Le Bistrot d'Henri — Restaurant in Paris

OH MY GOSH! Our favorite of the favorites!!! Our friends recommended we try Le Bistrot d'Henri on our trip to Paris and we are so glad we made it! The most charming bistro! It's tiny and full of life and amazing food. The staff (owners?) made us feel so very welcome from the first second we entered the establishment. Make sure you have a reservation, they fill up quickly and tables do not stay empty for long. Honestly, I wish I could give this 10 stars! It was quite a surprise when they had to pull the table out in order for my husband to have a seat, but it was also quite fun to almost share dinner with your neighbor. You can't help but to strike up a conversation and you definitely get a peek at other dishes. We ordered red wine and a white wine spritz which was so refreshing! We kept our tradition of ordering snails with each dinner and they were so tasty. My husband ordered the bone marrow and said it was divine - me, I'll take his word for it - not my idea of delicacy. LOL. His Beouf Borguingnon was tender and delicious. So much so, that I was inspired to order it at another restaurant later in the week, but, alas, it wasn't close to competing with this stuff. I had the Chateaubriand with green pepper sauce and my, oh my, oh my! When I say I wanted to lick the plate, please believe me! I had to hold myself back! The meat was perfectly cooked at medium rare and perfectly seasoned. The sauce was delightful and the little explosions of crunchy peppercorns had me digging for more of them. This is a staple on our list of recommendations and future visits. You will fall in love...

The 2 stars is only for the food - if you do choose to dine here, I recommend the beef bourguignon as that was the only highlight of our experience.

The disappointing service and experience included: Being seated at an extremely cramped table right next to the front door, which customers consistently bumped into the back of my partners chair when opening the front door Immediately being told to “sit down” when I attempted to request to move - I did not even finish my sentence (there was an empty table inside when we walked in) Waiting over 15mins for someone to notice us and take our order, and then the waiter scoffing loudly and making a weird face when we told him we didn’t want to order wine Having to go up to the staff to request the bill, as we waited over 15mins after finishing the meal, but then being told to wait as the bill “wasn’t ready and they’re going to write all the bills now” Had to go back up to staff again after waiting another 10mins and still no attention It is so cramped inside that the waiter accidentally broke a wine glass from another table when walking to our table with the card machine, which left us waiting another 5mins until he returned It took about 30mins to pay which was shocking

Overall, a really disappointing experience and we would not return. The space is extremely tight and the service is not friendly, but desperately lacking. We felt unwelcome and sometimes...

This place single-handedly convinced me that Paris has some of the most underwhelming food in the world.

The owner was quite the character—very condescending and constantly coughing near our table since we were seated right by the register. Every time a tourist walked in, he made it clear he was annoyed, complete with exaggerated sighs.

At one point, the table next to us ordered a Coke, and he erupted, berating them for five minutes about how it's not the "Parisian way" to drink it with a meal. They understandable got up to just leave the awful experience behind them, but the owner had to have the last say and yelled at them as they left. Honestly, I don’t care about the etiquette; what really bothered me was how he ruined the atmosphere for everyone around.

We ordered the beef tartare and duck confit. Let me tell you, if this is what French cuisine is about, they might be playing a long-running prank on the rest of the world. The duck confit tasted like it had been microwaved, and the beef tartare was nothing like I’ve had before—more like ground beef with raw onions and an overwhelming amount of cumin.

I can only imagine that if we visited on a day when the owner wasn’t running the show, we might have had a better experience. Unfortunately, we got stuck with the most insufferable restaurant owner, which really...