Le Mabillon - Paris — Restaurant in Paris

This is a long one and hard to believe but an absolute real life nightmare.

Served us rotten escargots and at first didn’t want to give me another until I said that was ridiculous. They came and the first snail was good but the tongs they gave me were so broken and old I could not hold the escargots shells making them impossible to eat. I have ate escargots every night in Paris and never had a problem with freshness or working tongs. When I requested that I have tongs that work and that my son still hasn’t received his food the server literally threw the tongs on my table and said ‘applaud.’ Being from Canada I can understand French for the most part so I got the message loud and clear. I still could not eat the escargots because now I had two broken tongs. My six year old son waited over an hour for pasta that never came. We were served drinks when we arrived and then waited an hour with no refills or water. We got up and left. They called 911/police and told them that we dashed on a $150 euro bill when we were only served escargots we couldn’t eat, calamari, one beer and one Campari for over an hour without being checked on. They called us fat Americans and that this isn’t fast food. I’m Canadian; and have experience in French food and also owned a restaurant. We waited for the police to come and the police said ‘in France we speak French;’ and said my ID was fake because it is from a province in Canada and wanted to put me in handcuffs. They told us to ‘go back to England’ even though we’re from Canada. When we were escorted by the police back to the restaurant to pay our bill we demanded our food for our boy and the police said ‘didn’t you get your food already?’ That’s right folks. Almost thrown in jail over rotten escargots, food never served to us and horrible service. The other tourists around were mortified; and some in tears; that this could happen and couldn’t believe how awful we were treated… they screamed and yelled and lied to the police right in front of my six year old boy. I owned a restaurant and would never ever leave a table there for an hour without checking on them. I have to say this may be the worst and disgusting behaviour I have ever experienced in my dining life. You cannot make children wait that long and treat someone like an idiot and throw utensils at them and expect them to sit there and take it. To the manager and server; I hope you’re ashamed of yourselves and wonder how you can sleep at night. Absolute scum...

Was really excited for this place as I was passing by and it was always crowded. We managed to get a place for 6 people. The bouncers were reluctant to enter as we weren’t dressed up for the restaurant but the manager let us in. Once we got in we were seated at our table right away but it took about 40 minutes to get a drinks menu after we tried flagging the server down many times. Once we ordered, the drinks took a bit to come out. The drinks were okay as it looked fancy and had fancy names but the substance just consisted of cheap alcohol. I had a gin and tonic but the alcohol just consisted of Hendricks gin. We ordered some beers along with some ciders and wine but it wasn’t worth the hype.

After having our first drink we tried to get the servers attention several times but no one came to check on us or take our second order. My friend went up to the waiter and told him that we weren’t receiving the best service and that we would like a menu. We were presented with the bill and we were asked to leave. When we persisted, the bouncers were called on us and we were forced to leave. We weren’t aggressive but we were still forced to leave. I have never experienced this kind of service before. I believe that because we were tourists we had different treatment. The servers continually looked after the locals and all the tourists were left behind.

Overall, I don’t recommend anyone to come to this restaurant. There is preferential treatment from the servers. They are rude and have no customer service. If I could give it negative...

We were very happy to have found this place so near our Air BnB in Saint Germain. We arrived to Paris in the evening and were concerned about being able to find a vegan friendly place to eat since Abattoir Végétal was closed down.

Le Mabillon was very accommodating and our waiter was patient and helpful in cobbling together a lovely dinner for us.

We had the lettuce hearts, avocado with vinaigrette (a perfectly ripe hass), haricot verts and the linguine al'arrabbiata "sans fromage" (without cheese). Our waiter was also conscientious in letting us know that the avocado vinaigrette had egg in it and brought us delicious olive oil and basalmic vinegar as a dressing. (The olive oil really was excellent).

The pasta and haricot verts were consistently cooked to perfection (we ate here a few times since it was so comfortable, convenient and good) and the lettuce hearts are a substantial serving of good quality greens.

The Chablis here was hands down the best white wine we had in Paris, which is saying a lot, and the bio Cote du Rhone was also fantastic.

The only thing I wouldn't recommend is the guacamole & chips. The chips are flavored (like a mild dorito) and the avocado used for the guac isn't as good as the hass avocado you get when you order it as a stand alone dish.

This is an easy going, comfortable place that is friendly and great for people watching. Many thanks to Mabillon for making us feel at home and feeding us so well...