite a small dining room staff.

Céline Pavard has also developed a true passion for wine. Today, she oversees a wine cellar of about 350 labels, representing various French vineyards. She specifically cites the work of Françoise Bedel in Champagne and that of Jacques Carillon in Burgundy.

Céline Pavard has not forgotten a single detail of this adventure, which began almost on a whim. The former pharmacy student, now a restaurateur and a leading figure at the Auberge de la Brie, has built—together with Alain—an establishment that, after more than three decades, continues to bring to life the vision they had in their youth: that an old farmhouse in the Brie region could become a world-class restaurant.